Drifter: Henry Lee Lucas

Serial killer movies have become two a penny, it feels like at least a couple come out each year. This one, directed by Michael Feifer, just feels like old hat, like it is treading water to make a point that has been made a hundred times before. It doesn't help that Henry Lee Lucas has already been covered in brilliantly grainy fashion previously with John McNaughton's 1990 skin itcher Henry: Portrait OF A Serial Killer, which quite frankly is superior to this in every department. On the plus side are the performances of Antonio Sabato Jr. (Henry) and Kostas Sommer (Ottis), where the former is broody and twitchy, the latter hyper insane, but ultimately it achieves nothing. Kudos, however, is due for at least cleaving close to what facts of the case are known to be true. 4/10

When you see Antonio Sabata Jr is the star, you should already know what you're about to get. But being a true story murder junkie, I had to check it out. And yeah... pretty bad. But I liked learning more backstory. So if you're hunting for a good kinda Lifetime movie type film, just with a lot of bad language and gore, this one's for you.

This movie is not a classical low budget blunder trying to cash in on the fact that it's about serial killer. Granted, the budget was small, but that did not made a big impact on the movie. Script is well written, and constructed. Realistically portraying the torture in his childhood years, that later on led to his twisted personality, movie is not afraid to make a bit longer scenes, just to make you a bit more uncomfortable.

Henry Lee Lucas was a serial killer that, imprisoned, confessed to over 600 murders. Truth is that we really do not know how many victims he killed, due to his false confessions that were rewarded by the police by better treatment.

Overall, do not expect a masterpiece, or some innovative and strange things in it, but more of familiar style of directing with the focus on the story. If you want to go further than that, you can start analyzing events in his childhood and their impact on his killing urges. Was it all his fault, or were there other culprits?

Movie did manage to stick to the actual story of Henry, so it's not all dramatization and imagined events, like some of the recent movies. They slap a "based on a true events" sticker on it, and hope that it will sell better. This is not the case here.

While the infamous "Henry: Portrait of A Serial Killer" is considered the definitive movie about Lucas, it does leave out a ton of facts and information. "Drifter" certainly helps to fill in the blanks, with it's disturbing account of young Henry Lee's childhood, and the mental and physical abuse inflicted upon him by his mother. Here we are shown Lucas in three different stages of his life, child, teenager, and full grown psycho killer. All three actors to portray him are very believable in their roles, and I must say this is Antonio Sabato's film, and his depiction of Henry Lee Lucas is cold and charismatic at the same time; unfortunately in this case, Sabato's good looks are something that needs to be overcome in order for him to come across as believable. Watching the film from start to finish, I found myself looking for any flaws or weaknesses that would cause the pathetically low rating for the movie on this site. I found none. The murky cinematography perfectly captures the mood as well as the time that the story is supposed to take place in, and the script, although leaving many of the murders out due to time and budget limitations, (Lucas murdered over 100 people) never loses focus. This is a lean and mean production that ditches big budget Hollywood sheen for a low key, factual approach. I can only assume the low rating was given because of Sabato's extreme good looks, as most negative reviews mention that and consider it a problem. Those interested in one of America's most notorious mass murderers should ignore those silly criticisms and give this a watch.

Antonio Sabato was so bad in this movie. I used to think he was a good actor. I read the book about Henry Lee Lucas in the 80s. As always, the book is always better than the movie. However, the movie from the 80s "Henry Lee Lucas, Portrait of a Serial Killer" was done real well. This one couldn't hold my interest. It was done so badly.