Taking Lives
dir. Caruso
Opens Fri March 19
Various Theaters
Angelina Jolie and Ethan Hawke have it rough. Not Ben-Affleck-and-J.LO rough–but rough, nonetheless. No matter how good an acting job these guys may be doing up on the screen, your concentration is constantly broken by thoughts like, “Wow…I read that since breaking up with Billy Bob, Angelina hasn’t had sex in two years.” Or, “Cheating on Uma Thurman? What was Ethan thinking? And her, with those two precious babies….” Regardless of this conflict between the real and cinematic worlds, the new serial killa-thrilla Taking Lives works even better because of Jolie and Hawke’s personal off-screen problems.
When Montreal detectives have a score of mutilated bodies on their hands, they call in FBI profiler Agent Scott (Jolie) whose keen clue-cracking skills lead them to their star witness (Hawke). Scott eventually figures out that their serial killer is tracking his victims and stealing their identities… for all the usual reasons (dead twin brother, locked up in a cellar as a child, cold bitch of a mother). Getting in her way is the misogynistic–but extremely HOT–French Canadian cop Olivier Martinez, and the buzzy sexual feelings Scott is developing in her nether regions for her star witness–who may or may not be who he seems.
Now, if they gave a class on how to write a typical page-turning potboiler, it would contain all these clichéd elements. However, while you may have seen it all before, Taking Lives still works because director DJ Caruso keeps the pace leisurely but tense, dropping red herrings into the mix to successfully keep you guessing. And while it’s no Silence of the Lambs, Lives is still good, solid entertainment that has two or three pants-crapping scenes sure to make you startle.
And as an added bonus, if you carry in the knowledge that Angelina hasn’t had coitus in two years, and Ethan is a bad boy who cheated on Uma, it makes their sex scene that much hotter. And if they’d let the French Canadian cop join them for a three-way? Then you’ve got a movie.
