4Digital Media, out now

A masked vigilante stalks the streets of a dark city, tracking down those responsible for the death of his family.

Finn Jesse Haaja’s feature debut (he’s also co-writer) really wears its influences on its sleeves, and while it is competently made and passes the time, it is so referential to other, better films of this well-trodden genre as to be redundant.

Star Kris Gummerus plays Rämö and masked alter-ego Rendel, an all-too-obvious fusion of Nolan’s Batman (the suit and tone), The Punisher (extreme retribution violence), Spawn (The Mask) and The Crow (general MO). Of course there’s an evil corporation – VALA – which is launching untested vaccine Nh25 onto the streets of Finland and there’s heavies (very heavy, bearded heavies) who exist only to be fodder for Rendel’s revenge.

There’s an underlying line in humour, and I did chuckle when two goons were asked why they sent someone to hospital rather than kill him. “But you said to take care of him!” the lead idiot protests in the subtitles. But most of the time it’s relentless punch-ups in dark warehouses and alleyways to the strains of a sub-Danny Elfman superhero score.

Verdict: If this movie exists purely so that Finland can claim to having its own dark knight, then so be it, but the rest of us are scratching our heads wondering what gap this Nordic Batman wannabe fills in our moviegoing lives. 4/10

Nick Joy