Based an the double-initial slayings in Rochester, New York, Rob Schmidt's THE ALPHABET KILLER (Anchor Bay) reunites the director with his Wrong Turn star Eliza Dushku-and although his lead actress is the same, his style and pacing have dramatically changed. What starts out as a mere whodunit, with Dushku's Megan Paige in relentless pursuit of a child slayer, gradually transforms into an altogether different film, with enough twists and turns to trip up even the most seasoned viewer. While the film has its faults, Schmidt successfully keeps the murderer's identity a secret, perfectly dishing out a number of red herrings.
Even Megan's adult onset schizophrenia is effectively kept under wraps for the first 20 minutes; once it's revealed, the film shifts from a kind of ghost story to a study of a young woman trying to overcome a crippling disease-and the further Megan's illness progresses, the more Dushku shines. Surrounding her is a solid supporting cast including Cary Elwes, Timothy Hutton, Michael Ironside and Bill Moseley.A pair of commentaries is included, one by Schmidt and producer Isen Robbins and one by actor/writer/producer Tom Malloy. The former, mainly technical chat offers excellent advice for budding filmmakers on how to make a feature on a shoestring budget. Malloy's track is more of a running history of the scripting process as well as the crime and disease Alphabet Killer is based on. His comments are fascinating, while his sheer joy regarding everything involved in this movie is palpable. Although both writer and director lament that they had to fabricate an appropriate finale rather than leave the film open ended, both offer plausible conclusions to the Long-unsolved crime. Also included is a brief behind-the-scenes piece, consisting of random footage set to a hip techno beat, plus an alternate opening that's not too different from the final version.
Review originally appeared in FANGORIA #280, February 2009.
Comments (1)
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|2009-07-01 11:16:25 Sean Ogden
This movie was a horrible borefest, and I was was looking forward to this since Fango's WOH 2007 when Rob Schimdts presented a clip from it. The whole movie plays like it was made for the Lifetime channel and I expect to see it on there in a couple of years. He needs to just do Insomia already.
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