*SPOILERS*
Make sure you have one thing in mind going into this movie! If you've seen a lot of serial killer movies, there will be no surprises with this one. In all honesty, that's how it was with me. I like Judd Nelson and wanted to see how he did in a very serious role. How was the experience? Pretty much the way I expected. I thought the plot was a tad on the weak side of things. How many times have we seen the story of a young kid with a traumatic childhood growing up to be a freak? It's very clichéd and redundant, thoroughly annoying as well! More originality was needed for this one. I did like the idea of the killer picking off random names in the phone book. I felt that was a nice touch, but they didn't do nearly enough with it. Another issue I have is how incompetent everybody was in the police department! They were disgustingly blasé towards everything and I ended up getting annoyed with it more than anything else. The kills themselves were OK. I liked the strangulation death with a piano wire. I also thought it was cool how he forced the victims to kill themselves. I said earlier that more originality story wise was needed. I will give credit to some of the creativity as far as the death scenes are concerned. I actually didn't mind the first half. It wasn't that great by any means, but it was watchable, and I was enjoying Robert Loggia's crafty performance. Then they did something mind-boggling...they killed Loggia off. My interest wavered big time after that. Leo Rossi is very good at playing a smartass (Halloween 2 comes to mind) , but he can't carry a movie. He's forced to carry much of the second half with Nelson, and he simply can't get it done. I also got tired of his whiny persona at times, too. Judd Nelson is actually pretty good as the serial killer. He's effectively creepy and put his own spin on his character. His intimidating stare gave me the creeps on more than one occasion. It's too bad his career hit the skids and he didn't have a good enough script to work with. Robert Loggia is the best thing about this movie by far! even if his character is stubborn at times. Meg Foster is solid as the wife. The climax drags on and on until it ends with a whimper. I thought the ending was very anti-climatic
They had the potential to make this more than just another serial killer movie. Unfortunately it goes by the wayside and the foolish choices hamper this film far too much for me to give this a full recommendation. It might be worth a look if you have nothing else to do, but even that's pushing it. If anything, see it for Judd Nelson and Robbert Loggia! I expected more from the director of Maniac
5.1/10
Make sure you have one thing in mind going into this movie! If you've seen a lot of serial killer movies, there will be no surprises with this one. In all honesty, that's how it was with me. I like Judd Nelson and wanted to see how he did in a very serious role. How was the experience? Pretty much the way I expected. I thought the plot was a tad on the weak side of things. How many times have we seen the story of a young kid with a traumatic childhood growing up to be a freak? It's very clichéd and redundant, thoroughly annoying as well! More originality was needed for this one. I did like the idea of the killer picking off random names in the phone book. I felt that was a nice touch, but they didn't do nearly enough with it. Another issue I have is how incompetent everybody was in the police department! They were disgustingly blasé towards everything and I ended up getting annoyed with it more than anything else. The kills themselves were OK. I liked the strangulation death with a piano wire. I also thought it was cool how he forced the victims to kill themselves. I said earlier that more originality story wise was needed. I will give credit to some of the creativity as far as the death scenes are concerned. I actually didn't mind the first half. It wasn't that great by any means, but it was watchable, and I was enjoying Robert Loggia's crafty performance. Then they did something mind-boggling...they killed Loggia off. My interest wavered big time after that. Leo Rossi is very good at playing a smartass (Halloween 2 comes to mind) , but he can't carry a movie. He's forced to carry much of the second half with Nelson, and he simply can't get it done. I also got tired of his whiny persona at times, too. Judd Nelson is actually pretty good as the serial killer. He's effectively creepy and put his own spin on his character. His intimidating stare gave me the creeps on more than one occasion. It's too bad his career hit the skids and he didn't have a good enough script to work with. Robert Loggia is the best thing about this movie by far! even if his character is stubborn at times. Meg Foster is solid as the wife. The climax drags on and on until it ends with a whimper. I thought the ending was very anti-climatic
They had the potential to make this more than just another serial killer movie. Unfortunately it goes by the wayside and the foolish choices hamper this film far too much for me to give this a full recommendation. It might be worth a look if you have nothing else to do, but even that's pushing it. If anything, see it for Judd Nelson and Robbert Loggia! I expected more from the director of Maniac
5.1/10