The tight, claustrophobic confines of a tower block can provide interesting insights into social interaction: and when you place a sniper on the opposite roof, cinema logic states it can only become more interesting. However, James Nunn and Ronnie Thompson’s debut picture is as much concerned with group responsibility as it is with individual relationships.

TOWER BLOCK opens with a brutal murder on its top floor. As doors are closed and bolts locked to the 15-year old victim, the residents sign their own death warrant as a vigilante sniper decides to shoot out some rough justice, trapping them in their apartment hallway. As days go by, no help is forthcoming and the hodgepodge group of tenants, lead by Becky (Sheridan Smith), go to increasingly dramatic lengths to escape their predicament.

…plot holes are positively gaping and innovation on the convention is hardly prolific. Yet this has never been restrictive for horror…

As you might be able to work out from this short synopsis, plot holes are positively gaping and innovation on the convention is hardly prolific. Yet this has never been restrictive for horror, and in an odd sort of way, its orthodoxy allows the film to rattle through the scenes at a thumping pace without losing its audience. This cling to conformity, however, falls apart when it comes to characterisation. The cast feels a little bit like a BBC One take on council estates; the drunk, the drug addicts, the ex-soldier, the abusive mother, the track-suit thug with a jaunty step … all somehow tame and unbelievable.

Lack of edge in character stops any real tension in the group as the situation never really threatens to boil over. Similarly, as a look at social dimensions under stress, TOWER BLOCK’s lack of reality stops any real relevance. Watching, one can’t quite escape the fact that Joel Schumacher’s PHONE BOOTH dealt with similar issues, in similar sniper fashion, but with far more insight and twists.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPRbgK9QSnw