SLAUGHTER OF THE INNOCENTS A Film Review Copyright Dragan Antulov 1999
Scott Glen belongs to that broad category of great actors whose reputation is sometimes marred simply by appearing in unwatchable cinematic stinkers. In case of Scott Glen such stinker was SLAUGHTER OF THE INNOCENTS, 1994 film by James Glickenhaus, just one of the many thrillers that exploit the public's obsession with the serial killers. In SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, "Oscar"-awarded film that inspired the entire trend, Scott Glen played FBI agent specialised for serial killers. In this film Glen, in a way, repeats the role by playing Agent Stephen Broderick, one of the Bureau's best when it comes to dealing with homicidal monsters. However, this time the maniac in question seems to be too much even for Broderick. Luckily, his 15-year old son Jesse (played by Jesse Cameron-Glickenhaus) is a wunderkind determined to help his father, even if it means that he would have to run away from house and chase the dangerous maniac by himself.
I must say that I was, in a way, both surprised and not so surprised when I realised how despised SLAUGHTER OF THE INNOCENTS is among net.critics. This movie was hardly masterpiece, but it is still better than its reputation. Glickenhaus' screenplay is a mess, the movie is sometimes too preachy, unbelievable or boring (totally pointless scene involving shootout between FBI and lone Neonazi), but Glen and others at least play their parts professionally, and Glickenhaus does provide some suspensful scenes, including quite spectacular finale. Most probable reason why people hate this film is the fact that Jesse Cameron-Glickenhaus, rather talented brat (who also wrote some of the songs in the film) happens to be director's son and that his character actually steals the film from Scott Glen. Although some of the viewers might feel cheated, and although some may have problems swalloving the concept of underage boy battling serial killers, the movie is rather watchable, but hardly anything above it.
RATING: 4/10 (+)
Review written on June 1st 1999
Dragan Antulov a.k.a. Drax Fido: 2:381/100 E-mail: dragan.antulov@st.tel.hr E-mail: drax@purger.com E-mail: dragan.antulov@altbbs.fido.hr
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews