Watcher, The Review

The connection between a murderer and the man who hunts him is no new concept in the narrative arts. The overt performance of sadistic murders specifically to taunt your nemesis is the theme of The Watcher - James Spaderplays Joel Campbell, a burnt-out FBI agent who`s fled LA for Chicago in an attempt to escape the nightmare of his failed attempt to capture serial killer David Griffin - Keanu Reeves. But Reeves needs the connection with Campbell and follows him. Just to up the ante - he sends Campbell a photograph of his next intended victim with a 24 hour warning. Campbell`s in a bad way psychologically, his psychiatrist Marisa Tomei is singularly unable to help him. He`s surrounded by the nightmare.....The Watcher doesn`t much advance the causes of the serial killer movie. Over-directed by first-timer Joe Charbanic who made music videos for Keanu Reeves? band Dogstar, the film has a moody emptiness where you feel everything you would like explored is ignored in favour of stylishness. I like James Spader, he brings something, an intelligence, to what he does on screen but his character is pretty much confined in this. You want to laugh in sheer incredulity when Marisa Tomei turns up as a psychiatrist but in fact she makes her incompetence work for her. And Keanu Reeves is ok as the ultra cool murderer - I`m not giving away any secrets here, he`s established as the bad guy very early in the film. But potentially interesting characters and situations don`t make a good movie,they have to be realised... Comments By David StrattonThis isn`t a bad thriller. James Spader, as the tormented cop, and, especially, Keanu Reeves as the ruthlessly playful killer, both turn in very solid performances, and first-time director Joe Charbanic handles the material with intelligence; the sequence in which the cops desperately try to locate the killer`s next victim before it`s too late is handled with flair.