Now Playing
Critics & Publications
Archives: A-Z Index
Advanced Search

Upcoming Release Calendar
Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
How Metascores Are Calculated
Discuss Film In Our Forums

sort by name

sort by score

38 12 Rounds
48 17 Again
76 Adventureland
48 Angels & Demons
54 Battle for Terra
xx Bruno
80 Coraline
40 Dance Flick
83 Drag Me to Hell
72 Earth
45 Fast & Furious
61 Fighting
34 Ghosts of Girlfriends Past
72 Gran Torino
73 Hangover, The
47 Hannah Montana: The Movie
51 Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
54 Imagine That
41 Knowing
32 Land of the Lost
56 Monsters vs. Aliens
34 My Life in Ruins
51 My Sister's Keeper
46 Next Day Air
42 Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian
54 Observe and Report
25 Obsessed
48 Proposal, The
70 Public Enemies
61 Soloist, The
83 Star Trek
64 State of Play
55 Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, The
52 Terminator Salvation
35 Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
77 Under the Sea 3D
88 Up
43 X-Men Origins: Wolverine
34 Year One

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

sort by name

sort by score

67 $9.99
75 24 City
66 Adoration
74 Afghan Star
48 Alien Trespass
56 American Violet
82 Anvil! The Story of Anvil
57 Away We Go
81 Beaches of Agnes, The
62 Big Man Japan
28 Big Shot-Caller, The
78 Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story, The
55 Brothers Bloom, The
82 Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country
xx Call of the Wild
63 Cheri
62 Cherry Blossoms
63 Dead Snow
65 Departures
18 Downloading Nancy
58 Easy Virtue
70 End of the Line, The
77 Every Little Step
64 Examined Life
80 Food, Inc.
38 Gigantic
56 Girl from Monaco, The
67 Girlfriend Experience, The
87 Gomorrah
89 Goodbye Solo
63 Great Buck Howard, The
79 Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
xx Home
82 Hunger
91 Hurt Locker, The
16 I Hate Valentine's Day
81 Il Divo
54 Is Anybody There?
71 Jerichow
58 Julia
74 Lemon Tree
36 Life is Hot in Cracktown
40 Limits of Control, The
42 Little Ashes
64 Lymelife
50 Management
57 Merry Gentleman, The
66 Moon
35 New York
62 Not Forgotten
xx Offshore
78 O'Horten
64 Outrage
40 Paris 36
54 Pontypool
71 Pressure Cooker
52 Quiet Chaos
83 Revanche
67 Rudo y Cursi
86 Seraphine
65 Sex Positive
70 Shall We Kiss?
77 Sin Nombre
59 Sleep Dealer
74 Song of Sparrows, The
54 Stoning of Soraya M., The
82 Sugar
84 Summer Hours
61 Sunshine Cleaning
28 Surveillance
42 Tennessee
63 Tetro
64 Throw Down Your Heart
80 Tokyo Sonata
63 Tokyo!
70 Tony Manero
74 Treeless Mountain
88 Tulpan
74 Two Lovers
83 Tyson
83 U2 3D
60 Under Our Skin
69 Unmistaken Child
69 Valentino: The Last Emperor
22 What Goes Up
45 Whatever Works
57 Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Suspect Zero
Paramount Pictures


6.2

based on 29 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 14 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

FILM:

Shadow of the Vampire

MPAA RATING: R for violent content, language and some nudity

Starring Aaron Eckhart, Ben Kingsley, Carrie-Anne Moss, Harry J. Lennix, Kevin Chamberlin, Julian Reyes, Keith Campbell, and Chloe Russell

A thriller about an FBI agent tracking down a serial killer who targets serial killers.

GENRE(S):	Crime \| Drama \| Horror \| Suspense/Thriller
WRITTEN BY:	Zak Penn (also story) Billy Ray
DIRECTED BY:	E. Elias Merhige
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: April 12, 2005 Video: April 12, 2005 Theatrical: August 27, 2004
RUNNING TIME:	110 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas

Merhige understands how exciting going to the edge of credibility can be without falling off, and he has the bravura talent and imagination needed to pull off the sheer, hurtling audacity of Suspect Zero.

Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan

With its spooky atmosphere to spare and a riveting central performance by Kingsley, an actor who manages to elicit both terror and sympathy, I was able to forget all those things, basking in the pleasure of my own goose bumps. So, for an hour and a half, will you.

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

The script isn't really good enough to worry about whether it's being over-directed; in fact, E. Elias Merhige's over-direction is one of the best things about this movie--along with Ben Kingsley's grimly unstoppable killer-of-killers, Benjamin O'Ryan.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

The trouble is that the plot is so elliptical to be almost unfollowable (though it helps to have seen the trailer).

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Suspect Zero has enough going for it to eventually develop a cult following. But compared to "Silence of the Lambs" and "Seven," it's still the minor leagues.

