It's not as bad as most of the negative reviewers say, but the movie does strain credibility in a number of areas. Could a guy like Jack Verdon (Ray Liotta) score with over a hundred women over the course of his lifetime? Possible, but given his charisma, or lack of it in this film, not likely. Even worse was the attitude of FBI agent Vuckovitch (Christian Slater). You think that's how the agency trains it's personnel to conduct suspect interviews? The guy was abhorrent, while Verdon's boss Art Langley (Ving Rhames) simply stood there doling out dirty looks.
There's a creepy aspect to the entire story with the murderer's method of leaving a calling card, and gets even creepier when we zero in on his real identity. You can probably see it coming with the flashback scene of Jack and his very first moment of intimacy and it's resultant fallout. The title, which might have taken it's inspiration from 2003's "Mystic River", has very little to do with the main story except for the first couple of victims before it takes on a wider perspective.
The one character I felt bad about was Jack's partner Jenny (Sarah Ann Schultz); I never expected her to become one of the murderer's victims. In any other picture the hero might have popped up just in time to make the save, so that was a bummer. Even more so than finding out she was on Jack's long list of one night stands.
There's a creepy aspect to the entire story with the murderer's method of leaving a calling card, and gets even creepier when we zero in on his real identity. You can probably see it coming with the flashback scene of Jack and his very first moment of intimacy and it's resultant fallout. The title, which might have taken it's inspiration from 2003's "Mystic River", has very little to do with the main story except for the first couple of victims before it takes on a wider perspective.
The one character I felt bad about was Jack's partner Jenny (Sarah Ann Schultz); I never expected her to become one of the murderer's victims. In any other picture the hero might have popped up just in time to make the save, so that was a bummer. Even more so than finding out she was on Jack's long list of one night stands.