Critic Reviews

• Cath Clarke, Time Out

  'Shell' never fully comes to life. And while Pirrie is brilliant, at 25, I didn't buy her as a teenager.

• Graham Young, Birmingham Mail

  The deer-skinning scene will have everyone worshipping their supermarket packets more than ever.

• Rich Cline, Contactmusic.com

  With a remarkably vivid sense of life in rural Scotland, this tightly contained drama is an impressive debut for writer-director Graham.

• Derek Malcolm, This is London

  This is a sensitive and intelligent film but so slow-burning that sometimes it seems to stop dead in its tracks.

• Allan Hunter, Daily Express

  A sensitive, unflinching exploration of bleak lives Shell marks the emergence of a distinctive new voice in British cinema and a striking young performer in Chloe Pirrie.

• Xan Brooks, Guardian [UK]

  A hushed and haunting coming-of-age drama, pungently played out in the remote Scottish highlands, where the wind boings off the microphone and passing lorries set the crockery rattling.

• Nigel Andrews, Financial Times

  [A] strange and poignant film, in which tragedy grows from smallest seeds of foible and foreboding.

• Robbie Collin, Daily Telegraph

  Shell, the captivating debut from the young Scottish filmmaker Scott Graham, finds claustrophobia in the widest-open landscape, and isolation in the closest-knit relationship.

• David Jenkins, Little White Lies

  A decent effort and director Scott Graham is one to watch, but this is far from a fully formed drama.

• Siobhan Synnot, Scotsman

  A father and daughter run a petrol station in the Highlands, but their relationship is fuelled by something more unsettling, in Scott Graham's promising feature debut.

• Guy Lodge, Empire Magazine

  Scott Graham's haunting, minimalist debut grips from the outset with startling photography and an attention-grabbing turn from newbie actress Chloe Pirrie.

• Tom Dawson, Total Film

  It's refreshing to see a British film in which place and character are so entwined.

• Alan Bett, The Skinny

  Scott Graham's excellent debut feature is a triumph, a film which troubles the mind for days after viewing.

• Hannah McGill, The List

  Perhaps it's appropriate to a degree given the film's desolate and unpopulated setting, but there isn't quite enough content here to fill out feature length.

• Shaun Munro, What Culture

  Scott Graham's striking debut oozes atmosphere and is well worth the slow-burn.

• Matthew Turner, ViewLondon

  Engaging and intense coming-of-age drama that marks out both actress Chloe Pirrie and writer-director Scott Graham as future British talents to watch.

• Ben Mortimer, HeyUGuys

  Shell is an excellent film with some truly fantastic performances.

• Amber Wilkinson, Eye for Film

  Isolation rules and comfort is cold in Scott Graham's gripping and emotionally tense feature debut.

Read all 18 critic reviews