A Scientist at the Movies Reviews by Greg Paris

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Title: Mr. Brooks

Date Viewed: 6/2/07

Details:

Kevin Costner

Demi Moore

Dane Cook

William Hurt

Marg Helgenberger

Danielle Panabaker

Written & directed by: Bruce A. Evans

Score: 1/2

The Review: Mr. Brooks is a monster -- a successful and popular business and community leader who loves his wife and daughter, but who is also an addict, concealed in plain sight, duplicitous -- a cold-blooded serial killer. But this doesn't begin to encompass the role assembled by the collaboration of Costner and Hurt. Perceived from the character's (Costner's) point of view, it looks like a dissociative schizophrenic break. What fascinates is in part the complexity of the character, in part the perspective of a damaged psyche, in part the clever trick of visualization. There are multiple character threads: there is good, buried in there, along with evil, some remorse and sufficient attraction to murder to continue doing it against all attempts to stop. Another curious twist is how he recognizes, and what happens when he realizes, the consequences of genetics.

Helgenberger is wasted on what turns out to be a minor role as his wife. Moore is a bit more focused, as well as a bit of a renegade, in her turn as the detective trying to understand the serial murders and bring in the killer. Cook is both bizarre and a bit unsatisfying as the wild card.

One of the reasons I enjoy cinema is the attempt to discover unusual visualizations, novel and different concepts realized on-screen. This often means the best ideas come in animation, where there are no limits to the human (or living) form or the laws of physics. Mr. Brooks tries to push the envelope here, into psychological territory already partly explored in A Beautiful Mind, but we instinctively know that the dialogs between Costner and Hurt as co-character are evidence of pathology. Not a bad film, if a bit disturbing.

(3-Jun-07)

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