Kris:
This is weird. I thought that this movie was going to go all out crazy. I thought it was going to touch upon the paranormal profiling abilities of a renegade cop who was tracking down some guy from an X-Files episode who could miraculously transform himself into anyone he wished. Or at least he would go through extensive plastic surgery to become his victims, using his victims' money for the operations, of course. In the end, and actually early in the opening credits, you'll see that its just some average bloke who dons different shaped spectacles, colours or chops off his hair, picks up certain mannerisms and his victims' clothing style, but never really changes his visage. This is interesting in a way, because it points out how many missing person cases are unsolved simply because the person is forgettable. Or how we become a certain persona that pleases our audience. That we're all a form of production performance art depending on what our peers expect and encourage us to be.

In this age of identity theft, fraud and disingenuine facades, I suppose it's creepier to imagine that any stranger you meet on a train or on the street could be your potential murderer. And with the technology of cell phones and internet conferencing, he could hide away in "reclusive socialism". That person could go on impersonating you, unbeknownst to even your family, for as long as he wanted to. This movie unfortunately doesn't go too far into the logistics of stealing personas, and the killer is more of a clumsy, confused psychopath living out the Hell his mother created for him in childhood. This brings up a good statement about parenting and how favoritism, punishment for imperfection and parental neglect takes a nasty dive. Most parents are guilty of this... it's almost unavoidable; we even see it on sitcoms. In this case, its extreme of course, yet it reminded me of the recent, all-too-real story of the man who locked his child in the closet because the kid was getting in the way of his video game habit. The child was later found dead; starved to death.

On a lighter "note" (haha), long gone are the tinkling "bells" from Phillip
Glass, who has been resurrected for Hollywood suspense soundtrack sake to produce a few interesting sound bites, but a far cry from innovative. While inserting a few head-scratching (and sometimes inappropriate) aural creatures, I believe in this case, his presence takes precedence over the content.

Overall, this was a bumpy ride, but it had some truly jump-out-of-your-seat
moments, a bunch of false starts, and some okay cadaver effects (for those of you that love to groan "ewwww" at the sight of blood). Many over the top and overly dramatic direction seem too silly for words at times. It was still more enjoyable and deeper than Twisted, even though they both shared the element of deviant and investigator sharing the same afflictions for gore and therefore being “one and the same” (at least from the killer’s viewpoint). Everything is laid out clear and simple here; there's nothing you'll need a degree in Psychology or Anthropology to figure out. Dialogue is clean and sparse and everyone's pretty darn serious, which makes Ethan Hawke's charisma shine. Angelina Jolie, as always, is gorgeous to look at, and pulls off the pouty, reserved, nonchalant FBI agent bit. She doesn't have many lines, so she's just sort of inserted for the "Keanu Box-Office Factor" and bouncing boobs shots. Brief cameo by Kiefer Sutherland (who's always sexy as the bad guy, but whether he's good or evil in this movie, I won't say).

Chris:
Like D.J. Caruso’s last film, The Salton Sea, Taking Lives is a surprisingly enjoyable film, albeit a predictable and slightly absurd police thriller. The film, based on the novel by Michael Pye, follows FBI Agent Illeana (I forget her last name) as she attempts to track down a killer addicted to stealing people’s identities. Of course, with being a killer and all, credit card fraud does not suffice, leaving the lonely deviant with one remaining alternative: to bash his victim’s face in with a rock and (like) totally assume their identity. But with Angelina in the starring role, it’s not like you would expect her character to be much closer to the everyday norm. Lying prone in freshly unearthed graves is her preferred method of forensic Crime Scene Investigation. But be it psychic intuition, or just the intimidating brainpower enhancements implanted in her memory foam pillow lips, she knows how to get the job done. The killer and the detective play out the familiar cat and mouse chase, but even though you (again) figure out the twist less than twenty minutes into the film you still have a pleasurable experience watching the film. (Yes, regardless of the sequence featuring Angelina’s bare breasts).

My main problem with the film was not in the performances, direction, or cinematography, but in the extremely compressed nature of the film. It seemed that the scriptwriter tried to cram all the “cool” elements from the book into the film, regardless of whether it would make any logical sense in pacing of the film. Angelina’s character ventures into many life threatening and truly thrilling events, only to seemingly forget what has transpired by the next scene. Likewise the dialogue seems similarly compressed, as sound clips of seemingly intense drama in the trailer constitute complete conversations within the film. As far as the action in the film is concerned, it’s enjoyable until they decide to follow every fast moving character, car, etc. in an extremely jerky close up. Chases are not thrilling if you cannot tell what is happening on the screen.

But these small qualms aside, Taking Lives is an enjoyable popcorn thriller. While not exactly innovative, it surely beats the pants off The Bone Collector.

--Chris Nelson
--Kris Kobayashi