Mindhunters (2005)

Mindhunters is an And Then There Were None type story about FBI trainees trapped on an island where one of them is a serial killer killing the others off in a series of Rube Goldberg machines so ludicrous they make Final Destination look restrained. Mindhunters is not a film you rent for a good time. It's something you rent for a laugh. In that area, it delivers. Don't get me wrong: this is a pretty terrible film. But it is fun. I Love murder mysteries and that automatically makes this watchable, especially as And Then There Were None is one of my favourite books of all time. It's got a good premise and the odd exciting set-piece, as well as some interesting ideas but mainly it gets by on being fun. Eventually the fun wears off during the disappointing finale. The movie does not make a hint of sense, Renny Harlin's misjudged direction makes the film look extremely artificial and over-stylized and the acting is weak as well. At the end of the day, it's a B movie. Mindhunters is sometimes exciting and tense but sadly fails to ever be genuinely scary or make you truly care about its characters. LL Cool J again proves to be a likable presence however. The main fun of Mindhunters is watching the utterly preposterous murder sequences and wondering how such an idiotic script was ever greenlit. It's quite fun and hardly terrible, although an argument that it's particularly good would be hard to construct or justify.4/10

If LL Cool J is in a film it means that acting skills are optional. The rest of the film requires you to believe that someone had the remarkable ability to set all the events up knowing the script in advance. Because the events that occur could only have happened if you could see the script in advance. So these clowns are supposed to be FBI agents. Yet vending machines magically dispense things in a highly suspicious fashion and the agent is not surprised by this? This is a true idiot's delight.Sadly this has every type of amateur associated with it. There are truly horrible elements created solely just to create screams from the audience. It probably took a crew time to set up that scene, but somehow we're supposed to believe that the killer was able to set up this entire elaborate scene all by himself. And then the great finale, which would have made Jacques Cousteau envious. It's a comedy in the absurd. Leave it to these clowns to take exaggeration to the max. It takes a special type of low talent hack to come up with this pitiful waste of film. I give it a 3 for the actors who try to do what they can with this script. They weren't terrible, just made to do some very dumb things.

Jake Harris (Val Kilmer) runs a training program for FBI profilers. It's above and beyond the normal gun training. He takes the team to Oniega Island off the coast of North Carolina to take part in a simulation. Philadelphia P.D. detective Gabe Jensen (LL Cool J) tag along to observe. They are assigned a serial killer called the Puppeteer. However the killings soon become real.It's an Agatha Christie murder mystery crossed with the modern trend of serial killer and FBI profilers. The problem is that it's so completely fake. I'm not saying murder mysteries are always about realism. There is something over the top ridiculous about this that drains the brains out of this thriller. I'm not invested in guessing who is the real killer. It becomes how crazy each perfectly timed kill gets. That has a bit of value but not that much.

"Mind hunters" is a thriller based on idea from famous Agatha Christie book. Ten people are left on isolated island . Soon there are mysterious deaths . Nobody can leave or enter the island , which means that the killer is someone from the group … The book is fantastic and is one of my favorite books. The psychological tension , the dark atmosphere , the shocking twists … Anyway the book has been adapted into movie and furthermore the whole idea of people left in isolated place with killer being one of them has appeared in countless thrillers . "Mind hunters" is one of them.Mind hunters are special FBI agents that specialize in making psychological profiles of serious killers . 6 of them plus one guest are supposed to train their skills on small island investigating fake case of serious killer . Soon , the murders become real and the have to figure out who is the killer.The movie is directed by Renny Harlin famous for "Die hard 2" , "Cliffhanger" and "The long kiss for goodnight" . I like him as an action director – he's a solid craftsman . Unfortunately he's one the biggest problems of the movie . He fails to create dark atmosphere and psychological tension which is so important in this kind of movie . The movie is certainly well paced and never boring , but it obviously lacks atmosphere . Harlin relies on cheap scary tactics that thousands of Hollywood craftsmen tried before. He's simply not a thriller director.The second problem is the script. Our heroes are barely written and mostly defined by their skills , not character . We have 7 characters , yet none of them is either particularly interesting. It's hard to chose your favorite , someone you love or hate . "Mind hunters" never involve you emotionally to what is happening in the movie. It keeps you interested , but never really experiencing the movie , never really caring for characters.The screenplay has some nice twists , humor and dialogue . Sadly near the end it becomes almost an action movie with obviously too long fights and shootouts . The motivation for killer to kill is logical , yet very unoriginal. And some of the knowledge and brilliance of characters seems a stretch.I had problem with the acting . Val Kilmer gives the best performance in the movie , but he appears for 5 minutes only . All the rest including Christian Slater and LL Cool J don't offer anything special . Except for some very bad on-liners ("Lights out ") coming from LL Cool J.With a better director , cast and few changes in the screenplay this could be a great thriller . For me it's a decent popcorn movie . I give it 5/10.