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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
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Taking Lives
EMAILPRINTWarner Bros. Pictures Inc.

Generally unfavorable reviews
Based on 35 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 21 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Action | Crime | Drama | Suspense/Thriller
Written by:
Jon Bokenkamp (also screen story)
Michael Pye (novel)
Directed by: D.J. Caruso
Release Date:
Theatrical: March 19, 2004
DVD: August 17, 2004
Running Time: minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: R for strong violence including disturbing images, language and some sexuality
Starring Angelina Jolie, Ethan Hawke, Kiefer Sutherland, Gena Rowlands, Olivier Martinez, Tchéky Karyo, and Jean-Hugues Anglade
FBI profiler Special Agent Illeana Scott (Jolie) suddenly finds herself on a twisted and terrifying journey, surrounded by suspects in a case that has become chillingly personal. (Warner Bros.)
Also On Metacritic
FILM: Disturbia The Salton Sea Two for the Money
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
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...
Variety Todd McCarthy
A somber, absorbing thriller that treads familiar psycho serial killer terrain with style. Elegantly made and comparatively restrained in cramming sick and grisly stuff down the audience's throat.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
A certain genre of thriller depends more upon style and tone than upon plot; it doesn't matter if you believe it walking out, as long as you were intrigued while it was happening.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Stephen Cole
If only Taking Lives had given Jolie a greater foil than Ethan Hawke -- a young Kevin Spacey or Jack Nicholson say -- the film might have been a B-movie classic.
Read Full Review >New York Post Megan Lehmann
Smarter than your average serial-killer movie, thanks to unusually fleshed-out characters inhabited by a high- pedigree cast.
Read Full Review >ReelViews James Berardinelli
The movie voids a lot of good will with a cheesy ending. This is just the kind of denouement I was hoping Taking Lives wouldn't sink to, yet it does.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt
Clearly, much care and intelligence have been lavished on discouraging, routine material.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Dana Stevens
From a technical standpoint, Taking Lives is competent and sometimes even impressive. It is cleanly edited and nicely shot -- at times as cool and rich as a York Peppermint Pattie. Beyond that, there is not much to say.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
By the time we get to the unsurprising surprise ending, what seemed innovative and challenging in Taking Lives has lost its juice and reverted to formula form, and we leave the theater with that same old let-down feeling of having endured a ritual one more time.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Carla Meyer
The tense, stylish thriller turns into soft-core, slapdash psychodrama.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jami Bernard
Ho-hum, another serial-killer thriller. Even with Angelina Jolie thrown in for forensic sex appeal, this dog won't hunt.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Stina Chyn
Has a lot going for it, but two-thirds of the way through, things fall apart. The films weaknesses are directly tied to the narrative.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
If Taking Lives starts off with a modicum of wit and creepy-crawly scares, it winds up somewhere else altogether: in the cliche-strewn land of preposterous red herrings.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
No amount of technical skill can substitute for genuine shivers, and in the fright department this picture rarely lives up to its hype.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
This multiple-twist thriller gets off to a fine, creepy start but eventually becomes too preposterous for its own good.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
After ''Seven'' and three ''Hannibal'' hits, the audience tolerance for baroque serial-killer flourishes has been duly amped. We require sustained creativity in our sick violence, and Taking Lives, after a token bit of ghastly foreplay, loses its life.
Read Full Review >Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
By the pseudo-shocking end, we're half-entertained by the dedicated cast and half-lulled to sleep by the dull, overfamiliar sounds they make.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps
Sadly, Taking Lives, adapted from a novel by Michael Pye, proves to be one long wallow in elements that have long since had their effectiveness dulled flat.
Read Full Review >Slate David Edelstein
Caruso is a much more resourceful director than this material deserves, but I resented being two steps ahead of the genius profiler and the genius serial-killer.
Read Full Review >Empire Jo Berry
It's not hard to figure it out, but Caruso manages to throw in some tense moments that almost -- but sadly not quite -- make up for the film's daft ending.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum
On the plus side, it isn't boring, and Jolie and Ethan Hawke, who plays an art dealer and key witness, generate a certain amount of edgy chemistry. But eventually the filmmakers' desire to shock and tease overtakes any feeling for character or common sense.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Manohla Dargis
It's slick nonsense at best and for the first hour it's watchable. There's cheap entertainment to be had from a thriller in which two detectives are played by beauties as ravishing as Jolie and Martinez.
Read Full Review >Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
The serial-killer thriller of the week, should have gotten a life of its own instead of trying to steal it from Michael Pye's novel of the same name and several other movies.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
Even though Taking Lives is not very good, it does contain a) a cool car chase and b) a sex scene in which Jolie goes topless. For some, this will be enough entertainment.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Ed Gonzalez
If the Naqoyqatsi-lite score by Philip Glass doesn't exactly make sense of the film's sketchy identity politics, it does complement its utter ridiculousness.
