Mr Brooks

STOP! SPOILERS BE HERE!

The following is a bit of a review of "Mr Brooks", a film I saw last night. The reason that most of it is not yet visible is because simply by saying whether or not I liked it, I'm liable to give away much of the plot. So, you've been warned.


"Mr Brooks" SPOILERS FOLLOW
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First things first: I liked the movie. Although the plot twists weren't huge, and there were a dozen stories being told and Dane Cook was in it, I liked the movie. That's of course not surprising, considering that in the end the killer gets away with it and Dane Cook's character is six feet under. Literally! I like that. I don't want all movies to be morality tales. I don't need to learn a lesson every time I go to the movies. The bad guy is allowed to win. It's OK. And of course any time an annoying asshole like Dane Cook gets killed, I'm happy.

That being said, the movie does have faults. First, there are too many stories being told: everyone has a story and none of them are explored entirely. Earl's daughter is one of the main characters, in terms of impact, but barely anything is mentioned about her motivations or feelings. Why did she kill that guy? Give me more details! Considering the importance she has to the plot, it's very odd that the entire subplot of Mr Brooks committing a look-alike murder is shown in the span of a minute, mostly as he's traveling to and from the airport. Did Jane kill the father of her baby because he refused to even acknowledge the child? Or does she actually have the mental "condition" of her father?

Second, too many characters. We get introduced to a number of characters who have a total of 30 seconds on-screen time. Atwood's father is mentioned in a bit of detail but nothing ends up happening in the end. For obvious reasons, sure, but it's still a valid point.

Lets return to the highlights, though. I'm a little wired right now and my brain is a bit jumpy, I apologize for the inconvenience.

Mr Brooks is one evil badass. He is already in my Top 10 list of Evil Fictional Characters. BTW, that list is populated by the likes of Darth Vader, Hannibal Lecter, Verbal Kint, God and Hans Gruber. Marshall is superbly played by William Hurt. One of his better performances, I think. That, and his role in "Dark City".

The film has very few glaringly obvious plot holes, at this point. I usually spend a few days analyzing a film after watching it, but so far I haven't hit on anything serious. Not like "Fracture", which oozed with bad plot and mistakes. Right now, the only thing I can think of as being wrong was said by Mr Brooks: he mentioned that because Dane Cook's character peed himself in the victim's house, the police will be able to track him down by DNA. That's not accurate: urine is sterile and has no human cells in it to identify a suspect by, so unless the character was actually urinating blood, the police would still have nothing to go on. But, I didn't mention this mistake in the faults section. Why not? In all likelihood, Mr Brooks was lying. He needed a good reason to convince Dane Cook's character to kill him, and a threat of jail or even the death penalty is a very good reason. This threat is only effective if the police actually have a way to link Dane Cook's character to the murders. Mr Brooks is smart enough to know that urine wouldn't be that link, but who knows about the man with the weak-bladder?

Finally, and this is something I discovered after watching the film, it's apparently the first of a trilogy. I'm happy to hear that. There is still so much to find out about Earl and Marshall. And Jane. And her baby. I just hope that the sequels don't take too long. I'm not that patient.

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