Who watches The Watcher? Probably no one, and with good reason. One of the lamest serial killer thrillers of the post-Silence of the Lambs era, this jarringly incompetent film (by music video vet Joe Charbanic) has the bad sense to cast Keanu Reeves – he of the vacant, dim-bulb charm – as a homicidal maniac who moves to Chicago so he can continue playing a cat-and-mouse game with James Spader’s mentally unstable detective. Spader takes meds to ease his migraines and visits a shrink (Marisa Tomei, with duffel bags under her eyes) to discuss the guilt he feels for letting Keanu kill his lover years earlier. Meanwhile, Keanu dances around to Rob Zombie tunes, watches lots of victims and explains to Spader that they’re “yin and yang.” With the killer constantly taunting the cops (after a while, he starts mailing photos of his victims-to-be to the police), Spader’s distraught detective fearing he’s all-too-similar to his criminal counterpart, and more bad camera tricks than one can tolerate – what purpose does it serve to shoot Keanu’s POV shots in digital video? – it’s as if Charbanic wants only to provide a handy compendium of well-worn genre conventions. Unfortunately, to see them all on display, you’d actually have to watch The Watcher and, well, I can’t see any reason to do something like that.
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