THE KILLER INSIDE ME — ★1/2 — Casey Affleck, Kate Hudson, Jessica Alba; rated R (violence, sex, profanity, nudity, vulgarity, gore, slurs); Broadway Centre
The rather dopey ending for "The Killer Inside Me" would be laughable if it weren't for everything else that came before it.
This period thriller may be based on Jim Thompson's well-regarded 1952 novel, but it is one of the most repellent and reprehensible movies in recent memory.
It's particularly vicious in its depiction of violence toward women — material that, on the surface, appears it was done for shock value. However, this material is done so clumsily it doesn't come off as shocking as much as it does exploitative.
Also, this material defies the best efforts of its talented star, Casey Affleck. He plays Lou Ford, a west Texas deputy sheriff who definitely has an anger problem.
He's also involved with two women: respectable Amy Stanton (Kate Hudson) and Joyce Lakeland (Jessica Alba), a prostitute.
However, Lou treats both of them with equal contempt and violence. And when he beats Joyce and leaves her for dead, he's forced to cover his tracks and to resort to murder.
Co-screenwriter/director Michael Winterbottom's take on Thompson's tricky material illustrates the problems with adapting novels. Some things that are made implicit on the printed page don't work when they are depicted explicitly on screen.
That doesn't just include this film's sometimes frank sexual material but also its over-the-top violence. When Lou assaults Joyce, it's done with such unflinching detail that you'd swear Winterbottom was trying to get laughs instead of horror.
As for Affleck ("Gone Baby Gone"), you can see him trying to mute and tone down his performance in response.
And neither Hudson nor Alba really work in their good-girl and bad-girl roles, either.
"The Killer Inside Me" is rated R and features strong, often disturbing violent content and imagery (gunplay and shootings, vehicular mayhem, fiery and explosive mayhem, brawling and beatings, and violence against women, including sexual violence), simulated sex and other sexual contact, strong sexual language (profanity, crude slang and other suggestive terms), male and female nudity, gory and bloody imagery, and derogatory language and slurs (some of it sexist in nature). Running time: 110 minutes.
e-mail: jeff@desnews.com