CULT KILLER movie poster | ©2024 Saban Films

Rating: R
Stars: Alice Eve, Shelley Hennig, Antonio Banderas, Paul Reid, Olwen Fouéré, Nick Dunning, Matthew Tompkins
Writer: Charles Burnley
Director: Jon Keeyes
Distributor: Saban Films
Release Date: January 19, 2024

CULT KILLER has a title that’s misleading, given that there isn’t a cult as such. It’s otherwise a decent if somewhat self-conscious detective thriller set in Ireland.

The film begins with an onscreen quote from Genghis Khan about vengeance that is borne out by the ensuing action.

We see business of several kinds taking place in an Irish pub. It is here that Cassie Holt (Alice Eve) first meets former Interpol investigator/current private detective Mikeal Tallini (Antonio Banderas), who becomes her AA sponsor.

Five years later, Cassie is working for Mikeal as an investigator. When Mikeal is hired by local Police Detective Sergeant Rory McMahon (Paul Reid) to look into the killing of a wealthy local man, the victim’s equally well-heeled business associates are suspiciously reluctant to have the case solved.

After several twists, Cassie is enlisted to help the cops. This is one of the rare instances where the killer telling their pursuer that they’re alike is true. Cassie has trauma in her past, and the more she learns, the more she can relate to the murderer.

The screenplay by Charles Burnley is willing to go darker than we might expect, but at the same time, it doesn’t explore the private eye/perpetrator link as fully as it might. Since CULT KILLER comes in at a reasonably brisk hour and forty-five minutes, it’s understandable that the filmmakers want to keep things moving. However, since there are numerous mood-setting flashbacks to Cassie’s detective training and recovery from alcoholism, it seems like a little extra time could have been set aside for what is arguably the film’s most distinctive feature.

Director Jon Keeyes keeps the mood moderately grim, with main characters humane enough to keep things from total bleakness. The violence is occasional, but very bloody. Given that sexual child abuse propels the narrative, Keeyes treads a careful line of showing and telling us enough to keep us informed – and appalled – without throwing in any visual or audio elements that might push viewers (at least those open to the subject matter in the first place) over the edge.

There is a slight, odd meta aspect to CULT KILLER, with Cassie, Mikael and even Rory referring to pulp fiction and noir at various points. This isn’t a horror movie, where we need to get up to speed on what the characters know and believe; it’s a detective tale. The characters don’t need to talk about genre conventions for us to comprehend what’s happening.

Keeyes has assembled a first-rate cast, starting with Banderas, who gets to be matter-of-factly badass, yet warmly avuncular, with what might be called melancholic optimism. Eve is personable as primary protagonist Cassie, who projects an air of underlying sanity, along with simmering anger and a vulnerable streak. Shelley Hennig scores as a defiant and mercurial American, and Reid conveys reliability.

But the really brilliant actor choices are among the villains, with Olwen Fouéré, Nick Dunning, and Matthew Tompkins superb as three of the most effortlessly entitled, horrible upper-class bullies imaginable.

The message in the finale of CULT KILLER is worth debating, but for those who can cope with its central topic, it works well enough.

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