I'm not sure why I haven't caught up with this film before now, but holy sh*t, is it good. Great atmosphere and music. At times it feels like a classic Hitchcock film, but with a "foreign" film sensitivity.
Great acting, writing, production...everything. This is serious movie-making.
It's amazing isn't it. It was very painful to watch at certain points, especially in the reactionary scenes to the murders, the murders themselves and watching Viktor's (Stephen Rea) innate decency take such a toll on him for merely doing the right thing. Yet at the same time there were also these great, inspirational and wonderfully heartwarming moments of the supportive people in Viktor's life, and how they are gradually won over by his preseverance. I thought Donald Sutherland in particular was extremely good in bringing both levity and conviction, but also warmth and humour, to his very unique role. And the script, the editing, the use of music...amazing.
Who was your favourite of the cast? Sutherland's always been my favourite, however Rea's understated and powerful performance also ranks very highly with me, and Jeffrey DeMunn, while limited in terms of screentime, was both downright chilling and pathetic. Von Sydow was excellent in lightening up the mood in a much needed way in his first scene, and then bringing such an incisive power to his second scene. Imelda Staunton, Joss Ackland, and basically everyone else was very good too.
I am thrilled to read your reaction. I have watched this movie at least 7 or 8 times since it was released and I love it so much that I take it personally when someone doesn't feel the same way. I used to follow James Berardinelli's film reviews but after he wrote to me that he didn't care much for Citizen X, I literally never read another review of his again.
As far as the performances, I though Max von Sydow and Jeffrey DeMunn were both astounding. In his Emmy acceptance speech Donald Sutherland thanked "the perfect Jeffrey DeMunn" and I thought THAT was perfect. I wrote DeMunn a letter after seeing this movie for the first time, thanking him for being able to create such a moving portrait of this man everyone considered nothing but a monster. I thought the performance was not just a great artistic achievement but a humanitarian act. And he actually replied to me! We struck up a brief correspondence and I got to meet him in New York when he was doing an Arthur Miller play on Broadway. A very lovely guy and the last person I would expect to have hunting as a hobby, but he does.
I also very much liked the actor who played the volunteer who patroled for 36 hours straight without a coat.
The exchange where Max von Sydow introduces himself to Chikatilo and then starts reading him his hypothesis, etc., is my idea of a perfect scene.
And the scene where they finally arrest Chikatilo and one by one the volunteer detectives line up behind him to make sure he doesn't flee is one of my 5 favorite film scenes of all time.
Just the way the movie elucidated the whole issue of Soviet Russia's refusal to acknowledge the existence of a serial killer was masterful.
I could go on and on.
I saw this movie for the first time today. I've never heard of it before. I think it is one of the best movies I've seen. I watched it twice in a row.
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