‘The Rule of Jenny Pen’ Review: John Lithgow Slays in James Ashcroft’s Dubious Thriller

The namesake for James Ashcroft’s The Rule of Jenny Pen is a creepy hand puppet. Her eye sockets are empty, turning what’s otherwise a nondescript, cherubic face into something sinister. Adored by Dave Crealey (John Lithgow), she’s part of a therapy program in an elder care facility, but the therapy isn’t working, what with the man incorporating the doll into the physical and sexual abuse that he visits upon the other residents.

A more conventional film might have suggested haunted goings-on, obfuscating where Dave ends and Jenny Pen begins. But Ashcroft’s thriller, which he and co-writer Eli Kent adapted from Owen Marshall’s short story, is all Dave, and Lithgow is phenomenal as the aging psychopath. Throughout, the actor’s body language exudes violent entitlement whether Dave is greedily hunched over his mealtime sludge or yanking on a man’s catheter.

Though he’s at the opposite end of life, the character resembles one of those schoolyard bullies who are all too aware that their size lets them push the other kids around. Dave’s advantage is that he’s so much more spry and lucid than the other residents, particularly in comparison to Stefan Mortensen (Geoffrey Rush), a former judge whose stroke has left him in a wheelchair with limited use of his hands. He’s haughty and proud, and thus a natural target for Dave.

For a while, The Rule of Jenny Pen has novelty going for it. This is, after all, a film in which Lithgow’s Dave presents the naked wrist of the hand he uses to hold Jenny Pen and demands, “Lick her asshole.” But as with Ashcroft’s prior film, Coming Home in the Dark (which was also adapted from an Owen Marshall story), the bleak atmosphere becomes more grating than unsettling. It doesn’t help that the film single-mindedly sees its elderly characters as objects of disgust or receptacles for harm. And some of that harm doesn’t even involve Dave: In an early, tone-setting scene, Stefan witnesses a man accidentally set himself on fire with a lit cigarette.

Dave’s wanton cruelty is The Rule of Jenny Pen stock-in-trade. The film doesn’t necessarily have to explain what his deal is, but his reign of terror goes on so long and so unchecked that it begins to strain credulity, even with the handful of scenes establishing a short-handed staff going about their duties on autopilot. Long before the film reaches its obvious conclusion, it’s begun to feel as repetitive as watching someone do the same puppet routine over and over again.