The Killer Inside Me Review

Posted by Erik Luers on 07.03.2010

Caught between a wall and a hard fist...........

Casey Affleck ... Lou Ford
Kate Hudson ... Amy Stanton
Elias Koteas ... Joe Rothman
Ned Beatty ... Chester Conway
Jessica Alba ... Joyce Lakeland
Simon Baker ... Howard Hendricks
Bill Pullman ... Billy Boy Walker











Michael Winterbottom's intriguing new film, The Killer Inside Me, is a sadomasochistic Freudian nightmare, or maybe an exotic fantasy for the criminally deranged. Some are classifying the film as strict noir, but it's more in tune with neo-noir, playing with convention and turning it upside down and pulling it sideways; imagine if Bogie's Sam Spade revealed himself to be in possession of the real Maltese Falcon all along. This is a thriller with corrupt people in control. Opening to the expected mixed reviews, the film is guaranteed to fly under most cinemagoers' radars, and undeservedly so. It's a psychologically-enhanced reincarnation of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, a yesteryear view of crooked politics. First playing at Sundance and then at Tribeca, the film is now left free to go at it alone, warts and all. Although flawed, the expert handling of the tricky material enables the viewer to strangely appreciate its imperfections — walking along a tightrope, Winterbottom occasionally falls, but damn if we aren't always excited to see where it is he will land. His film is exciting, a little confusing, a tad vague, gleefully violent, and always interpretive. At the end of the day, this works just fine.

Set for the most part in a safe and sweet, quiet city, our lead character is a young cowboy hat-wearing sheriff by the name of Lou (Casey Affleck), a man who follows orders and lives his life as an upstanding citizen out to protect upstanding citizens. He's a clean shaven poster child for 1950s wholesome Americana. Overseeing the entire city is the Conway family, an industrialized group of entrepreneurs with their faces posted on every billboard in the area. In their own monopolized way, they control everything, even Lou. These are not good people, and Lou has his reasons for not trusting them (his stepbrother whom had worked with the Conways wound up dying on the job in a freak accident which may or may not have been a planned murder). So Lou gets a character arch, a reason for being suspicious and for always having his guard up. He is also sexually involved with a traveling prostitute who wants to marry one of the Conway boys, and Lou is ordered to get rid of the woman by the Conway papa (Ned Beatty) so that his son's sexual antics do not ruin the family name. Is all this making sense? The city thrives on lies and small town political maneuvering. Lou is given orders by everyone, and his nobility allows the people to believe that he will do them good and proud. There's just one problem: Lou's mind has been acting a little funny lately.

Whether or not Lou disposes of the prostitute will be a question answered only when you see the movie. What can be disclosed however is that what does happen is excruciatingly and excessively brutal, a skilled array of makeup effects and quick, tough editing. Some may be put off by its ruthlessness, but that's the way it should be, no? Just as interesting is Affleck's performance in this scene. Nonchalantly putting on black gloves and getting ready to attack the woman he used to sleep around with on lunch breaks, his interpretation of the character is of a frighteningly calm, mentally unstable individual. Lou feels bad when he carries out these immoral acts but goes through with them all the same. Hell, he even apologizes as he does them. Sometimes he even argues with himself. Affleck is a somewhat laid-back actor, restrained almost to the point of emotionless, and his quiet demeanor makes us anticipate his next action; in movies, you're never allowed to be one step ahead of a crazy person (that would make you the crazy one). Lou has his troubling issues, and Affleck seems to reason with him and internalize them effortlessly. With his performance in this film and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, the actor has shown a real knack for acting out the freakishly obsessive.

For reasons only hinted at, The Killer Inside Me is curiously Oedipal and sexually submissive, connecting dark flashbacks to Lou's current perverse behavior. Throughout his life, the confused man has seen a lot of women sexually taken advantage of, if not altogether abused, by members of his own family. His brother may have molested a young girl in a car parked in the garage (Lou was a witness to this), and his father was into some kinky, smack-that-rear-till-it-turns-red abuse on dear old mom (Lou was again a witness, or so we think). The family was highly supportive of male dominance in the bedroom. In one scene, Lou has sex with his loyal girlfriend, Amy (Kate Hudson), and puts his hands over her face as he penetrates her hard. Is he disgusted by her presence or is he thinking about his prostitute on the side? And if he cares for the “lady of the night” more, why does he threaten to arrest her and subsequently beat her as a prelude to sexual intercourse? And what's with the auto asphyxiation provided by Lou's leather belt? Winterbottom's film possesses a sexual overcurrent as twisted as its characters — one always influences the other.

Once in a while Winterbottom (or the original source material written by Jim Thompson) rummages through the cliched "characteristics of vicious killers" drawer a couple of times too often. Lou loves classical music, putting his records on to sooth him after a hard day's work of bloodshed and guilt. The killer as artist? It doesn't take an erudite scholar to realize we've viewed this pontificating babble before, more recently in the immensely overrated American Psycho from Mary Harron. Winterbottom does provide us with an instance of intentional humor however, one where Lou looks through his vast book collection and notices the Sigmund Freud shelf; one of the books even contains old photographs of his naked mother....get it? Lou is an aristocrat in a house with symbolism running amuck. As to why he loves eggs so much, well, the world may never know. One character notes that it's always light just before the dark, so maybe we can assume that this is also applies to the sunny side up.

Even if most of what we are presented with is supposed to be factual to the story (in the world of the movie, anyway), some may doubt the subjective viewpoint we are provided with. We are experiencing the film through Lou's eyes, his dreams and memories providing us with a solid narrative backbone, and yet some of the things we view seem a little odd. Take the final scene for example. It's beautifully over the top, but are we to accept it? It casually breaks away from everything we have been lead to believe, and perhaps this is another one of Lou's thoughts gone up in a blaze of glory. Two characters begin to emerge together like wax figures as hell finds its way into Lou's small town and his home. What starts off as a horrific thriller transcends into a bizarre, romantic power struggle.

From its energetically pulp opening credits to its head-scratching finale, Winterbottom's film is a crazed conceit that is a lot of fun to run with. It has a casually assured determination to be eccentric. Even the music is comforting and peaceful, and if one feels it to be out of place, so too are the characters in this city. Everyone wants to run away. Although some of the film goes a little off course (supporting characters played by Simon Baker, Bill Pullman, and Elias Koteas, looking more and more like Robert De Niro every day, leave a little to be desired), the style supports the story quite well. As for whether or not the film has an agenda to be macho and woman-hating, we must first note that the abuse is neither fun to watch nor something to intentionally get off on. Much of it is downright ugly. A feminist view of the film may not be flattering, but it must fair. And yes, the title can be deciphered as having two meanings, not to mention spoken by two sexes, hence the film's sexual ambiguity embedded throughout. The Killer Inside Me is a movie with palpable weirdness and unflinching violence, and if you can accept it (and stomach it), there's much to appreciate. Like Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 movie from Universal, this flick is about a maternally-indebted psycho domesticated.

The 411: If The Killer Inside Me is playing anywhere near you, go do yourself a favor and see it. It's got some excellent acting, some brutal scenes of violence, and a sense of style all its own. It may be a little flawed, but it hits more often than it misses. Although the film won't be classified as a rollicking good time, it does provide some solid food-for-thought. Oh, and thrills. Now ain't that essential? The Killer Inside Me is warped entertainment, but, you know, the good kind. Guaranteed to be enjoyed by those interested in looney bins and even more so by those that have found themselves sent to one.

Final Score:  8.0   [ Very Good ]