The dedicated social assistant of child service Emily Jenkins (Renée Zellweger) has a huge backlog of cases of abused children to take care. However, her chief Wayne (Adrian Lester) delivers two more cases for her and Emily heads to interview the family of Lilith Sullivan (Jodelle Ferland), the young abused daughter of Edward Sullivan (Callum Keith Rennie) and Margaret Sullivan (Kerry O'Malley). Emily finds the parents very weird persons and forces Wayne to summon them for additional interviews. Emily connects to the sweet Lilith and during the night, she feels that the girl would be in danger and together with Detective Barron (Ian McShane), they invade the Sullivan's house and find the couple trying to burn Lilith inside the oven. Lilith is sent to a child care and she asks Emily to adopt her. Emily requests to take care of Lilith and the girl moves to her house. Sooner Emily learns that Lilith is not as innocent as she seems to be.
"Case 39" is a scary horror film with great screenplay and performances. The bleak story begins in the direction of a drama, and out of the blue shifts to a suspenseful psychological horror film as has some common aspects with "Orphan". The end is not bad with the victory of the good, but this film deserved a better and darker ending. My vote is seven.
Title (Brazil): "Caso 39" ("Case 39")
"Case 39" is a scary horror film with great screenplay and performances. The bleak story begins in the direction of a drama, and out of the blue shifts to a suspenseful psychological horror film as has some common aspects with "Orphan". The end is not bad with the victory of the good, but this film deserved a better and darker ending. My vote is seven.
Title (Brazil): "Caso 39" ("Case 39")