Taking Lives

By RUSSELL BAILLIE

(Herald rating: * *)

It might be another serial killer film starring a couple of big Hollywood names but at least it tries to bring a little je ne sais quoi to its grimly familiar detective tale.

It's set in Montreal for one thing.

Jolie is the FBI agent who has been called in by a friend in the Canadian city's constabulary to use her psycho killer expertise on a case of a murderer who leaves his victims minus their hands and with their faces smashed.

That location does offer some fresh gothic atmosphere to it all. It also means the local cops get to be bilingually grumpy about their American visitor - the main detectives are played by familiar French actors Olivier Martinez, Tcheky Karyo and, Jean-Hugues Anglade.

And director D.J. Caruso would seem to want this to play more like Hitchcock, than yet another spawn of Se7en and Silence of the Lambs.

So much so he pops a couple of visual references to Psycho, Vertigo and probably a bunch of others. Philip Glass' score even reminds of Hitchcock's regular composer Bernard Herrmann.

However, it was a pity the time paying tribute wasn't spent tying up the implausibilities which start mounting up early, capped only by an ending that manages to be both brutal and stupid.

Jolie's Special Agent Illeana Scott is called in after one body is unearthed and after a witness to another of the killings, gallery owner James Costa (Hawke), risks becoming the next target.

They edge towards something other than a professional relationship.

Meanwhile, an elderly woman (Gena Rowlands) has fronted up at the police station saying she saw her long lost son and warning them her offspring is a dangerous man (though no one thinks to ask why).

And then there's the shadowy figure (Keifer Sutherland) who just might be the guy who started killing loners 20 years ago and taking over their identities like a less fussy Mr Ripley.

The reasons for that turn out to be so pathologically antiquated, you wonder if Hitchcock had a hand in the script, too - though it's actually from a novel by Michael Pye.

Jolie looks like she's dressed for the office and does her bit for FBI recruiting along the way while Hawke's performance shows something we haven't seen from him before on screen.

It does deliver one heart attack-strength fright. But it has the effect of using up the film's tension in one go.

It also marks the point where Taking Lives starts to unravel on its way to its terrible finale.

Cast: Angelina Jolie, Ethan Hawke

Director: D.J. Caruso

Rating: R16 (violence, offensive language, sex scenes)

Running time: 100 mins

Screening: Village, Hoyts, Berkeley cinemas