'Legitimately horrendous': Film critics maul Scottish actor Louise Linton's directorial debut

It promised to be the Hollywood bow for the Scottish actor who became the bête noire of liberal America thanks to her high-profile ties with Donald Trump’s administration.

Louise Linton and her husband, Steven Mnuchin, the former US Treasury secretary. Picture: Saul Loeb/Getty

But the directorial debut of Louise Linton, the wife of Steven Mnuchin, the former US Treasury secretary, has received a critical mauling ahead of its release.

‘Me, You, Madness’, a feature also written and produced by Ms Linton and in which she takes the starring role as a bisexual serial killer-cum hedge fund manager, is due to hit streaming services in the US on Saturday.

The Fettes-educated actor, regarded by many of her critics as a totem of the Trump era’s brash, wealth-focused culture, has said she raised the money for the movie via friends and family, and that “there will be people who love it and people who hate it”.

One reviewer described the film as "the first legitimately horrendous movie of 2021”. Another tartly observed: "To call this a vanity project is an insult to vanity projects."

Frank Scheck, a critic with the Hollywood Reporter, described the film as “exceedingly laborious” and singled out its “tiresome attempts to send up its star’s image and not take itself too seriously”.

He wrote: “The lead performers don't so much wink at the camera as leer at it and threaten to lick it all over, and we're treated to so many lascivious shots of Linton's toned, bared physique that one would accuse the filmmaker of sexual exploitation if it weren't Linton herself. But then again, she never did know how to read a room.”

Robert Kojder, a member of the Critics Choice Association, awarded the movie a single star, describing it as akin to “watching a Tom and Jerry cartoon, only something set in the real world that doesn’t abuse all logic, but the rules of its own inner workings”.

He continued: “Even basic continuity errors that exist in every movie are blown up to sizeable proportions here (a character has his hand sliced open, but is bandaged up in the next shot). It’s a one-note movie that is never clever, amusing, entertaining, or anything less than ******* irritating.”

Pete Hammond, chief film critic for Deadline Hollywood, assessed ‘Me, You, Madness’ as “a colourful, but mindless confection”, specked with “godawful garishness”. His review, perhaps the most positive of those released so far, concluded: “It is dumb – yes, dumb – fun if you’re in the mood, but not much else.”

Prior to entering public office, Ms Linton’s husband was a Goldman Sachs banker who carved out a career in movie production, with credits on blockbusters such as Suicide Squad.

‘Me, You, Madness’ was produced by Stormchaser Films, a company co-founded by the couple in 2015. Mr Mnuchin divested his stake in the firm after entering the White House, but it became the centre of an ethics row.

Ms Linton, from Dalkeith, is best known in her homeland for her self-published book about her gap year in Africa, in which she claimed she was hunted by an armed militia.

It was later removed from sale after a series of factual inaccuracies came to light. The High Commission of Zambia in London issued a statement condemning her “falsified memoirs”.

A message from the editor:Thank you for reading this article. We're more reliant on your support than ever as the shift in consumer habits brought about by coronavirus impacts our advertisers. If you haven't already, please consider supporting our trusted, fact-checked journalism by taking out a digital subscription.