This viewer is not surprised to learn that this rather pedestrian murder mystery / thriller is based *very* loosely on a real life string of unsolved killings in the Rochester, NY area. Too many of the characters are rather standard issue for this sort of thing, and the story (credited to co-star Tom Malloy, who plays cop Steven Harper) doesn't exactly go out of its way to be credible. While it's somewhat commendable to have a main character who's struggling mightily with their own mental illness, it's too hard to root for her most of the time. She blatantly goes ahead and does things that she's been ordered not to do, although of course we in the audience know that the crimes won't be solved unless she indulges in this behaviour. There's an over abundance of lazy cops here that are happy with pat answers.
Eliza Dushku, who'd acted for director Rob Schmidt in the horror feature "Wrong Turn", is front and centre as Megan Paige, a young detective who's had some success due to the way she obsesses over cases. However, a bout with schizophrenia does her no favours as she attempts to solve a series of murders. The monster responsible has come up with this gimmick of slaughtering little girls with double initials (W.W., as in Wendy Walsh, for example) and dumping their bodies in towns with the same initial (Webster, in this case). Her colleague and former lover, Kenneth Shine (Cary Elwes) reluctantly lets her return to the case even after she's made a suicide attempt.
There's a number of solid and familiar performers here - Timothy Hutton, Michael Ironside, Bill Moseley, Carl Lumbly, Larry Hankin, Jack McGee, Melissa Leo, Tom Noonan, Martin Donovan - and some of these people get an A for effort. But there's not that much they can do with basically third rate material. Dushku is a lovely woman, but not an overly talented actress. Still, she deserves some credit: she tries as hard as she can. The filmmaking is basically adequate, and there's a rather drab look to "The Alphabet Killer", with not that much in the way of strong colours. The ending offers up the kind of twist that, if you didn't predict it early on, you'll likely scold yourself (as this viewer did) for not seeing it coming.
Six out of 10. (The supporting cast raises the rating a notch.)
Eliza Dushku, who'd acted for director Rob Schmidt in the horror feature "Wrong Turn", is front and centre as Megan Paige, a young detective who's had some success due to the way she obsesses over cases. However, a bout with schizophrenia does her no favours as she attempts to solve a series of murders. The monster responsible has come up with this gimmick of slaughtering little girls with double initials (W.W., as in Wendy Walsh, for example) and dumping their bodies in towns with the same initial (Webster, in this case). Her colleague and former lover, Kenneth Shine (Cary Elwes) reluctantly lets her return to the case even after she's made a suicide attempt.
There's a number of solid and familiar performers here - Timothy Hutton, Michael Ironside, Bill Moseley, Carl Lumbly, Larry Hankin, Jack McGee, Melissa Leo, Tom Noonan, Martin Donovan - and some of these people get an A for effort. But there's not that much they can do with basically third rate material. Dushku is a lovely woman, but not an overly talented actress. Still, she deserves some credit: she tries as hard as she can. The filmmaking is basically adequate, and there's a rather drab look to "The Alphabet Killer", with not that much in the way of strong colours. The ending offers up the kind of twist that, if you didn't predict it early on, you'll likely scold yourself (as this viewer did) for not seeing it coming.
Six out of 10. (The supporting cast raises the rating a notch.)