Mindhunters Recap

Jamie

Ooooooo, are you ready for a little dumb fun? That’s what you get with this And Then There Were None adaptation (?) that twists you up in a pretzel with its Saw/Final Destination/Dimension Films theatrics. You think LL Cool J is the bad guy? What are you, a total idiot? Better not think it’s our boy Val or cool as ice Slater, cause they’re just here for dat paycheck. Anyone else in the anonymous cast? Hell no, even though they all have reasons to want to knock off the rest of their mindhunter classmates. You really can’t go wrong with a tight serial killer whodunit like this.

Alright, well you can go a little wrong. The acting is… fine. The premise is… fine. The twists are… fine. Renny Harlin is… Renny Harlin (I’ve always thought he had a nice flair for the visual… just check out Cliffhanger). All that’s a compliment really. Everything is done up to snuff to give you something that’s supremely stupid and yet just entertaining enough to let it slide. Probably the biggest gripe is as they built up this somewhat convoluted high-level concept it became predictable if you weren’t prepared to sit back and turn off your brain. You see there are all these mindhunters (read: FBI profilers) in training. Only some of them are going to make it as they head into their final immersive exam on a secluded island. Everything goes to plan until they arrive and they start dying… like for real. Uh oh! As they each die off these geniuses finally realize that they are getting killed by their laughably specific “one weakness.” Like one guy always has to lead, another smokes, another never goes anywhere without a gun. Weird though, Johnny Lee Miller’s character is “their best driver and has the best aim.” You think maybe the guy who doesn’t have one of these traits might be different than the others in some way?

Anyway, even when that twist is revealed it’s done in a way that is at least stupid and fun and eventually I was like, fine, he’s a serial killer who’s life long plan was to kill FBI profilers so that he could show off how smart he is. Great, he’s Dexter but kills FBI profilers. It’s so stupid that I ended up respecting it. Enjoyable film. Did get me thinking about how the BMT gang would end up going in BMindhunTers.

• Patrick – Brains of the operation and he can’t go anywhere without his sweet ‘puter. As he dives into the web with his VR headset he finds that it’s been affixed to his face! Talk about crispy graphics as the brightness is turned up to deadly levels.
• Jamie – Brawn meets beauty as Jamie brings both to the table. You can’t keep a shirt on this hunk and that’s all well and good when you’re having fun in the sun. Not so fun when you are lured into a meat locker with promises of a rad party. 
• Kyle – Kyle can’t resist all things submarine related and so when he gets a note that says “meet me on the submarine,” he runs right down there. What’s on the sub? A submarine sandwich party of course. Too bad those ‘wiches are poisoned.
• Robotron 3000 – Our robot helper is always going rogue and solving mysteries. That loveable scamp! In fact there is nothing that isn’t totally awesome about Robotron 3000. Not sure what his weakness is, probably nothing to worry about and definitely not the one killing everyone with his robot strength and robot brain.

Sounds about right. I can’t believe I haven’t mentioned the other two employees of BMTHQ before. Patrick?

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! Mindhunters? More like Mindcandy, amirite? This movie has a major claim to fame: my wife insisted that she continue to watch this film with me. It’s obviously fun for the whole family. Let’s go!

• If you know anything about Ten Little Indians by Agatha Christie eventually guessing who the killer is is trivial since, spoilies, you just have to think through who could possibly be the “red herring” death in the whole affair.
• I do love serial killer nonsense though. The bad ones are just so amusing in how over the top they are.
• LL Cool J is fine. The rest of the actors I could mostly give or take. The fact that Val Kilmer and Christian Slater both appear in about 25% of the movie and are top billings is a bit shocking. I assume that is intentional.
• I did genuinely like the film though. It is like The Bone Collector (which, yes, will be a future BMT, and yes, I watched on a plane by accident because I assumed that this weird Denzel Washington film couldn’t possibly have a sub-40% Rotten Tomatoes score). Trashy but fun.
• I’m honestly grasping a bit at what to say. We are on a bit of a streak here. Lots of okay-ish films where the worst you can really say is “not for me” and the best you can say is “not exactly high art, but I had fun with it.” So I’ll just leave it there.. I’m quite pleased I got to watch Mindhunters for BMT because this is exactly the type of film I would have otherwise watched on a plane.
• A fun Setting as a Character (Where?) for, if I was understanding correctly, the film mostly taking place on or near the island of the original Roanoke colony (which makes sense for a training exercise from Quantico I suppose). Obviously going to give it a Worst Twist (How?) for the inevitable reveal that Jonny Lee Miller was the killer all along. And definitely closest to BMT, despite liking it quite a bit it is an objectively silly genre and film.

Obviously I would have loved a sequel to this … but do you know what is better than a sequel? A prequel! Give me that traumatic backstory of Val Kilmer as FBI profiler and the case that got him relegated to teaching! As a matter of fact, cast Jack Kilmer (who is currently 26 years old) as a prodigy profiler in the profiling group at Quantico and do a whole series of his early years. Then roll that into a trilogy of films which culminate in his ultimate dismissal as an official profiler. It’s brilliant. Unfortunately Mindhunter is now taken by a better show, so I think you’d have to augment the name to like FBI: The Mindhunter Project or something.

Cheerios,

The Sklogs