Read Full Review >Dallas Observer Luke Y. Thompson
The film's finale is truly egregious, a laugh-out-loud combination of ludicrousness and sadism that someone somewhere probably found scary, assuming they never saw a thriller before.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan
Nosedive it does, abandoning all pretense of style and eccentricity for at-times laughable predictability and a parade of unconvincing red herrings straight out of Murder Mystery 101.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Desson Thomson
Taking Lives would have to work nights to reach mediocrity.
Read Full Review >Rolling Stone Peter Travers
If you can buy the pillow-lipped Angelina Jolie as a psychic FBI agent in Montreal to hunt a serial killer, then you can swallow the other implausibilities in this retread thriller.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Wesley Morris
Because the characters in the movie have only stock obsessions and vague personal histories, there's no reason to be interested in them.
Read Full Review >USA Today Mike Clark
The trouble with indulging Taking Lives is that it's taking your time.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Robert K. Elder
Caruso, who showed flair in the Val Kilmer vehicle "The Salton Sea," has a penchant for the dark side. In this case, it's the plodding, predictable ZIP code of the dark side.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Charles Taylor
Jolie is far too good for this tripe but she does give the film its only believable moments, and for the first half, her concentration makes you watch her intently.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 6.9 (out of 10) based on 21 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Dan gave it a9:
Definitely underrated. I thought the characters were amazing. The back and forth between Hawke and Jolie was very well done. I thought Jolie's character was well developed for this type of film. Her quirks and oddities are intriguing at the very least. She is not portrayed as a weak willed woman who can't defend herself. But on the other hand she isn't some unrealistic beauty who can handle everything herself in a really tight dress and finish the scene with a witty line. Bottom line: Jolie plays her character with flaws, oddities, and REALISM! It works! Sutherland's important, yet brief, role helped tie the two parts of the story very well. I thought the plot was well thought out.... It made sense, and was not corny. Not going to talk much about it because I do not want to spoil anything. And the filmwork was probably the best I've seen recently. The focus on the eyes was really interesting because it highlighted everything. It allowed the audience to get in the head of the characters, particularly Jolie. The angles were interesting and beautiful. It gave off the feal of a dark, brooding noir, yet having some extra character. The colors were brought out in interesting ways, particularly in driving sequences, like when Hawke is being escorted back to his apartment by Jolie. Overall an impressive film.
Nick A. gave it a4:
D.J. Caruso’s makeover of Michael Pye’s novel of the same title is one that should have never been made—or at least not in the manner it was. Originally a thriller about a serial killer named Martin Asher (who’d been stealing the lives and identities of his victims ever since his presumed death at age 16), the film version of 'Taking Lives' never reaches the suspense – or thrills – that it intended. Angelina Jolie gives a performance as petty as her character (an FBI profiler named Illeana Scott, who is assigned to help a Montreal investigative unit track Asher), though does so in the company of equally trivial bids by acting veterans Ethan Hawke (who plays James Costa, an independent artist and eyewitness to Asher’s most recent murder), Oliver Martinez (one of the detectives on the case), and Kiefer Sutherland (as the suspected killer). However, the real killer in (or of, I should say) this film is its incoherently adapted screenplay (which, by the way, took a team of four script doctors to finalize), which is made more unpleasant by the messy, inconsistent and unstylish direction of Caruso (whose 2007 release, 'Disturbia', is anything but). 'Taking Lives' is a prime example of a Hollywood misfire and a showy exhibit of humdrum clichés, predictable twists, and poor career choices by otherwise great actors.
Abby gave it a6:
This movie was actually not bad. The out of place sex scene, the elevator, the hidden room, the cops who weren't really doing their job there were a lot of things wrong but it's worth seeing.
Jeremy W. gave it a4:
This movie started out being really intriguing. I loved the beginning as well as Angelina Jolie lying in the grave. But they never developed that character, and all of sudden the story just starts adding all these different plot elements, mushrooming out into a big patchwork with only the barest threads holding the thing together. Who the heck were all those cops anyway? Why was there a hidden room in the mother's house? Could have been great, wound up being pretty lame.
sat gave it a10:
GooD!!!
Tiffany V. gave it a 2:
This movie had potential and was pretty good until it completely unraveled 3/4 of the way through. Starting with the out of place, awkward sex scene, and culminating with the elevator scene, the rest of the movie was completely laughable. Lame.
Greg T. gave it a 7:
Not bad. But then again, I like Angelina and Ethan Hawke. The boy in this movie was too flat and too robotic for one to be concerned about. However, there are a few interesting twists and turns in this movie which make it worth renting.
