The Killer Inside Me (2010) trailer

[Steve-O]

wow... Here's the trailer for The Killer Inside of Me.

Edit: the HD Trailer was pulled...



A few warnings: This is NOT SAFE FOR WORK. It has sex and violence toward women. If you don't wanna see that kind of stuff don't watch. It also gives away a lot of the plot if you haven't read the book. But I have to say it looks promising.

[Steve-O]

Interesting post on The Killer Inside Me...

I didn't expect a controversy-free debut for The Killer Inside Me at Sundance, and it sure didn't get one. If you saw the lengthy trailer (more of a sizzle reel, truthfully), then you know the very dark film noir was sure to cause a commotion. Rough, rough sex, maybe even hateful sex, highlighted the video, and we saw Jessica Alba being punched and slapped by an angry Casey Affleck, among other notably intense scenes.

http://www.getthebigpicture.net/blog...ds-at-ifc.html

[David]

Looks interesting, thanks.. I've thought that Casey Affleck was a pretty terrific actor for a while now.

[Steve-O]

Jessica Alba Defends 'Killer Inside Me' Violence At NYC Premiere

Our own Mappin & Webb Ltd. is has been at the Tribeca Film Festival and writing lots of reviews. I'm hoping he can write something about the film for us.

Best quote:

Affleck, the flick's male lead, said he'd never been a huge fan of the film-noir genre. "It was never a big thing for me," he said. "Obviously, I like old movies. I like all kinds of movies. There are some people that are real super film-noir geeks, lovers, and I'm not one of those people."

[David]

Jessica Alba Defends 'Killer Inside Me' Violence At NYC Premiere

Our own Mappin & Webb Ltd. is has been at the Tribeca Film Festival and writing lots of reviews. I'm hoping he can write something about the film for us.

Best quote:

..I withdraw my kind words.

[Steve-O]

Here's that Killer Inside Me (with plenty of NSFW action and spoilers)


and the 1976 version (Jessica Alba is an upgrade...)



and here's Tim's (M&W) take on the 2010 version.

[Mappin & Webb Ltd.]

You can click on the link Steve provided in his previous post to read my very short take on the film which basically sums up my thoughts (keep in mind the audience I was writing for as they’re obviously not noir aficionados like our knowledgeable kind here at BAN.) I will add by saying I thought the cast overall was sturdy, especially a surprisingly fine performance turned in by Kate Hudson. The big misstep in this department was adding Jessica Alba. She had a difficult time with portraying her character in a convincing and compelling manner, which I understand are fairly essential skills needed to be a competent actress. Additionally she simply didn’t look like a rural West Texas prostitute, more like, well, Jessica Alba. I understand the Hollywood A-List cache a star like her can provide for a film, but the trade-off is she looked and felt very out of place.

Casey Affleck was solid, however I didn’t appreciate the direction both he and Director Michael Winterbottom steered the Lou Ford character. Affleck‘s portrayal became more heavy-handed with the arrogance and deviousness of Ford in the last act. This was not completely absent from Ford’s character in the book, but Thompson didn’t convey it as being so broad and obvious. It came off as territory we’ve all seen before.

While I could go into further detail with the cinematography (it was fine and only that) and other aspects of “The Killer Inside Me”, what surprised me most about the film was how boring it was overall. Nothing anchors it down, be it a particular performance, visual style or tension building aspects of script; It never seemed to embrace the material and make it pop - even in the now infamous beating scene.

No matter how faithful an adaptation of Thompson you render it’s not always going to translate well to the big screen. There’s a significant difference between seeing Jessica Alba being brutally pummeled for three minutes straight and having her face caved in, and reading Thompson’s description of the same scene: “I backed her against the wall, slugging, and it was like pounding a pumpkin. Hard, then everything giving way at once.” Thompson conveys so much grizzly imagery and tactile description in those two short sentences that I begin to question what was going through the mind of Winterbottom when he committed his translation of the scene to film. He professes to just simply being true to the material when questioned about the scene. Of course it’s subjective and questionable as to how much Winterbottom was being true to Thompson’s original material. Trying to duplicate it page by page may not necessarily make for a good film, however, Thompson’s work definitely deserves much, much better.

[Richard]

I welcome a remake -- or a new take -- of The Killer Inside Me, one of Thompson's best novels, but from what I read above I'm not so sure.
I see a lot of mis-guided judgment and misdirection in films. There's a way to do violence that tells the story without making audiences feel sick.
Jessica Alba is a very capable actress in the right role.


Richard

[Richard]

and the 1976 version (Jessica Alba is an upgrade...)

Susan Tyrell is believable and poignant playing a prostitute.
She was a really good actress who always projected a kind of worn-down working-class resignation.

