guilfisher-1 For surly he walks away with this and his portrait of a demented serial killer. This is unusual as Keith is always the victim, ala OFFICER AND GENTLEMEN. He was excellent. Kelly McGillis I usually like but felt there was a monotone level of work in this. Her face never showed any emotion except fear. Does she ever enjoy anything? I liked her in WITNESS and TOP GUN where she at least had interesting moments. But wasted in this. I guess we're supposed to see she's a tough detective and determined to catch her prey. Aging Bruce Dern plays a small role of a detective. Dern would have been more interesting if he had ended up the killer as he plays strange roles better. D W Moffett (what does the D stand for?) played another detective and love interest to Kelly. I remember him in AN EARLY FROST as the love interest to Aiden Quinn. A good looking guy too. But give the laurels to Keith for a wonderful job. And to all those lovely ladies he managed to charm into his den. Maybe sometime we could see a serial killer who takes all the beautiful boys and torments them. It would be different as most of the time it's always the women that get chosen.

Cali For those that think "Perfect Prey" was better cinema than "Witness" this movie is the "perfect fare" for them. Well acted, the grizzled Kelly McGillis does take her role seriously, and for that we thank her. D.W. Moffett gives a splendid performance, but the true star of the show is David Keith. Never have I seen an actor take such demented delight in smearing red lipstick all over his characters sick, depraved lips. The storyline is decent, with an ending that borrows liberally from "Silence of the Lambs." Great cinema for that Saturday evening when Mom has to wait up for the teen that is out for the night with the family car. "Perfect Prey" is intriguing enough to keep the mind off worry, yet mindless enough that a viewer doesn't have to think as the clock nears one in the morning. For those that love a good storyline that offers a little more bang for the buck, try "Witness." Definitely Kelly McGillis at her finest, if only for the classic scene with a younger and sturdier Harrison Ford where they dance alone in an Amish country barn, a scene where McGillis truly sizzles and smolders with implied sexuality and Amish girl heat.

Robert J. Maxwell This one, David Keith, is an antiques vendor and schlepper who for some reason is killing 30-ish successful women by plastic-bagging them, then dressing them, grooming them, and posing them in the position of antique dolls. Kelly McGillis is an ex-medical student, a graduate in fact, who was Keith's first victim but managed to escape his clutches before being turned into a dead doll. She has an MD from Texas but, after spending some time recovering from her trauma, she is now an ordinary homicide cop in Houston. (Sure.) The plot. Well, you already pretty much know it by now, I presume. A number of women turn up dead in peculiar ways. The police have to figure out if there is a link between the killings. There is. Then they have to figure out the particular theme this serial killer is using. Usually phrased as, "What do these women have in common?" In other movies of this genre -- and it IS a genre unto itself -- the killings are based on puzzles from Alice in Wonderland, or replications of previous high-profile serial murderers, or a drawing of a pentagram on a map, or -- I think there's one based on a game of tic tac toe. Or was it hopscotch? One forgets after viewing a dozen or so examples.McGillis does alright by her role, although she hasn't much in the way of range. (It's hard to imagine her getting stoned and enjoying herself.) And she has one of those cases of asthma or whatever it is that disable her at critical moments, a momento of her earlier abuse. She is intense enough, though, and that's about all that's required of her. Moffet, or whoever plays her partner Detective Cirillo, seems to have only one key on his instrument. It would have been a more interesting movie if he'd been the heavy. David Keith has the juiciest part, an outwardly charming, inwardly explosive, sadistic madman. What a scuzzball he is, trying to spoon feed pecan pie to one of his victims before offing her. He gets a bit of exercise because he's required to change personae from time to time. Bruce Dern, gone gray and losing his hair under his cowboy hat, has played numerous psychotic heavies and if he'd been a few years younger would have done fine as the heavy in this movie as well. He's hardly on screen, though.There's nothing original in this flick. I'm beginning to yawn when the finale begins with the lone female investigator breaking into the murderer's darkened house and creeping around with a flashlight whose beam reveals spooky objects and ominously closed doors. It worked okay for a while but has now become redundant, after "Silence of the Lambs" and any number of other examples. Other boilerplate scenes include the fight between the investigator and the maniac. The investigator is armed but has the gun knocked out of his or her hand. A shot of the pistol skidding along the floor. A shot of somebody's hand grasping for the weapon just out of reach. To my knowledge, this sequence was first used in a motion picture in the year 1798.You know something, though? It's bad enough that these plots always involve the murders of young women, but this film has a drawn-out and especially execrable scene in which the murderer, Keith, teases one of his tied-up, terrified victims. The victim knows she's going to die and so do we, but we must sit there and watch David Keith try to pamper her and then throw a fit of pique when she refuses to eat his goddamn home-made pie and then plastic bag her while she screams and wiggles. At whom is this scene aimed? What I mean is, who will enjoy seeing something so brutal and disgusting? It's not necessary to our understanding of either the plot or the character. Casting decisions must have been given about 5 seconds of thought. The first killer we see, being sentenced in a Texas court, is a big, hulking, ugly, sneering brute who spits at Inspector Kelly McGillis. How much more interesting if he'd been a little mouse. David Keith, the killer-in-chief, has always been cast as a weak, perennial loser. The uncooperative sexist detective on the Houston PD is a fat guy with a mustache and no neck who could have won the blue ribbon as prize hog at the Texas State Fair. Well, looking at the donut instead of the hole, the formula wouldn't have been reused so often if there weren't something workable about it. And there IS one well-written, if overacted, scene at an outdoor flea market in which Keith almost, but not quite, lures a beautiful blond customer into his web. If it's late at night and you find you can't sleep, you might give this a try. Either it will act as a distraction from your distress or as a soporific. Both ways, you win something.

onceasalways Not sure why this movie got such mediocre ratings - it was well acted, well written, and well casted - - and most importantly, suspenseful!It's downfall is only that it is totally reminiscent of Silence of the Lambs.. If you liked Silence, you'll probably like this movie too.It had everything from the serial killer on the loose to the interview with the psychopathic killer in jail (sniffing the air, even!).. But, I loved Silence - and though I didn't realize the similarities until the end, this held my attention up until the last suspenseful minute.Well worth my two hours! Bruce Dern and Kelly McGillis stood out in their roles - good casting.. good movie..