Paige's phone, puts on Steve's sunglasses, and stares blankly into a mirror. Cast Production Critical reception On Rotten Tomatoes, a review aggregator, 80% of 28 surveyed critics gave the film a positive review; the average rating is 6.4/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "A brutal and effective British hoodie-horror that, despite the clichés, stays on the right side of scary." Dennis Harvey reviewed the film for Variety and said that it was "an effectively harrowing Brit thriller-cum-horror pic," comparing it to Last House on the Left and Lord of the Flies. The Guardians Peter Bradshaw drew parallels with Deliverance, Straw Dogs and Blue Remembered Hills, and stated that "this looks to me like the best British horror film in years: nasty, scary and tight as a drum," concluding that the film was "exceptionally well made, ruthlessly extreme, relentlessly upsetting." Other critics, however, have savaged the film, denouncing it as an incitement to class prejudice against working class people in Britain. The Sun condemned the film's "nasty suggestion that all working-class people are thugs" while The Daily Telegraph concluded that "this ugly witless film expresses fear and loathing of ordinary English people". Owen Jones, in his book Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class cites the film at length as an example of media demonisation of proletarian youth via the "Chav" stereotype. He comments, "Here was a film arguing that the middle classes could no longer live alongside the quasi-bestial lower orders." Eden Lake has been linked with other films that deal with concerns over "Broken Britain" and a fear of "hoodies," including Harry Brown, The Disappeared, Summer Scars, Outlaw, The Great Ecstasy of Robert Carmichael, Cherry Tree Lane and Heartless. See also Cinema of the United Kingdom Mathil Mel Poonai, a 2013 Tamil language thriller that bears several similarities to Eden Lake. NH10, a Hindi movie loosely draws its plot from the film adapted to an Indian context. References External links 2000s exploitation films 2000s gang films 2000s horror thriller films 2008 directorial debut films 2008 films 2008 horror films 2008 independent films 2000s crime thriller films British crime thriller films British exploitation films British horror thriller films British independent films British slasher films British survival films Films about couples Films about murderers Pathé films Films scored by David Julyan Films shot in Buckinghamshire 2000s English-language films Films directed by James Watkins 2000s British films 2000s French films British horror