With Hallam Foe, British director Peter MacKenzie and scripter Ed Whitmore adapt the 2002
roman of the same name, a quirky, bittersweet, coming-of-age psychodrama by Peter Jinks. The character of the title is the 17-year-old son (
Jamie Bell) of a wealthy Scotch businessman father (Ciaran Hinds). Still rattled by the death of his mom (who drowned in a nearby loch), Hallam retreats into a deep-seated fantasy world. He harbors amorous feelings for his new stepmother Verity (
Claire Forlani) until he gradually concludes that she murdered his biological mother. Hallam nonetheless lets himself be seduced into an affair with Verity, and is so repulsed by this transpiration that he flees to Edinburgh. His life turns a corner, however, when he spots - and instantly becomes infatuated with - Kate (
Sophia Myles), a local girl who bears an uncanny resemblance to his mother. After he talks her into giving him a routine job in the kitchen of the hotel that she manages, they become romantically involved, ever so gradually, which spells trouble for Hallam's emotional state by thoroughly overwhelming and confusing him -- and deeper trouble still still when Kate's married lover (Jamie Sives) discovers that Hallam has been spying diligently on Kate from his perch in a nearby belltower.
Ewen Bremner co-stars as the bellhop supervisor at the hotel. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide