I never would have thought that I could be bored watching a movie about a pair of serial killers. Born Killers changed all that, as it is easily the worst serial killer film I've ever seen. Surprisingly enough, this film starts out pretty good and slowly descends into being unwatchable. John & Michael were left to learn about life from their father, a complete psychopath, so it's no surprise, that they turned out to be killers as well. John (Jake Muxworthy) is the quiet, good looking, methodical one, while his brother Michael (Gabriel Mann), is reckless, leaving John to clean up his mess. After we get the back story on the brothers, and see them in action, they go their separate ways, and the story focuses on John. Jake Muxworthy plays the quiet killer, who eventually meets up with a girl. He falls in love and tries to put his killer urges behind him to live the normal life. Muxworthy was the only reason this film got a rating at all. The film lacked the action I was hoping for and just turned into one conversation after another, but Muxworthy was as advertised, as this good looking, methodical killer, who not only plans things down to the last detail, but who also narrates the story. Born Killers wasn't bad in a way where the movie didn't make sense, the problem was how boring and slow moving it was. After the initial action, nothing really happens except for a lot of people doing a lot of talking, and if that's all I wanted to see, I'd just hang out at the mall.

I thought the following two quotes were the most memorable in BORN KILLERS (aka PIGGY BANKS, which would have been a better title for this film, even apart from its use in the poignant father-sons sharing context which brought to mind Polonius' advice to Laertes in HAMLET, but which is truncated to meaninglessness in the "memorable quotes" section here):* * * QUOTE #1) Serial Killer John Vanderslip (his voice-over as he roams a store looking for masking tape--he comes back to Gertie's house with a roll of duct tape, of which she already had a shelf full, qualifying for inclusion in the movie "goofs" category): I'd ended hundreds of--I guess you'd say--human lives, and what good did it do? I wasn't rich, and I wasn't satisfied. Either there was some invisible purpose to my life, or there wasn't. I needed to find out if 'thinning the herd' was part of it, or if I could stop if I had an endless supply of cash. So I would put God to the test." (John then buys a lottery ticket--another goof, because this is supposed to be taking place, and actually is being filmed, in Salt Lake City, UT, and they don't sell lottery tickets there.)* * * QUOTE #2) John (after downing the fatally poisoned shot of Irish Creme his half-sister\lover Gertie has come back from the kitchen with): No more for me, please.Gertie: That one should do you.* * * I don't want to clutter the "memorable quotes" section with TWO of my own, so please vote "yes" for #1 or "no" for #2. Thank you. Voting ends one year from today (March 10, 2010).

I'm not much of a gore fan and once upon a midnight dreary I must have clicked this into my Blockbuster queue and it showed up in the mail. I didn't expect much. The best surprises are totally unexpected. This is most definitely NOT a cheap slasher movie, packaging aside.While the movie lacks the pizazz of Natural Born Killers, it is a very impressive and well acted movie that takes us on a horrifying trip that plumbs the depths of psychopathology. The very banality of the murderous lifestyles juxtaposed with the ordinary and almost attractive personalities (Gertie especially) of the characters is deeply disconcerting. You might find yourself asking if you might have tipped a few beers at a bar with any one of these and not realized how close you came to the personification of the deepest depths of evil. These are not the glamour figures of Bonnie and Clyde, nor the Robin Hood stereotypes, or the John Wayne Gacey perverts but a whole different breed of animal. Going into the more detail could ruin the plot. I'd recommend giving it a shot in first person.I also wonder who p.o'ed who in the marketing of this film. It's packaged as a cheap slasher movie which it definitely is not, and Blockbuster distributes it as "Born Killers" with no hint of an alternate title. But the IMDb doesn't even list that title (at the time this is written, and believe me I looked carefully). Try Googling it and you will find it hard to even locate a decent website for the film. Ironically I found the film by clicking on an advert on this site which took me to the movie at Amazon listing Piggy Banks as the alternative title. It's almost as if they don't want anybody to find out the secret.

I love it when I see a movie and it surprises me by being totally superior, and different, then what I was expecting. This film, about a young serial killer who is forced to confront the emptiness of his life, is not the clichéd blood fest the DVD cover, and the lame title ("Born Killers"? C'mon…), would have you believe.But don't get me wrong, because there is blood, murder and horror. The movie starts with two brothers in the prime of their careers as serial killers. Their father (a chilling Tom Sizemore, seen in flashback) taught them that people are "Piggy Banks" to be busted open for the loot. While Michael (a charmingly evil Gabriel Mann) gets off on the creepy sex part of their vocation, John (Jake Muxworthy, reminiscent of Kurt Cobain), the more cold-blooded of the two, just wants the cash.The brothers part ways, and John goes on an odyssey of self-discovery. What he finds is the enchanting Gertie (Lauren German), who may or may not be his sister. As John experiences deep feelings for another, he is shocked out of his moral abyss like a worm placed in the sun. John, always in control, begins to fall apart. It's as existential a piece of character development as I've seen, and it works. This film is packaged as a straight up exploitive slasher flick. It's not. There's no doubt that some will be disappointed by the way this film turns into something else. The killers don't crack jokes when taking lives, there isn't a race against the clock, a secret identity doesn't need to be revealed, and most of the killing is in the beginning. Director Morgan J. Freeman, probably best known for his break out Sundance debut Hurricane Streets, deserves a lot of credit. All the performances are outstanding, and even when the film gets cerebral, I was on the edge of my seat. It's a star turn by Jake Muxworthy, and Freeman isn't afraid to keep the camera on him. It's well paced, well shot (it has a cool bleach by-pass look for the flashbacks) and has locations that somehow evoke a serial killer paradise. This film deserves to be seen on it's own terms, and not as just another exploitive slasher film. Too bad the packaging and title are so deceptive.