Review of Copycat (1995) by Sam I — 30 Dec 2006
Serial killer movies are a dime a dozen and, coming on the heels of one of the genre's defining masterworks; Se7en, Copycat had a tough act to follow.
In a prologue serial killer expert Helen Hudson (Weaver) is attacked by Darryl Lee Cullum (Connick Jr). A year later Hudson hasn't left her apartment since the attack but has been calling the police to offer help with what she thinks is a new serial case. As it becomes clear that this new killer has some obsession with Hudson she works with Inspector MJ Monahan (Hunter) and her partner (Mulroney) to catch him.
Copycat, at its heart, is a formulaic and not especially interesting serial killer/cop movie. Jon Amiel directs well, but not remarkably.
This is one movie whose success can be put, almost wholly, down to its cast.
Sigourney Weaver is excellent as the anxiety plagued expert who has come too close to her subject for comfort at once haggard enough that you can believe she's been shut in her apartment for a year and attractive enough that her relationship to Muroney isn't much of a leap.
It's Holly Hunter who owns this movie though. In a role written for a male she's just terrific. Tough, funny, sexy and smart. She impresses from the off with a great intro on a firing range that lays out the character perfectly from her toughness to her sense of fun.
All movie serial killers need a hook (a figurative hook, this isn't I Know What You Did Last Summer) and here it is that the killer is mimicking, to the smallest detail, the methods of serials who have gone before him. It's executed in nasty, but never exploitative, fashion, dwelling not in the violence but its aftermath.
It's a crying shame when, following a genuinely surprising twist, Copycat dies in its third act. The ending is as standard and as dull a chase as I've seen and it seriously hurts the movie leaving you longing for the smart resolution of something like Se7en.
If you like a good police procedural then you'll enjoy this, but watch it for the great acting rather than the story.
This review of Copycat (1995) was written by Sam I on 30 Dec 2006.
Copycat has generally received positive reviews.
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