Bad Match | A queasily effective Fatal Attraction for the era of swiping right

Bad Match Jack Cutmore-Scot
(Image credit: © 2016 Europacorp - Studio Babe)

Bad Match Jack Cutmore-Scot

Dating hell.

A louche LA Casanova gets his comeuppance in the low-budget thriller Bad Match, a Fatal Attraction for the era of swiping right from writer-director David Chirchirillo, screenwriter of 2013’s darkly comic fable Cheap Thrills. Jack Cutmore-Scott’s caddish protagonist, Harris, is a master of online dating and he only goes in for one-night stands.

Yet when his latest hook-up proves more than usually clingy, his efforts to shake her off send his life into a tailspin. Lili Simmons’ flaky stalker Riley may look like an incipient bunny boiler, but is Harris the one who is really unhinged?

Bad Match lacks the ferocious grip of Cheap Thrills but its anxious depiction of modern dating still proves queasily effective.

Certificate 15. Runtime 80 mins. Director David Chirchirillo

Available on DVD & Digital from Precision Pictures.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj5yEnhuUgk

Jason Best

A film critic for over 25 years, Jason admits the job can occasionally be glamorous – sitting on a film festival jury in Portugal; hanging out with Baz Luhrmann at the Chateau Marmont; chatting with Sigourney Weaver about The Archers – but he mostly spends his time in darkened rooms watching films. He’s also written theatre and opera reviews, two guide books on Rome, and competed in a race for Yachting World, whose great wheeze it was to send a seasick film critic to write about his time on the ocean waves. But Jason is happiest on dry land with a classic screwball comedy or Hitchcock thriller.