'To Catch a Killer' movie review: Slow burning but Tension and thrills are on high!

Still from To Catch a Killer

Film: To Catch a Killer
Cast: Shailene Woodley, Ben Mendelsohn, Ralph Ineson, Jovan Adepo, Mark Antony Krupa, Rosemary Dunsmore
Director: Damián Szifron
Rating: 3/5
Runtime: 119 mins

This procedural cop thriller about the hunt for an armed and dangerous lunatic who is on the verge of committing mass murder is generic and familiar given its theme and beats… but the treatment and the intense performances make this experience a fairly thrilling ride.

The location is Baltimore and it's New Year's Eve. There are so many people out and about, celebrating the advent of a new dawn. Just when you start getting immersed in the festivities, a ghostly, ace sharp-shooter from out-of-the-blue, picks out his select targets and makes a meal of them. In a matter of minutes, 19 dead people are strewn across multiple locations within a small periphery. In the next few minutes, we see pandemonium break out as people rush out helter-skelter in an effort to get out of the shooter's range. It's all so sudden and unexpected and no one knows where the shots are being fired from. The cop on the spot Eleanor (Shailene Woodley) is smart enough to direct her colleagues to document the fleeing people on their mobile cameras. And that's exactly why the FBI's chief investigator Lammark (Ben Mendelsohn) chooses the troubled officer with a long history of self-abuse to assist him on the case.

The nightmare continues as the shooter continues on his shooting spree in several other locations…and the FBI is unable to identify him because he is smart enough to evade notice. OTT platforms have had a surfeit of such stories and most of you may have devoured them whole, so this film might not seem like a worthy retreat. But it is. Despite the formula that combines criminal activity with sleuthing, the narrative here manages to be absorbing, and intellectually engaging for most of its runtime.

'To Catch a Killer' is chilling and recalls to memory the many mass shootings that the USA has faced because of its dogged persistence in allowing gun culture to survive. The narrative not only brings to light the misuse of the provision for guns as personal protection, but it also digs deeply into the modern world of fragile minds plagued by mental illnesses. The characters here are a compelling study of a fractured psychological state. Writer/Director Damian( Wild Tales) Szifron divines a realistic narrative that involves police and administrative face-offs in a tension-ridden, bleeding atmosphere of palpable dread.

The narrative is sensitive in depicting pain and trauma leading up to mental illnesses. It helps in deepening the ensuing drama beyond the perfunctory cop-killer routine. It also frames a chilling understanding of motivation and training and how tragic life experiences have a role to play in the making of a criminal and that of a cop, for that matter. The intricacies involved here are elaborated with a finesse that wouldn't be found in other generic thrillers.