Il cartaio (2004)

Il cartaio: Directed by Dario Argento. With Stefania Rocca, Liam Cunningham, Silvio Muccino, Adalberto Maria Merli. A Rome policewoman teams up with a British Interpol agent to find a crafty serial killer who plays a taunting game of cat-and-mouse with the police by abducting and killing young women and showing it over an Internet web cam.

“Iu0026#39;m a big fan of Dario Argentou0026#39;s work; his early works are true works of perfection and have seen most of his stuff and mostly his work do strikes many of emotions such as thrills, tension and brilliant over the top death scenes. But after during the late 90u0026#39;s to present most of his stuff have been hit and miss, and this one from reading the reviews have been classed as a miss. But In my opinion I actually rather enjoyed this effort from him, sure it doesnu0026#39;t have almost none of his trademark techniqueu0026#39;s. But on its own it does stand as an okay murder mystery.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eFirstly the plot is a very interesting and intriguing one, we get the old serial killer playing cat and mouse with the police routine, and in this case we get a killer setting up an online poker game with the police force, while using an innocent woman as bait and if they lose, she dies. This does make for a very interesting story line and it does keep the viewer interested in seeing what happens, and I did feel for these victims in that situation, but the fact that nothing is shown, doesnu0026#39;t leave a lasting impression, as nothing is shown afterwards and kind of makes the outcome disappointing.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003ePlus it lacks the stunning visuals that Argentou0026#39;s normally provides, instead the look and feel of the movie, looks very standard, and more towards the mainstream side of things. But the two leads are very decent, Stefania Rocca as Anna was a very strong leading character, she does keep you interested and has a good presence on screen even with the bad dialogue, and Liam Cunningham makes for another good character as her partner John and even their forcibly written romantic subplot, they makes it believable and they do share great chemistry together, along with the both of them fighting their demons does anchor the story along at a nice pace. Also Slivio Muccino was another good addition as the computer wiz kid, he was just brilliant. But the other side characters were just forgettable and were just poorly written.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eBut some of the other aspects of this movie doesnu0026#39;t really work, like the whodunit mystery in which this movie very much relies on, wasnu0026#39;t really inventive or shocking, and the final climax was just very predictable and just plodded along, and even the motive or lack of and honestly had a hard time remembering who he was at the end and just seemed lacking and lazy, but the overacting at the end was rather fun.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eAll in all u0026quot;The Card Playeru0026quot; is an okay serial killer mystery flick, but for fans of Dariou0026#39;s visual style, you will be sorely disappointed, as this just doesnu0026#39;t take any risks at all and feels just rather safe and plodding.”