Taking Lives in 25 Words or Less

All the elements of a drool-worthy spec, but as a film... eh. Perhaps even double-eh. Which is probably an important lesson for someone. Grade: C-.

IMDb | Metacritic | Amazon DVD

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Comments

I'm glad you saw this, because it struck me as the sort of movie that people who are as movie savvy as you might look down their noses at, but I watched it on DVD (It has Angelina Jolie, people!) and I found it worth watching. ("Worth watching" probably equates to around a C/C-)

I thought the performances were all right, and the scene from the trailer with the guy kicking the other guy in front of the speeding car is as gruesomely compelling as advertised. However, the problem with this kind of movie is that they make a big deal out of how you're going to be surprised that the bad guy isn't who you thought it was. But then there's a finite number of people who it could be, because they've only introduced so many characters. So you almost instantly guess who they're going to make you think it is and who it really is - it can only be one of three or four people unless they're going to pull a Scream 2 and just yank the murderer in from the wings, with a quick introduction and a flimsy explanation of his/her motive.

So, despite being well shot and having some fine thrillery moments, decent-to-good performances, and Jolie nudity, the whole surprise wrap-up and surprise epilogue pretty much fall flat.

All valid criticisms, but I think they're outweighed by, you know, the Jolie nudity.

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