Executioner review – sleazy MP hams it up with sex worker in darkly comic blackmail thriller

Based on actor-director Peter Benedict’s own play this tiny-budget thriller has the feel of a stagey recording as the double-crosses pile up higher than an MP’s promises

The fictional shadow cabinet minister at the centre of this darkly comic blackmail thriller is offended when the male prostitute he has hired describes his reputation as “colourful”. Colourful MPs support bloodsports and wear bow ties, he says; he prefers the term “maverick”. It’s never said out loud, but clearly he sits on the right in political terms; you can tell from the sneer in his voice as he utters the word “proletariat”.

Executioner is adapted by Peter Benedict from his play Deadlock, with a staginess that feels a bit much for the screen. Benedict also co-directs and stars as the MP, called Robert Marlowe, giving a lip-smacking performance that makes Hannibal Lecter look like a character from kitchen sink realism. The entire film is set in the basement studio of Marlowe’s country pile, where he dabbles in pottery while listening to Gilbert and Sullivan (there’s even an echo of The Mikado in the plot).

Marlowe’s wife – “more of a long-term alibi”- is away for a few days. So, his assistant Mark (Christian Greenway) has booked 19-year-old Tommy (Max Raphael) to spend the night. As Marlowe shows Tommy around the studio, he tells him that the German manufacturer of his kiln made ovens for the holocaust, which doesn’t bode well.

In fact, things turn dark pretty quickly, and the preposterous double-crosses pile up higher than an MP’s promises before an election. The whole thing has clearly been put together on a tiny budget, and in truth has the feel of a filmed recording of a play more than an actual movie. It also feels a bit dated with its portrayal of a sleazy venal Tory MP; the original play was first staged in 2007 and, post-David Cameron and Boris Johnson, our rightwing baddies and their version of privilege and disdain have evolved.

• Executioner is on digital platforms from 6 July.