But I can't believe in Jessica Alba playing this particular role.
A high-class hooker among the big-city jet-set, maybe; but a prostitute in rural Texas, never.

As for the whippings and beatings, remember, this is the director of 9 Songs doing his riff on Uwe Ball.
I think I'll skip it.

Richard

edit:
I love it when the IMDb tells us the emulsions: Fuji Super F-64D 8522, Eterna 250D 8563, Eterna 500T 8573.
Also, a $13,000,000 budget is extremely low and commendably practical by today's industry standard.
but I could shoot the average Jim Thompson novel for under a million and there'd be no difference in quality.

[Steve-O]

Oh... Tyrell is certainly a better actress.

[David]

As is all too common the case, I came away from this film wondering not whether or not I liked it but "why did they bother?"
Absolutely unexceptional in every way, in my opinion - and as far as I'm concerned it was Affleck who was the weakest link.
Rather than conveying a normal, unsuspicious guy on the surface - he appears fairly creepy at all times(!) At least that's
how I saw him. Not a complaint against his acting, but his casting. Keach seemed a better fit to me.

And man, that beating scene is one rough watch. Took me a while to shake it.

[Andrew666]

Michael Winterbottom is one of those extraordinary film-makers - an auteur. He divides his time between really important left-wing movies that everyone should see such as Genova, A Mighty Heart and The Road to Guantanamo - and more commercial movies that still leave your jaw dropping in terms of style and depth - The Killer Inside Me is one of those.

Based on Jim Thompson's classic, it shows Casey Affleck in his finest role to date - as a bipolar psychotic killer, who also happens to be the local sheriff. But it's Jessica Alba and Kate Hudson who astound in roles that you wouldn't think they could carry off - but they surely do. Jessica, in particular, is having an amazing year as she's also in the brutal Rodriguez drive-in classic Machete.

Michael is already working on his next, the tale of a psychic who has had a vision of her own death by one of two men that she knows - if only she could work out which one it was...London Fields is due out next year. Meanwhile, enjoy the feast of nostalgia and noir that The Killer Inside Me presents.



Jessica and Casey in The Killer Inside Me

[Davidmk]

Well i finally saw this one tonight , Rented it from Redbox , Quite the Brutal film for sure , some of those scenes will stay with me for a few days ..... Overall i liked the film , not sure it's something i'd watch again , but it was worth seeing once .
I liked the acting , parts of it did miss at times , but overall it worked for me ...

[Steve-O]

it's out on DVD so I finally watched it. Alba is miscast (she's not that bad of an actress... but this isn't a good fit for her). Kate Hudson was very good (as M&W mentions above). Overall, I thought the movie looked good but it wasn't easy to follow even if you read the book. The violence was in-your-face brutal. I get what Winterbottom was trying to say... but it didn't make watching a couple of brutal beatings any more watchable. From what I remember about the novel there wasn't a love story... or a back story about goings on with his sexy stepmother in it. The film overall looked stunning and the performances were better than most movies. But the rest was a bit of a mess.

[Davidmk]

Yeh , i have to say almost 2 weeks later those Violence scenes still do bother me quite a bit , they really went for it , I do gove Jessica alba for giving it a go & thought she was not half bad , but a bit uncomfortable & out of place at times , now that i have sat with the movie in my head for a bit , Kate hudson was great , that scene in the house with the Violence was another tough part to watch .
I agree the look of the film is pretty amazing , looks a lot like it was shot on the 70's , the whole look & feel was very well done .
Funny , we were out shopping tonight & Walmart stocks & sells this movie ! funny how they won't sell cd's with swears on them , but they sell movies like this ...... makes no sense .

[Keith]

I turned it off after 30 minutes in, maybe I wasn't in the right mood. For some reason I felt like I was watching something pointless. The opening credits were great but the film just had a bland feel to it mix with the in-your-face violence just was a turn off, don't get me wrong I watch a lot of violent films but it just didn't do it for me. Maybe I'll give it another shot later.

[Christina Delassalle]

I call these types of movies, with the EXCESSIVE violence and brutality..”seat squirmiers.” There was a lot of “oh jeeezsus” being said by us.
We almost watched it when we were eating pizza, we sure dodged a bullet there, not a good dinner movie by any means!

I have to say Casey Affleck can play a disturbed and disturbing character really well. But it was like a Boy Scout gone bad, really bad.

I spent most of the movie just waiting for Bill Pullman to show up.

Jessica Alba didn’t work at all for me in her role. But do have to say I was quite pleased and surprised with Kate Hudson.

I was really excited to finally watch this film, but was left with a bad taste in my mouth. Not so sure I’d recommend this to any of my friends, I was really hoping for a lot more and didn’t get it. And what I did get I didn't like.

They sure had a bunch of great cars though!