Green River Killer
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   157 of 328 readers found this review helpful.

I find serial killers to be an interesting lot. I enjoy watching documentaries and re-creation movies that examine their motives, crimes, and ultimately either their capture or hypotheses regarding their demise. I thought “Green River Killer” was going to be such a movie, but instead I was subjected to a disjointed mess that tried to marry dramatizations and actual footage, and somehow succeeded in creating a steaming pile of “what the hell did I just watch?”

If you think the “Faces of Death” series is the epitome of American cinema, I have found your “Streetcar Named Desire”.

“Green River Killer” sort of tells the story of Gary Ridgway (played by a surprisingly talented George Kiseleff) who’s hobby is picking up hookers, strangling them with his suspenders, and then dumping the bodies in the woods by a sign that says “Green River”. We all need something to do in our spare time, right?

Kiseleff was a dead ringer for the real life Ridgway (shown periodically during the film) and his performance was good, but it seemed like he didn’t have enough support to really shine. It’s like Gregory Hines starring in “Panic Room”. Hell yeah he can dance, but in a 6’ by 12’ room, he doesn’t have a prayer.

The scenes might have been exact recreations of fact for all I know…but they didn’t make for very believable situations. For instance:

Gary was picking up the hookers from the same bar every time. It’s a small neighborhood join with 6 or 7 yokels, a half a dozen hookers, a madam and a bartender. Our hero leaves with a girl in front of everyone at the bar, kills her, then comes back again. With such a small clientele, wouldn’t someone notice that every time a girl leaves with this guy, they never come back? Isn’t it protocol that after you “misplace” two girls they cut you off?

While Gary’s at work, one of the guys in his department (the division of “move that pile of boxes from over there to over here) comments that there are rumors going around that he’s the Green River Killer…and they’ve seen him wandering around by the Green River sign, to which he responds by giving the guy a pounding. Hello? It’s a shame that there’s not some sort of organized force policing the area that they could report this to. Oh wait, they’re called THE POLICE! Let’s see…this guy repeatedly leaves a bar with hookers that end up dead, and you see him by the place the bodies are found, and when confronted with this information he becomes aggressive? Screw Barney, even Gomer could have solved this crime!

There are four distinct backdrops vying for time, the re-creations, the footage of the real Gary Ridgway being interviewed, some looped footage of autopsies, and these weird dream sequences/flashbacks. With a little focus (and a Robert Stack impersonator doing voice-overs) this could have been a compelling movie, but instead, there’s just too much stuff packed into too little time to really flesh out any individual facets.

Unless you are extremely hard pressed for 90 minutes of gratuitous nudity and watching cadavers get hacked up, go check out Brian Denehey as Bundy instead. This was too convoluted to even be a fun bad movie.

It’s a half can, but for having a couple good looking actresses willing to show some flesh, I’ll knock it up to a full can. It’s sad when brief nudity is the only redeeming quality of a film.

Added:  Sunday, January 01, 2006

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