Kiss the Girls

Forensic psychologist/DC detective/best-selling author Alex Cross (Morgan Freeman) steps over state lines when he learns his niece has become the latest acquisition of serial abductor "Casanova." Casanova, conveniently, provides the first break in the case by slipping a note under Cross's door. The second break comes in the form of Ashley Judd's Kate McTiernan, a doctor/kick boxer (guess which career choice will save her life?) who escapes Casanova's lair and joins Cross on the manhunt to save the other women.

This film from director Gary Fleder (Things To Do in Denver When You're Dead) is dark even when shot in daylight. But since Hannibal Lecter, our standards have risen -- when dealing with plotting psychopaths, we've come to expect relatively high IQs and a semblance of personality. Why create a scheming villain who's pursued by a forensic psychologist if they're not going to develop a relationship that ends in a chilling endgame standoff? Instead, we get hand-held cameras chasing women through the woods and cops who pow-wow about how well Casanova "plays the game." Despite a good performance by Judd (Freeman's Porsche-driving, Ray-Ban-wearing Cross is just too cool to make it seem he has a personal stake in this), the chills in Kiss the Girls rely more on the editing room than the intellect. Opens Friday at the Harbour Mall, Showcase, Tri-Boro, Westerly, and Woonsocket cinemas.

-- Robert Furlong