the orphan movie reviews

And when she was bad, she was very, very bad

Isabelle Fuhrman as little orphan Esther.

After seeing “Orphan,” I now realize that Damien of “The Omen” was a model child. The Demon Seed was a bumper crop. Rosemary would have been happy to have this baby. Here is a shamelessly effective horror film based on the most diabolical of movie malefactors, a child.

Pity. Esther is such a bright child. So well-behaved. Her paintings are so masterful. She sits down at the piano and rips off a little Tchaikovsky. So why does her adoptive mother have such a fearful attitude toward her? Could it be because after her arrival, Kate, her new mom, got drunk and almost let her son Daniel drown? Had Max, a darling daughter, but then miscarried a third child? Is an alcoholic trying go stay sober? Just doesn’t like the little orphan girl’s looks?

There is something eerie about her. Something too wise, too knowing, too penetrating. And why won’t she remove those ribbons she always wears? And why does she dress like Little Bo-Peep when she goes to school? Daniel is cool toward her. Max is too young to be sure. Only John, the father, is convinced she’s a bright kid, and blameless in a series of unfortunate events.

Vera Farmiga is at the film’s core as Kate, a onetime Yale music professor who feels she is unfairly targeted by her therapist, her husband and eventually the authorities. Peter Sarsgaard is John, the kind of understanding husband who doesn’t understand a damned thing except that he is understanding. And Esther, the orphan, is played by Isabelle Fuhrman , who is not going to be convincing as a nice child for a long, long time.

“Orphan” hinges on a classic thriller device: the heroine who knows the truth and insists on it, even though everyone is convinced she’s mad and wants to ship her off to rehab or even a mental institution. It’s frustrating to know you’re right when no one can see the truth you find so obvious.

Things happen around Esther. A child falls from a playground slide. A car rolls down a hill. A nun comes into harm’s way. Esther spreads disinformation. She’s secretive. And sometimes she’s so perfect, you want to wring her neck. When it turns out the orphanage has faulty info on Esther’s Russian origins, Kate starts sniffing around in what her husband dismisses as paranoia.

“Orphan” begins like your usual thriller, with Scare Alerts and False Alarms. You know, like a nice, peaceful shot until suddenly the sound blares and something rushes past the camera and — hey, it’s only kids. We even get the old standby where Kate is looking in the medicine cabinet and closes it and ohmigod! — there’s another face in the mirror! But hey, it’s only her smiling husband.

Sarsgaard is well-cast in the role. He looks normal, sounds pleasant and yet can suggest something a little twitchy. Not that he’s evil. Simply that he really should trust his wife more. Really.

How the movie handles the other children, Daniel and Max, would probably have offended Gene Siskel, who had a thing about movies exploiting children in danger. This one sure does. What with the treehouse and the pond and the runaway SUV, it’s amazing these kids are still able to function.

The climax is rather startling, combining the logic of the situation with audacity in exploiting its terror. Yet you have to hand it to “Orphan.” You want a good horror film about a child from hell, you got one. Do not, under any circumstances, take children to see it. Take my word on this.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

• Isabelle Fuhrman as Esther
• Vera Farmiga as Kate Coleman
• Peter Sarsgaard as John Coleman
• Aryana Engineer as Max Coleman
• Jimmy Bennett as Daniel Coleman
• Rosemary Dunsmore as Grandma Barbara
• CCH Pounder as Sister Abigail
• Margo Martindale as Dr. Browning

Screenplay by

• David Johnson

Directed by

• Jaume Collet-Serra

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‘Orphan: First Kill’ Review: The Return of Isabelle Fuhrman as Esther, the Pretend Child Psycho, in an Even More Preposterous Prequel

The Russian bad seed's ability to fake her way into a family isn't even the most contrived element.

By Owen Gleiberman

Owen Gleiberman

Chief Film Critic

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Esther ( Isabelle Fuhrman ), the demon child of the 2009 horror thriller “ Orphan ,” was a 9-year-old psycho freak who dressed like a frumpy Victorian doll and spoke in a Russian accent, which upped the ante on her malevolence by making her seem not just a junior devil but a junior devil from the land of Putin. Movies about monster children go way back (the original one, “The Bad Seed,” was released in 1956), and after “The Omen” and “The Brood” and “Ringu” and so many others, there wasn’t a lot of room left for a pulp horror film like “Orphan” to surprise us. But the movie, in its schlocky blunderbuss way, did have an original twist: Esther was not, in fact, 9 years old — she was a woman in her early 30s named Leena who had a rare hormonal disorder that stunted her physical development. The folly of “Orphan” is that it wasn’t much different from the film it would have been had Esther simply been 9 years old. If you’re going to make the adult-woman-in-a-child’s-body horror concept stick, it needs to be executed with psychology, imagination, and flair, three things that “Orphan” did not have.

