This Renee Zellweger horror film isn't the greatest thing you'll ever see, although I don't really think it's deserving of the tidal wave of negative reviews it has received since its 2009 release. The movie starts out pretty well, with some mystery and it makes you question whether the little girl is being tormented by her parents or by an evil force, or if she is just evil incarnate herself. Jodelle plays the part of Lily well, innocent and sweet when she needs to be and threatening and scary when called for. Renee really pulled off a good performance here too, she really got the over stressed, well meaning and kind social worker down. And as the film progresses she really did a good job of portraying the terror and at her wits end persona. Bradley cooper turns in an alright performance, I mean to be honest it didn't require a lot of great effort, it was just kind of a whatever character. The writing is pretty standard for the horror genre, it's not like slasher movie bad but it's nothing to be bragging about. One complaint I do have with the film is the effects of the demon when it is revealed, looked stupid and cheesy, wish they would've done better with that, came off as cheap. 7/10 for Case 39.

I can't look past the fact that Bridget Jones (Renee Zellweger) was cast for a serious role. Would the movie be better is someone else played the lead? Maybe a little, but I doubt it very much. It's just not that good a movie to begin with.In any case, Zellweger was a poor choice. She should stick to romcoms, I think. I can't take her seriously in a role like this. To add insult to injury, the little girl was godawful, too. While Zellweger looked constipated throughout the movie, the little girl was just awkward and kind of embarrassing to watch - she was not one bit scary. Her performance could best be described as "trying too hard, but failing miserably". With lots of child actors around, it beats me why they'd pick this talent-less brat. Basically, the acting by both leads was less than convincing to put it mildly.The movie itself is a (very poor) rehash of all the other Satan-child / evil kid movies I have seen. Not really a thriller, let alone horror. I don't know what genre it falls under, but it's just neither suspenseful, nor griping, and not one bit scary or disturbing.If they wanted to make something memorable out of this movie, they should have let alone the horror theme and, perhaps, explored the girls life as though she wasn't aware that she's evil or that she didn't want to do what her nature dictated and was fighting the evil within. Now that would of made for a much better story, I think.But this banal, done-do-death, clichéd mess? What was the point? If you want far superior movies with a similar theme, try the original "Omen" (not the remake with Julia Styles), or "Orphan".

CASE 39 really is a bad film. So bad that I found it to be near unwatchable, and for once it's not down to the storyline, as clichéd and predictable as it is. For anyone interested in the narrative, this tells virtually the same story as the same year's ORPHAN, concerning a little girl who's being seemingly abused by her parents and subsequently rescued by the social care system. Unfortunately the girl is hiding a dark secret...No, the problem with CASE 39 isn't the story, as rubbishy as it is, but the casting. Renee Zellweger bags the main protagonist role and she is completely AWFUL in the part. Whether it's her wheezing, affected voice, her squinty eyes or her frankly laughable emoting, she brings down every scene in which she appears and given that she's in the film for 90% of the running time, that's not good.Apart from Zellweger, this isn't too bad, just lacklustre. Ian McShane has a nice supporting role and it's good to see him taking a bigger physical role in the proceedings than usual. One set-piece involving an oven is truly shocking and the best bit in the film. There are a handful of supernatural scare scenes which utilise CGI but are okay - the bit with Bradley Cooper is quite amusing. I wasn't too taken with Jodelle Ferland's performance but at least she plays it subdued for two thirds of the film. But Zellweger is so poor that she makes this film near unwatchable as a result.

I enjoyed that thriller. I think, both directing and acting was solid and good quality. The script was up to a standard too, only downfall was that the twist was kind of predictable from some points onward. In spite of this, it managed to keep up suspense until the end.I very much liked Renee Zellweger in that movie. I think she gave a real good performance as a social worker and so did the other main character, little girl in her care. The development of the relationship between the two is the backbone that carries the film, and they both do a brilliant job at it. The scenes between the do are all very strong, full of psychological suspense.That is the other thing why I liked this movie: it uses the minimal amount of gore and CSI and maximal amount of psychological suspense. The visual revealing of the horror at the end is also done tastefully, and most importantly, not overdone.