Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant

...en underhållande skröna...

...plays like cut-rate Tim Burton, with a lot of striking color and cartoonishly gleeful morbidity...

A talented ensemble helps this pull through despite a leaden lead...

The boys' initial entry to the freak show conjures up a real sense of foreboding, creepily evoking the intrusion of an appealing hidden world at the margins of our own bland one.

Reilly’s terrific as the bloodsucker who’s lost his zest for death...