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Most critics, like myself, thought it was a dud of a movie, but I guess it’s become a cult film. Thus, 13 years later, here comes “ Orphan: First Kill ,” a prequel to “Orphan,” in which Fuhrman, who was only 11 when the first movie was shot, now really is a grown-up actor pretending to be a child.

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She’s got the same look: the pigtails tied by ribbon, the choker and ruffled 19th-century shirt, and the dour Slavic demeanor, as though she were playing Irina in some cracked version of “Three Sisters.” “First Kill” opens with her busting out of the Saarne psychiatric facility in Estonia, where she discovers and adopts, via the Internet, the image and identity of Esther, a lost child who’s the daughter of Tricia and Allen Albright ( Julia Stiles and Rossif Sutherland). Esther went missing four years ago and has never been found, the presumption being that she was abducted.

The Albrights are a la-di-da clan who fly around in private jets and live in a mansion in the wealthy coastal town of Darien, Conn., where Allen is a painter of some stature and Tricia is a socialite who works the charity circuit. When Esther shows up, with a Russian accent she didn’t have before and an entirely different personality, the assumption is that her years in captivity just sort of…changed her. For a while, the film seems to stretch the power of suggestion to a place of sheer ludicrous insanity, given that whatever shifts in temperament Esther has supposedly undergone, it’s not as if kids change that much physically just because they’re four years older. The idea that the Albrights were so stricken by Esther’s disappearance that they’re willing to accept this girl with the frozen stare as their own boggles all credibility.

Have no fear, though. The film has an explanation. If, like me, you’re a fan of Julia Stiles and were wondering what she’s doing in a potboiler like this one, there’s an answer: The character of Tricia, rather than just being the usual parent/victim/stooge in an attack-of-the-kid-from-hell horror movie, has a devious agenda. She knows what’s going on . Stiles plays her with a frozen frown of her own, a will of iron, and a grand scheme that would explain the whole thing if it weren’t, in itself, preposterous. (It has something to do with restoring Allen’s spirit.) The movie turns into a battle of wits between the calculating mother and the fake daughter, with Gunnar (Matthew Finlan), the Albrights’ teenage son, adding a note of cheesy entitlement worthy of a Trump scion.

Yet what happens is so contrived that it requires even more audience contortions to accept than Esther’s original ruse. “Orphan: First Kill” is draggy and suspense-free. Fuhrman, as before, invests her role with a cold creepiness, but the minimal, haphazard script sticks her with playing Esther as a one-note mascot of terror, somewhere between Freddy Krueger and Leprechaun. If there’s another sequel, I hope it figures out how to make Esther the pretend monster girl into a character with more than one layer.

Reviewed online, Aug. 16, 2022. MPA Rating: R. Running time: 98 MIN.

• Production: A Paramount Players release of an Entertainment One, Dark Castle Entertainment production. Producers: Alex Mace, Hal Sadoff, Ethan Erwin, James Tomlinson. Executive producers: Jen Gorton, Josie Liang, Victor Moyers, Kyle Irving, Leslie Johnson McGoldrick, Daryl Katz, Chloe Katz, Paul Marcaccio.
• Crew: Director: William Brent Bell. Screenplay: David Coggeshall. Camera: Karim Hussain. Editor: Josh Esthier. Music: Jason Robert Brown, Christopher Lennertz.
• With: Isabelle Fuhrman, Julia Stiles, Rossif Sutherland, Matthew Finlan, Hiro Kanagawa, Samantha Walkes.

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Orphan: First Kill Reviews

This movie has no reason to exist, but it works overtime to justify itself, becoming a worthwhile companion piece to the original that must be seen big, loud, and with an audible crowd (or with a group of friends at home on Paramount+).

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Aug 22, 2024

Is this prequel necessary? Absolutely not, but it’s an enjoyable popcorn slasher horror with plenty of truly savage and bloodthirsty moments.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Jul 9, 2024

Orphan: First Kill isn’t as gripping as the original film, but its self-aware tone helps make this prequel better than one might expect.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Jan 4, 2024

Orphan: First Kill is entertaining, and even when it doesn’t compare to the original movie, it’s fun to watch what happens to this family.

