Andy Van Scoyoc
If you like your mysteries fast paced and spoon fed, then THIS film is not for you. Drags and drags and you'll be tempted to turn it off.But don't. While the ending could have been better and lacked what you'd expect from the build up, the film is still good and worth a watch. The tie in at the end was a good touch and nicely ended it all. For patient viewers ONLY.
wes-connors
Demoted for not following police procedure, aspirin-popping FBI agent Aaron Eckhart (as Thomas "Tom" Mackelway) has his hands full with the opening murder committed by creepy Ben Kingsley (as Benjamin O'Ryan). Apparently, Mr. Kingsley likes to kill people and cut off their eyelids. It's all part of an elaborate plot involving serial killers. The story is engrossing, but it leaves you feeling lost. The first killing scene does not allow space in the editing for the perpetrator to be in the victim's car. The tailgater is enough to redirect attention. This opens the door to the supernatural being involved; definitely a consideration, but one addressed later in the film. Everything eventually makes some sense, but it does feels like a cheat, especially when one character takes the other prisoner.***** Suspect Zero (8/27/04) E. Elias Merhige ~ Aaron Eckhart, Ben Kingsley, Carrie-Anne Moss, Harry Lennix
Frederick Smith
In the world of suspense and drama, there are all sorts of sub-genre. File this one under psychic possibilities. Aaron Eckhart is a troubled man, a disgraced agent who the agency has decided can keep his badge, as long as he accepts a post in a remote station, out of the spotlight. Beside the stigma of being an agent who lost control and violated a suspects rights, he has headaches. Constant, severe headaches. And they aren't getting better. His supervisor is used to seeing this kind of agent, he knows the drill, probably left in charge of this office from a past problem of his own. I've read other reviews that seem to pan this film, and I have to agree it is not for everyone. The premise is unnerving, to say the least. And it is based to some extent in truth. There was a time when the U. S. government conducted experiments in Remote Viewing, a psychic phenomena where people with no prior knowledge of an area are tasked to report on things that are occurring in an enemy camp. The government has said this project was abandoned, since it proved to produce less than accurate results. But what of the remote viewers who were accurate? What happens to someone who is taught to look into the minds of serial killers and is never taught how to turn it off? Ben Kingsley gives a haunting performance as Ben O'Ryan, a former remote viewer now turned serial killer. Aaron Eckhart is the disgraced agent, targeted by O'Ryan to replace him. It's a film worth watching once if you are a believer in psychic phenomena. Otherwise, you might want to look for something else.
sddavis63
My first reaction as I began watching this film was that Ben Kingsley just didn't work for me in the role of a serial killer - even if his character is a serial killer with at least a hint of nobility about him - he does, after all, prey on serial killers; many of whom kill children. Still, while Kingsley is a great actor, to me he just doesn't fit as a serial killer of any kind - not even a noble one, which gave me an initial negative gut reaction as this began. Having said that, the movie could have overcome my reluctance to accept Kingsley in the role since his character wasn't the centrepiece of the movie. That was Aaron Eckhart's FBI Agent Tom Mackelway. Mackelway is a disgraced FBI agent who got in trouble with the Bureau for wrongdoing while working out of Dallas and ends up being "exiled" to to the FBI office in Albuquerque after a six-month suspension and psychiatric evaluation. Although not happy to be there, he does manage to put together the pieces of evidence that eventually lead him to Kingsley's O'Ryan.The background of the movie is that O'Ryan was some type of FBI special ops agent in the past who worked on a project involving "visioning" - allowing agents to get into the minds of others, especially apparently serial killers. Tormented by the visions he's seen, he's gone a bit off the deep end, and somehow Mackelway (who was never involved with the project) also has this visioning ability.The movie never really took off for me; it never really managed to draw me in. It's a bit of a mystery for a while as to why O'Ryan is obviously toying with Mackelway, but it wasn't all that riveting since I felt little connection with any of the characters and found the performances largely lacklustre, which matches my feeling about the movie as a whole. If you can stick with it, it leads up to a pretty good final confrontation between Mackelway and O'Ryan, but you do have to struggle to stay with it until those last few minutes, which are the most impressive few minutes of an otherwise largely unimpressive movie.
AD
