Papertrail (1997)

User Rating:

4.3/10   

Director:

Damian Lee

Writers:

Damian Lee (writer)
Joseph O'Brien (writer)

Genre:

Crime | Drama | Thriller

Tagline:

Two cops, twelve murders... No suspect!

Plot:

A burnt out detective follows the trail of a serial killer who sends him messages about the murders.

Plot Keywords:

Serial Killer | Murder | FBI Agent | Sex On First Date | Slow Motion Scene

Cast

Chris Penn	...	FBI Agent Jason Enola
Jennifer Dale	...	Dr. Alyce Robertson
Michael Madsen	...	FBI Agent Brad Abraham
Chad McQueen	...	William Frost
Terri Hawkes	...	Rachel Quinn / Alone
Catherine Blythe	...	Gail Morgan
Kenneth McGregor	...	Jerry Saracen
Thea Gill	...	Eileen Gibbs
Shawn Doyle	...	Chuck Switzer
Audrey Lupke	...	Molly Darrow
Elizabeth Smith	...	Little Girl #1
Amanda-Lynn Smith	...	Little Girl #2
Andrea McCabe	...	Cynthia Scott
C.J. Fidler	...	Rialla Frost
George Carter	...	Therapist

Also Known As:

Serial Cops (UK) (video title)
Trail of a Serial Killer (USA) (video title)

MPAA:

Rated R for violence including some disturbing images, a strong sex scene and language.

Runtime:

Brazil:88 min | Spain:89 min

Country:

Canada

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

UK:18 | Iceland:16 | Spain:13 (video premiere) | USA:R | Australia:MA

Filming Locations:

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Movie Connections:

Features It's a Wonderful Life (1946)

low rent serial killer flick, aggressively bad.

TRAIL OF A SERIAL KILLER is an aggressively bad entry into the serial killer genre, or in this case made for video which means I won't bother comparing the good movies in the genre(Seven, Kiss the Girls) or the bad(Copycat, Switchback) This movie which lurches across the screen before dying of its own nauses would deserve a mantle all its own.

The movie opens with a young girl who leaves a movie theatre(the Paradise none other) and is murdered on the walk home. But wait there's more. The killer takes the girl's picture, tapes her hands and then puts one of those movie notes in her mouth for Detectives Michael Madsen and Chris Penn to find, complete with magazine clipped lettering. It's hilarious, this killer with his sense of all purpose. And of course Penn has a psychological battle with the killer who "he knows" is responsible for this one too. The killer calls him and his family so you see it really is important that he finds this guy fast.

Did I mention the intercut between the shrink (Jennifer Dale) who only sees her crazy patients at night? One of her patients tells her she gets excited by committing violent acts. Is she the killer? Dale holds a meeting at a dark church for her most dangerous patients where we hear dialogue about sex and violence that's so corny you wonder how the actors could even respect the material enough to speak it. The whole movie's at such a garbage level what with the hollow plot and abandoned settings which smacks of four in the morning filming locations shot in warehouses and crackshops. The identikit, do everything killer is so bad it really is funny and Madsen and Penn spend the whole movie being over the top and macho when they should be taking fingerprints and watching smarter, techically competent movies of the genre.

A few weeks ago I was watching a show about killers where the host suggested that murderers like Ted Bundy should kill themselves instead of wasting society's time. You got a murder suicide plot, kill yourself is the point I think. TRAIL OF A SERIAL KILLER wants us to accept a serial killer, a cop, who we're supposed to suspect is crazy himself, wrapped up in a silly, low-rent world to find out who the killer is. Who knows? Who cares?

DG

NO STARS(out of four)