Full Review | Sep 8, 2023

While watching Orphan: First Kill, you can't help but feel as if it's being strangled by its own reverence to the original movie. From the 2000s reminiscent cinematography that replicates the cold tones of the 2009 film, to the step-by-step script.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 18, 2023

Orphan: First Kill struggles to find it's footing at first, as a slow plot and poor dialogue make it seem a little drab. However, when the twist kicks in and our actors are allowed to truly take their characters on, it's incredibly entertaining.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Jul 24, 2023

Orphan First Kill doesn’t hold a candle to Orphan. There is no way to say for sure, but there’s a good chance that even the filmmakers were aware of that. So, they didn’t try to match it.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Jul 20, 2023

ORPHAN: FIRST KILL has aspects that feel clever and just on the edge of something, but it’s rather dull and forgettable.

Full Review | Apr 7, 2023

Credit the screenplay for staying a step ahead of us and not being too predictable; ding the director for not delivering a single memorable kill.

Full Review | Jan 31, 2023

Because of poor creative choices and dull direction, Orphan: First Kill is a misfire of a prequel that recycles the same tropes and masks it with a few surprising plot twists.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/10 | Nov 30, 2022

The new twist is glorious, utterly wrong-footing both its audience and Esther and the melodrama that plays out is positively Gothic in its unashamed high-camp absurdity.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 30, 2022

Orphan: First Kill falls into the same overworked template that claims so many horror prequels. It’s working to a conclusion that’s out in the wide open and it fails to do much more than remind you of something you already enjoyed.

Full Review | Original Score: 5.5/10 | Nov 2, 2022

The filmmakers go all out with forced perspective shots, child-size body doubles and gauzy surreality to bring the audience along for the ride.

Full Review | Oct 28, 2022

While Orphan: First Kill can’t match the original film’s stand-out twist (few films can), it’s certainly not for lack of trying.

Full Review | Oct 3, 2022

Its creators understood that the job demands clearing a high bar for crazy, which inspires a go-for-broke pulp energy that’s appealingly ragged.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Oct 3, 2022

Its disparate opening, brusque storytelling, and bad technical decisions make for an unfavorable combination. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 5/10 | Sep 26, 2022

Aimlessly wanders around the same paths its predecessor laid out... [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Sep 26, 2022

If you're looking for a tense and terrifying experience, you better go see “Barbarian”. But if you don't mind a film that's not interested in realism, and instead develops a silly yet fun story, "Orphan: First Kill" works. Full review in Spanish.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Sep 24, 2022

It isn't a horror, horror movie, because the cards are all laid out from the get-go. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Sep 22, 2022

William Brent Bell, a horror film veteran director, handles everything with such ambivalence that the film isn't either irksome or stirring. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Sep 21, 2022

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‘Orphan: First Kill’ Review: Still Slashing After All These Years

Isabelle Fuhrman, who in “Orphan” had to be convincing as a child of age 9, reprises her role 13 years later in this prequel set two years earlier.

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By Ben Kenigsberg

While no classic, “Orphan” (2009) , starring Vera Farmiga and Peter Sarsgaard as parents to a homicidal adoptee, deserves a place in the pantheon of bad-seed thrillers, both for Farmiga’s commitment to the assignment and one jolt so outrageously fatuous it somehow plays as brilliant.

Now there is “Orphan: First Kill,” a belated prequel with a different director (the flat-footed William Brent Bell instead of the first movie’s Jaume Collet-Serra). Looking like it was shot on a cheap video format, it lacks the original’s scares and suavity, apart from an early escape set piece designed to resemble a fluid take. But the sheer derangement of its plot and a bizarre casting gambit make it more interesting than standard straight-to-streaming schlock.

Start with the casting: How could Isabelle Fuhrman, who 13 years ago had to be convincing as a child of age 9, reprise the role in her 20s, on the heels of her acclaimed turn as a monomaniacal college rower in “The Novice” ? Through a combination of doubles, stagecraft and sly tricks with framing and optics — Fuhrman’s face and feet are almost never clearly seen in the same shot — the filmmakers have metamorphosed her within license.

The actress’s resurrection of her murderous character — who here sometimes edges into camp, playing piano with bloody hands or swigging vodka in an airplane lavatory — may be the movie’s most grounded aspect. The plot, set in 2007, follows Leena (as her real name turned out to be) as she worms her way from Estonia to Connecticut, where she impersonates the missing child of an affluent couple (Julia Stiles and Rossif Sutherland).

If “Orphan” was an unlikely showcase for Farmiga, “Orphan: First Kill” gives red meat to Stiles, who plays a protective mother with surprising gusto.

Orphan: First Kill Rated R. Kills, none of them Leena’s first. Running time: 1 hour 39 minutes. In theaters and on Paramount+ .

Orphan: First Kill Review

Esther is back from the dead in this orphan prequel..

