The Worst Parents on Film

Cinema has a long and illustrious history when it comes to parents who aren’t perhaps best suited to bringing up their unfortunate offspring. To celebrate the home entertainment release of Can’t Come Out To Play, out on DVD and digital platforms from June 22, 2015 courtesy of Signature Entertainment, we take a look back at some of the worst parents to grace the big screen...

Katherine and Richard (Can’t Come Out To Play)

When it comes to overprotective parents, it doesn’t get much worse than Katherine and Richard (Samantha Morton and Michael Shannon). Their son Andy is in very poor health, and he must stay within his home adhering to the strict instructions of his mother - who also forbids him from having any visitors. When Andy’s new friend Maryann begins visiting and is discovered, Richard is seemingly fine with the visits, but Katherine does not feel the same, and her behaviour grows increasingly erratic...

There are few actors who could be referred to as true icons of the motion picture industry; yet one such actor has achieved the sort of iconic status which eclipses that of his contemporaries. Sir Christopher Frank Carandini Lee, a Knight Commander of the British Empire had been nominated for 30 awards of which he won 22, including the BAFTA Fellowship Award in 2011, the British Film Institute's Fellowship award in 2013 and in 1995 he was awarded the Bram Stoker Lifetime Achievement Award.

His filmography is extraordinary, having earned a place in the Guinness Book of World Records for being in 281 productions during a span of 70 years. He has played such diverse roles as a spear carrier in a production of Hamlet, the painter George Seurat in Moulin Rouge and so many other performances that just to list them would take several pages.

“But I don’t want to go among mad people," Alice remarked.
"Oh, you can’t help that," said the Cat: "we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad."
"How do you know I’m mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn’t have come here.” 
(Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland 1865)

The Singular and Extraordinary Tale of Mirror & Goliath (Angry Robot, June 2015) is my first published novel and is best described as a dark adult fairy tale set in a topsy- turvy Victorian period, encompassing fantasy and horror elements. 

The plot, in a nutshell: a little girl is locked inside a grandfather clock. She is rescued by a policeman who becomes her supernatural guardian. The Lord of the Underworld orders his assassin son, Mr Loveheart, to hunt her down because he wants to eat her and absorb her powers. 

The book is played out in Victorian England, Egypt and the Underworld and reveals a variety of unusual and colourful characters, including fraudulent psychics, mesmerists, Jack the Ripper and bewildered Scotland Yard detectives. 

I have explored a lot of themes within the book, but I think, if asked to focus on the most significant, it boils down to three areas: