I Am Not A Serial Killer
Director: Billy O’Brien
Talent: Laura Fraser, Christopher Lloyd, Max Records, Karl Geary
Released: 9th December
The awesomely named John Wayne Cleaver (Records) is a Midwestern teenager and diagnosed sociopath who lives by a strict set of rules in order to keep his homicidal tendencies in check. When citizens of his hometown begin to fall prey to a brutal serial killer, our protagonist feels compelled to investigate.
I Am Not a Serial Killer benefits from a reasonably intelligent script and an excellent turn from Max Records, whose John Wayne Cleaver proves to be as strange and fascinating a monster as the ones found in the young actor’s breakthrough, Spike Jonze’s Where the Wild Things Are. He is ably supported by Laura Fraser as his harried funeral director mother and Christopher Lloyd as an elderly neighbour with something to hide, while the Midwestern locations and the morbid sense of humour bring to mind the work of the Coens. Although the film loses its way somewhat once supernatural elements are introduced, it remains compelling right up to the black-hearted zinger that brings proceedings to a close. Worth checking out.
Words – Felipe Deakin