Orphan: First Kill will be in theaters and on Paramount+ on Aug. 19, 2022.

William Brent Bell's Orphan: First Kill is a head-scratching prequel on paper that defies its conceptual odds. Writers David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick and David Coggeshall crack a code in Alex Mace's story that somehow subverts expectations despite the plot's reveal in 2009's Orphan. An Estonian mental facility escapee, a con artist's crossing into America, her ruse as a missing girl now found — it's all backstory conveyed in Jaume Collet-Serra's bonkers thriller. Not only that, but the supposed orphan's chameleon trick has been revealed already in Esther's identity. How could Bell recreate all that suspense and obscurity when we already know what's happening? Cleverly and shockingly, the answer is simple: he doesn't.

Orphan: First Kill turns back the clock on Esther despite actress Isabelle Fuhrman aging over a decade, telling about the European jailbird's beginnings in Connecticut. By posing as Allen (Rossif Sutherland) and Tricia Albright's (Julia Stiles) lost daughter, the middle-aged patient suffering from a growth disability assumes her role as a beloved child. It's the same concept of Orphan, which lulls us into a sense of familiarity that's quite aggressively overturned maybe halfway into Orphan: First Kill. A picture-perfect family is manipulated by a criminal who passes as elementary school aged while we watch in disbelief — but Bell's production has more than one wicked trick up its sleeve. The American dream once again shatters, but in a prequel that dissociates as hard as fencing prodigy Gunnar (Matthew Finlan) pushes away his not-actual sister.

Fuhrman's ability to tap back into Esther's childlike mannerisms is on display as the 25-year-old actress has to play 8 years old again, reportedly with minimal digital effects regarding physical attributes. Bell's ability to manipulate Esther's figure using lighting, body doubles, and specific shooting angles keeps Esther deceptively juvenile when Fuhrman's not allowed to break her character's playground costume. A considerable obstacle of Orphan: First Kill is the believability of an already preposterous home invasion scenario, which Bell manages to execute through Hollywood magic. No fancy de-aging technology or deep fakes — Esther thrives thanks to both Fuhrman's portrayal of an American Girl dolly come to life and Bell's transformative filmmaking techniques. It's a welcome return, watching Esther confound and terrorize an affluent household as a knee-high tormentor who coyly smiles and plays puppetmaster with such sociopathic glee.

Care is taken to establish Esther's villainous habits in Orphan, whether that's learning to paint her darkest thoughts in invisible UV blacklight colors or earlier examples of a masterfully diabolical manipulator. Orphan: First Kill functions as an information-packed prequel, but is best when it differentiates itself in unexpected ways. All that relies on the performances of Julia Stiles and Matthew Finlan, when the facade of suburban royalty dissipates in front of Esther's eyes. A stricter tone about Orphan is jettisoned, ensuring Orphan: First Kill feels chaotically ambitious and banana-pants unfathomable. Spotlighting such storytelling wins in detail would require spoilers, so you won’t find further explanation here — but understand that it's a joy to watch Esther, Gunnar, and Tricia tiptoe around each other. Stiles is firing on all cylinders with respect paid to her Dexter role, stoking dangers that aren't pure replications of Orphan.

Bell embraces more of his Stay Alive and Wer styles here, which makes Orphan: First Kill more successful than his recent work on The Boy or Brahms: The Boy II. It's never bluntly horrific but still unnerving in twist-the-knife character developments. Orphan: First Kill feels like an unbridled relic from the ‘90s like James Wan's Malignant , both stab-happy brutal and effectively unhinged as revelations unfold. A war of ruthless wits and betrayal rumbles within the Albright's estate, hardly the opening chapter Orphan fans might predict. It would have been so easy to see precious little Esther tear another marriage apart from within — Orphan: First Kill ditches the easy route, and that's why it's able to feel like fresh franchise advancement while working backward into territories once presumed understood.

Still, there are struggles despite creative freedoms that swing so heroically hard. Rossif Sutherland's warm father prototype feels underplayed as the patriarch coming out of his shell, only to be hurtling towards heartbreak once again. The overall finale feels slight and rushed given the standoff established, as Esther's inferno payoff doesn't wholly equate to the excitement of her predatory behaviors and what transpires. Bell's command as director is suitable but never flourishes beyond adequate shot selection that's so missing the extravagance and sumptuousness that Collet-Serra indulges in his horror projects. Orphan: First Kill is carried by pitch-savvy performances and reckless screenwriting — other aspects struggle, especially before the film reaches overdrive once an explosive twist alters everything.

What’s your Favorite Dark Castle Entertainment horror movie?

