Lou Ford is a deputy sheriff in a small West Texas town and he was sent to investigate a girl named Joyce. He winds up in a sexual relationship with Joyce even though he is engaged to a local girl named Amy. Lou and Joyce decide to kill Joyce's boyfriend, a powerful citizen. Apart from this plan Lou has some different ideas in his mind. The film tells the story of a serial killer and also contains some controversial scenes of violence against women. Affleck's performance as Lou Ford was quite interesting, at the same time he nicely handles the mental and physical behavior of Lou. Even though Jessica and Kate Hudson shares few intimate scenes with Affleck, Both succeed in fascinating the viewers. Overall, the film has some violent scenes and only recommended to those who can handle it.

I was enjoying this, how much better it was than a previous attempt to film this book (which I recalled as one of my fave suspense novels). Then I found myself in the middle of a scene of such gorific brutality I was left wondering who, what could have made the tale - or the audience - deserve such a thing.I wondered so much I actually re-read the 244-page book.Ah, what a difference 20-plus years can make. Then I read it straight through, unable to put it down. This time it took over a month."Killer" tells the story of a man who murders to settle an old family score. On the one hand. On the other, he also obviously gets quite a kick out of it. Then he goes on a killing spree trying to cover up the first murders. He kills everyone he loves the most, and tosses a few he hates into the mix as well. Much to the disadvantage of everyone in town, he's the trusted deputy sheriff.I was struck by how little Casey Affleck seemed to inhabit the role of Deputy Lou Ford, but checking the original source, there isn't much there to begin with. Reasons why he kills seem limited to the fact that he's a character in a seedy story with a title to live up to and copies to sell. Reason often falls by the wayside - like the murder victims - as author Jim Thompson keeps his vision of small-town life limited to only the ugliest, darkest elements. In this kind of potboiler vision of life, the writer has to keep the pot stirring to distract you from wondering about things like 'how?' and 'why?', such wonderings having a tendency to make things fall apart.Thompson could clearly put together an intricately-woven crime story, and populate a fictional small town with believable types that instantly resonate. His nihilistic vision seems refreshing at first - hypocrisies are exploded; everything we usually try to push to the back of our minds is front and center. But I get bored with it all pretty quick, and feel kind of cheated; like I'd bought a prism to explore the color spectrum of light, but got stuck with a defective one that only shows the color black.The filmmakers use their considerable skills to put us right in the middle of the scene where Affleck beats Jessica Alba (Joyce Lakeland) to death. I wish such talent and thought could have been applied towards a deeper exploration of the main character driving all this. Vacant as he is, we're on a ride with a driver who's asleep at the wheel.

Michael Winterbottom's The Killer Inside Me is one of the most flat out disturbing films ever made under the sun, even if only for a few brief, harrowing sequences encased in a lurid, laconic, southern fried oddity of a story that defies genre confinement while still planting vague roots in crime drama. When the sequences I speak of show up, and you'll know exactly when, it takes you right off guard and immediately notifies you that the film has no intentions of towing a line within anyone's comfort zone. It's an odd story for someone to strive to tell, and one wonders what inky black corners of the psyche that Jim Thompson was spellunking in when he scribed the novel on which this is based. It starts off conventionally enough, under the prosperous sun of the West Texas desert in the heat of the 1950's. Sheriff's Deputy Lou Ford (Casey Affleck) is a regular enough guy, tasked with rousing a local prostitute (Jessica Alba) living in nearby suburbia. He also deals with the dodgy real estate kingpin Chester Conway (a blustery Ned Beatty) and his cronies. He's also got a cute fiancé (Kate Hudson). He's calm, cool and connected, right up until the part where he turns out to be a certifiable grade A murdering psychopath. Affleck let's the authoritarian composure bleed away and reveal the layers of evil beneath, until we begin to wonder if the film we are watching has been interrupted by someone taping over it with something far darker. But no... it's the same movie. It just veers into territory we didn't expect and may be taken aback by. Affleck discovers the psychopath within himself, and fits inside the characteristics like a glove. The first person to stray into his path is Alba, and there's a sequence where he gives her a royal, merciless, and bloody beatdown that will shiver your spine in its blunt, head-on realism. It's seriously stomach churning stuff, and levels off both the film and Affleck's role in pure stone cold seriousness. He's a budding lunatic, made all the more dangerous by bis position of power within law enforcement and shielded by his trustworthy reputation. The film resists generic story beats, and instead meanders about, diligently following Affleck from encounter to macabre encounter, discovering his dark interior nature without much rhyme or reason as far as conventional plot goes. This has a wickedly prolific cast for such a risky film, with fine work from Bill Pullman, Brent Briscoe, Tom Bower, Simon Baker and the ever reliable Elias Koteas who adds to the cumulative unease. It's Affleck's shown though, and he splinters nerves with his unpredictable, hollow and fascinating portrait of a psychopath. Soon we begin to wonder what he sees and heats is real, as characters he interacts with seem to come back from the dead and knowingly coach him towards trouble in trademark indications of serious mental distrbance. This one arrives at it's end severely south of where it started from, taking the viewer off guard. Those who appreciate the tantalizing, prickly nature of a thriller that isn't afraid to seriously shake up your nerves and take you places you've only been to on clammy nightmares will appreciate it. Just mentally psych yourself up for that scene I mentioned, because it will scar you and then some.

If this film is marked by nothing else, it's poor quality. Poor acting. No, I don't find Casey's poor excuse for a Texas accent convincing. Nor do I find Kate's or Jessica's performances very convincing, not that it says much. I mean, what do you expect from those two? They're not exactly the type of actresses one would cast in a role which requires authenticity. But that doesn't even scratch the surface regarding how inaccurate the film is in terms of its appearance. Alba doesn't strike me as a convincing Texan during this time period. One may look to the goofs section to see what other errors were made during filming. I know this is a low-budget b-movie but the glaring inaccuracies cannot be overlooked. In terms of a b- movie, TKIM is okay. In terms of a feature film it practically sucks. Too much confusion. Like many other people, I thought the child Lou was in the back of a car with a boy. The shot was so quick and I didn't care to freeze frame it to determine whether it was a girl. I don't recall the film making it clear enough who the chick was who gave Lou lessons in BDSM, lucky devil. I bet every straight guy who watches this film wishes they had childhood experiences like that! I do!! Overall, there's nothing remarkable about TKIM except, perhaps, the excessive violence. I don't object to violence in film but I believe the Joyce beating went on too long and was entirely unrealistic. Even a little pussy like Casey Affleck would knock down a chick with a few punches ... or less. How can Joyce just stand there and get clobbered? It's unreal. The actors and director took no care to make the scene look realistic, but instead let it drag on too long, eventually showing Joyce's grotesquely disfigured face. I didn't like the book either. It's not that it's a terrible story per se, but the book is the textual equivalent of a b-movie. It's terribly written. Some have referred to the book and movie as "noir" but they lack any of the elements we would expect to see in noir, except, perhaps, the time period, and Lou Ford's deep cynicism.