The Best and Worst of Kaya Scodelario

“The Best and Worst of” series chronicles the career highlights and lowlights of an actor starring in one of the week's new theatrical releases. This week, I take a look at the filmography of “Crawl” star Kaya Scodelario.

Films starring Kaya Scodelario that I've seen:
Moon
Clash of the Titans
The Truth About Emmanuel 
The Maze Runner
Tiger House
Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials 
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales 
Maze Runner: The Death Cure 
Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile 

Best Performance: The Truth About Emmanuel (2014)
All of Scodelario's most prominent roles in American movies thus far have offered little to no room to display any meaningful acting chops. On the few occasions where she's starred in something more substantial, she's absolutely thrived. It's essentially a coin flip between The Truth About Emmanuel and Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile for her top performance, but I'm going to give the edge to Emmanuel because she was in it for far longer. Her raw, fearless performance as a young woman who blames herself for the tragic death of her mother is the lone standout element of a messy psychological drama that goes completely off-the-rails during its ludicrous final act.

Worst Performance: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017)
Is there some kind of mandate on the Pirates of the Caribbean movies where you have to agree to not display any sort of personality if you're teaming up with Johnny Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow? Because that's really the only explanation I can think as to why every other hero in this franchise stinks so much. Scodelario and Brenton Thwaites proudly (?) inherit the stiff, robotic sidekick mantle from Keira Knightley and Orlando Bloom here as they serve as the latest disengaged passengers on Depp's scenery-chewing locomotive. With a production budget believed to be over $300 mil, hopefully they were at least compensated well for their lethargic efforts. 

Best Film: Moon (2009)
Man, did Duncan Jones' directorial career get off to an impressive start. Thanks to some clever writing and a sensational lead performance from Sam Rockwell, Moon succeeds as an eerie, fascinating and poignant sci-fi tale that put my brain through a blender for 90 minutes.

Worst Film: Tiger House (2015)
This cheap British home invasion thriller that was relegated to the VOD circuit here in the States betrays the basic blueprint of the genre by being pretty much entirely devoid of tension and ending on the most anticlimactic note possible. Respectable acting from the bulk of the cast and a couple of inspired kills prevent it from being a complete waste of time, but it still manages to be about as disposable as a B-movie can possibly be.

Thank you for reading this week's edition of “The Best and Worst of”. The next victim of my praise and ire will be “The Lion King” star James Earl Jones.