Orphan: First Kill justifies its existence by defying expectations of what rules prequels must follow. Isabelle Fuhrman slithers back into the scarred skin of a psychopath grifter who provides insight into her bloodthirsty beginnings, and it's like mortal maturation is not a factor. William Brent Bell has the right pieces to a puzzle that takes a bit longer to solve from a directorial standpoint, but once Orphan: First Kill gets going, its domestic wildness and brash nastiness are an intoxicating scent. Bell honors the anarchy that Orphan's story stands for and does so to his own maniac's rhythm. It’s rarely the prequel anyone could presume, and that's precisely why it'll win over Orphan fans who might have once scoffed at the very idea — let 'em laugh, then prove 'em wrong. Orphan: First Kill is one hell of a startling and uncontainable experience.

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‘Orphan: First Kill’ Review: Isabelle Fuhrman Is Marvelously Deranged in a Prequel That Should Satisfy Fans

Ryan lattanzio, deputy editor, film.

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It’s Estonia, 2007, and the opening sequence of “Orphan: First Kill” assures we are in the realm of a horror movie because it opens with an overheard shot of a car snaking up a mountainous road blanketed in snow. That’s an obvious crib from “The Shining” that horror filmmakers can’t ever seem to resist, and it’s never not a charming genre in-joke in the key of the Wilhelm Scream, an evocative and easy reference filmmakers love to throw in to put us in a chilling mood.

From there, this prequel to the 2009 cult favorite “Orphan,” now directed by William Brent Bell taking over from the first film’s director Jaume Collet-Serra, mostly diverges from such high-minded fare, settling into trashy TV movie vibes for the rest of its twist-laden run time. Despite another marvelously deranged performance from Isabelle Fuhrman (with the actress now 25, at an age closer to her character’s than she was at 10 years old in the original), “First Kill” can’t quite live up to the reputation of the original, beloved for its risible-on-paper plot about a 33-year-old Estonian immigrant able to pass herself off as a 12-year-old due to a pituitary disorder that keeps her proportionally small.

That’s not to say “Orphan: First Kill” doesn’t have its share of thrills, like a violent escape from an Estonian psychiatric facility in which “Esther” (whose real name is Leena) brutally shanks a prison warden before stealing the identity of a missing American girl and heading to the United States pretending to be her. There are less stakes but bigger world-building possibilities this time around now that the audience is in on the reality of Esther’s true identity: She’s a grown woman, not a child, and that comes with complications.

As with 2009’s “Orphan” starring Vera Farmiga and Peter Sarsgaard, Esther again targets a grief-addled couple, Allen (Rossif Sutherland) and Tricia (Julia Stiles). The Albrights are a moneyed family reeling from the unexplained disappearance of their daughter Esther, whom Leena comfortably inhabits because of her stature and seeming mastery of childlike bemusement. But this time around, “Orphan: First Kill” weighs the existential quandaries at her core: Is the whole ruse worth it at all? Seeing Fuhrman down a mini-bottle of vodka in an airplane lavatory after reuniting with her “mother” Tricia is a hilarious image. Screenwriter David Coggeshall seems to have leaned into the campy possibilities of the original movie.

The particulars of Leena’s ruse are laid out here in ways that must seem exhausting for her. She has to tape down her breasts, for one thing, and keep her mouth shut around friends of her teenage “brother” Gunnar (Matthew Finlan), who are quick to point out that she dresses like Lizzie Borden. Pigtails, ribbons, and all, Leena (and therefore Fuhrman) is convincingly child-aged on the outside, but her weary, darkened soul is obviously miserable on the inside.

A detective (Hiro Kanagawa) who was assigned to the original investigation of the Albright daughter’s disappearance gets too curious, and so of course meets a grim fate worthy of this franchise and its blunt approach to casual violence. “Orphan: First Kill,” however, hinges upon a twist introduced at the top of the third act that throws everything we’ve seen prior outrageously out of whack. Stiles, as the brown-haired and resigned mother feigning enthusiasm over reuniting with someone purporting to be her daughter, reaffirms her knack for focused performances of women in crisis. And that aforementioned third act twist is delivered in a nastily sudden way by her character.

Karim Hussain, the director of photography who has worked closely with Brandon Cronenberg and on other genre entries, shoots the proceedings with a gauzy, somnambulant haze. There’s a musty and even funereal decorum to it all, with the camera whirling around the actors’ faces during particularly harrowing moments. Coggeshall’s script isn’t especially sharp, as the movie really does hinge around that big twist, but the visual approach and performances from the actors give “Orphan: First Kill” an edge that should satisfy fans of the original.

“Orphan: First Kill” is now playing in select theaters and streaming on Paramount Plus.

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