May 31, 2007
The nifty "Mr. Brooks" is a sneaky thriller that does something that's disturbing: It gets you rooting for a serial killer.
While the movie -- written and directed with cool precision by Bruce Evans -- weaves its twisted and gripping tale, you find yourself on the edge of your seat trying to figure out how the main character is going to get out of one sticky situation after another.
It's only after the house lights go up and you start thinking about the film do you realize that the eponymous character in "Mr. Brooks" is a complete monster not worth pulling for.
And because the character is played by Kevin Costner, who brings his usual low-key, all-American charm to the role, Brooks is even more disturbing.
It's sort of like watching a cold-blooded version of Gary Cooper or Jimmy Stewart stalking and killing people.
With his performance here, Costner once again proves that if he's given the right material, he's one of the best actors working in Hollywood.
As the movie opens, Costner's Brooks runs a successful company that makes boxes, has a loving wife (Marg Helgenberger) and a daughter (Danielle Panabaker) at Stanford University.
But at night -- when he tells his wife he's working late at the office or in his pottery studio -- Brooks trolls the streets of Portland for victims, urged on by his cunning alter ego (William Hurt, delivering a chilling performance).
Things get complicated for Brooks, though, when a Peeping Tom (comedian Dane Cook, giving a creepy performance) discovers Brooks' secret life. But instead of turning him into the police, the Peeping Tom decides he wants to become Brooks' protege.
Life gets even more complicated for Brooks when his daughter returns from college under mysterious circumstances. So besides dealing with his unwanted protege, Brooks has to worry about what's going on with his daughter.
Evans handles all these story threads expertly, weaving them together to deliver one surprise after another.
It also helps that Evans sprinkles the movie with lots of black humor, mostly involving Mr. Brooks' conversations with his alter ego, who provides a snarky running commentary on all the action as the movie reaches its clever climax, which sets up things for a sequel.
Even though "Mr.
Brooks" isn't terribly original, the story is told in such an expert way with top-notch performances, seeing another chapter in the story of this "all-American" killer would be a grisly pleasure.
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