Movie Review

William Hurt and Kevin Costner in MR. BROOKS (2007).
© MGM

Mania Grade: B+
Reviewed Format: Theatrical Release
Rated: R
Stars: Kevin Costner, Demi Moore, Dane Cook, William Hurt
Writers: Bruce A. Evans & Raynold Gideon
Director: Bruce A. Evans
Distributor: M-G-M

MR. BROOKS

By: Rachel Reitsleff
Date: Friday, June 01, 2007

Broadly speaking, Mr. Brooks is a serial killer thriller, but that genre description creates all sorts of expectations that don’t apply here. This is a million miles away from not only slashers like Halloween and Friday the 13^th, but also procedurals in the Silence of the Lambs mode or even killer-as-hero items a la Hannibal. If Mr. Brooks is comparable to anything, it may be Hampton Fancher’s The Minus Man, but the resemblance is more in quality and surprise than tone or content.

Earl Brooks (Kevin Costner) is a serial killer with a pattern – he likes to shoot couples while they make love, then pose the bodies afterward, taking pictures of various tableaux but destroying the prints after he’s viewed them. He’s never been caught and has been “clean” for two years with the help of AA meetings (he tells fellow attendees he’s “an addict,” but not the nature of the addiction). Earl actually has a great life otherwise – he’s a wealthy businessman, popular in his Oregon community, and loves his devoted wife (Marg Helgenberger) and spoiled but bright daughter (Dana Pannebaker). But Earl also has not just a voice in his head but a full-blown imaginary friend, Marshall (William Hurt), who speaks for the id and keeps urging Earl to give in and do what they both want him to do. And Earl finally gives in and, with the stealth and clean-up skills of someone who’s had a lot of practice, commits another set of killings.

So far, this doesn’t sound all that unusual, but at this point – about 15 minutes into the movie – Mr. Brooks goes almost nowhere we’re expecting and becomes much the better for it. There’s an unwanted witness to the crime (Dane Cook) who comes forward to Earl with an unusual request. The cop investigating the new murders, Detective Atwood (Demi Moore), is burdened by her rancorous ongoing divorce and the fact that she’s being stalked by another serial killer who’s escaped from jail after she put him away. And Earl discovers there’s more to daughter Jane’s return from college than she lets on initially.

To say more might be to blow some of the pleasurable twists and reversals director Bruce A. Evans and his writing partner Raynold Gideon have used to construct their tale. It may be easier to talk about where the movie does not go. Earl doesn’t turn on his family, he doesn’t stalk any one victim for a length of time and he and Atwood don’t develop obsessions with one another, sexual or otherwise: they’re very businesslike about the whole cat and mouse thing, especially as they’ve both got a variety of other problems. Mr. Brooks is complex and multi-layered enough to seem like an adaptation of a novel, but in fact, the screenplay is original. It’s based well in character, and if the writers feel the need to underscore their character themes in the dialogue a little heavily, they are at least talking about what we see for ourselves instead of showing rather than telling. Even the gimmick of giving Earl someone to banter with in the form of Marshall, which could have been precious, annoying or just plain silly, turns out to be an effective device, especially because Costner and Hurt find a common rhythm and play within it as though they’ve been bouncing off each other forever. This isn’t the standard good guy/bad guy split personality dynamic – it’s smart, somewhat amoral and occasionally worried guy/smarter, completely amoral and either serene or really perturbed guy, and it’s kind of a blast to watch.

Costner does his best work in quite awhile here, providing layers of charm, shrewdness, menace and anguish, while Moore is persuasively tough, Hurt is enjoyably tricksterish and Cook is intriguing, making us wonder how far ahead of or behind Brooks he really is.

Despite or perhaps because of the story’s strong construction, there are a couple of loose ends at the finale. Given the filmmakers’ stated themes, it’s understandable why they left one or two things open, but everything else pulls together so well for the finale that there’s a slight sense of incompletion. Even so, Mr. Brooks is one of the more intriguing, well-done and non-derivative examples of its kind to come along in awhile.

MR. BROOKS

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