The first thing that surprised me when I looked it up later was that it came out in 2000.
It’s a VERY 1990s movie, a la Fried Green Tomatoes — lots of manipulative music cues and generalized corniness.
I must say, some bits of it really worked: I was genuinely spooked when the reporters almost got run off the road, for instance, and I’m rarely “thrilled” by “thrillers.”
I still don’t know who the hell killed all those kids and what to believe re: this movie/the SPIN magazine investigation.
Everyone agrees that Wayne Williams is a genuine weirdo who did himself new favors, but still.
BTW: The FBI’s “profiling” technique gained one of its first “wins” with this case, but this movie (while not mentioning the Bureau by name) laughs off the big “clue” that led them to finger Williams — the idea that “a white man couldn’t cruise around with impunity in all these black neighborhoods.” As a black character says, white men are in black neighborhoods all the time: phone company repairmen and other contractors, and cops, to name two groups.
One day we’re all going to shake our heads over “serial killer profiling” the way we do with leeching and Mesmerism. Or psychic detectives for that matter.
The best part of the movie, which I hope is true, is that the black owned and patronized gun store has a sign that says “Gun Control Laws Are Racist.”