Wall Street Journal Jim Fusilli

Directed by E. Elias Merhige, the film is never less than entertaining, but Sir Ben's portrayal of a sympathetic psychopath gives it a special zing.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

A novel twist in the second half succeeds in distinguishing this from the pack but also wrenches it away from the meager characters.

Dallas Observer Gregory Weinkauf

Merhige is too talented to be dismissed as a wannabe, but here his gifts for clever angles and oogy feelings are tethered to blasé genre redundancies and clunky storytelling. Looks great, less thrilling. I blame the screenwriters.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

The truth is, the freakiness kinda turns the director on, and he nearly strangles Suspect Zero with love.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

Kingsley gets the film's one big emotional scene and makes it count.

Miami Herald Peter Debruge

Ultimately the story of someone who preys on other serial killers, but can't seem to come up with an original way in which to do it.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

Fails to provide one essential ingredient: suspense.

San Francisco Chronicle Carla Meyer

It's merely adequate, with one riveting element but limited chills.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

Eckhart, who gets more rugged by the picture, certainly works hard to bring the audience along. But he's a nervous wreck for nothing. This movie isn't talking to us, it's talking to other serial killer movies.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

There's a point at which its enigmatic flashes of incomprehensible action grow annoying, and a point at which we realize that there's no use paying close attention, because we won't be able to figure out the film's secrets until they're explained to us.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

When, in its eventful final act, Merhige finally reveals what this thing is REALLY all about, it comes not with any blissful storytelling satisfaction but a grinding sense that this strange movie is a structural mess.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

Given nothing to do, Carrie-Anne Moss looks on from the sidelines as the film halfheartedly toys with the tired old notion that only a thin line separates the dogged investigator and the compulsive killer. She looks bored, and she should.

Variety Brian Lowry

A plodding and familiar "cop sees what the killer sees" riff that plays like a poorly inflated "The X-Files" episode.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

The clichéd and predictable Suspect Zero is the latest evidence that Hollywood has run the serial-killer thriller into the ground through overuse - the same way it earlier exhausted, say, buddy action-comedies.

USA Today Claudia Puig

The movie's premise is as dopey as they come: A serial killer with a conscience is killing other serial killers.

TV Guide Ethan Alter

It's not easy to make a thriller that's both incredibly convoluted and intensely boring, but director E. Elias Merhige scores on both counts with this lame excuse for a spooky crime story.

Film Threat Jeremy Knox

The movie contains not one surprise, not one shock, not one scare, not one bit of interest for any moviegoer over the age of ten (mentally or physically).

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

Suspect Zero is loaded with cheap thrills for the expensively educated.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

None of the principals is remotely likable--although Kingsley does appear to enjoy swanning around the great Southwest like a low-rent Anthony Hopkins.

Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell

Among the lamest serial-killer movies ever made.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

Preposterous, physically hideous paranormal thriller.

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

Finally, a serial-killer movie so preposterous, so garnished with accidental laugh lines and absent essential narrative logic it may actually put a permanent kibosh on this tediously overworked crime subgenre. Here's hoping, at any rate.

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

Instead of building suspense and tension, Suspect Zero devotes its efforts to creating a weird and creepy milieu that will leave fans of police procedurals wanting and avant-garde enthusiasts scratching their heads.

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

A grisly, depraved and wholly uninvolving exercise in empty mannerism.

The average user rating for this movie is 6.2 (out of 10) based on 14 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Amar T gave it an8:
I dunno abt all the -ve reviews, but i thought this was an interesting flick.

richard m. gave it a7:
Wife and I had read other user reviews as well as the critics before viewing and expected to be disappointed. No way! It was slow to grab us but it did and then some. Unusual, spooky and definitely worth watching.

Greg gave it a6:
Ben Kingsley - yes. This movie - no.

Rick M gave it an8:
Good movie. Well filmed. Intriguing story line.

Ronald T gave it an8:
Not a total waste of time. More like an independently written episode of the X-files, complete with government conspiracy and a sci-fi twist.

Les B. gave it an8:
Actually I thought it was pretty good.

Michael M. gave it a 5:
Hard to follow thriller, that barely keeps you awake through the entirety of the film. Aaron Eckhard does an okay job as the smart police detective, but Carrie-Anne Moss does the same character she played in The Matrix. The real highlight is Ben Kingsley's extraordinary performance (as usual) -- but he isn't featured throughout the movie. The feature tries to be too much like 1995's masterpiece "Se7en". But it's not. The only eye-opening scene in the whole movie, is the ending showdown between Kingsley's crazed serial killer and Eckhart's haunted detective, that surprisingly packs a pretty strong emotional punch. When all is said in down, it's safe to skip it in the theaters and wait for DVD.

Suspect Zero Paramount Pictures

Suspect Zero
Paramount Pictures