AllMovie

Mix a steamy scene from a B+ actress with a few too many familiar twists and turns and you have this standard serial-killer potboiler. Director D.J. Caruso spins a safe web for his sophomore effort, resting on thriller clichés long tired, but kept alive by everyone from Ashley Judd to the Shannon Tweeds of direct-to-DVD-land. Angelina Jolie collected a few more dollars for the more racy scenes, even if the rest of her doesn't quite prove her paycheck's worth in the remainder of the film, while Ethan Hawke continues his pretentious tirade from one wimpy "I'm an actor!" scene to the next. Olivier Martinez and Tchéky Karyo serve well in standard roles, though it's sad to see Gena Rowlands slumming it up in this one. The Montreal setting injects a little flourish into the story, but as the two leads are most definitely not speaking with a French accent and everyone else is, the location then just turns into mere set dressing and not an organic piece of the plot. Taking Lives also hinges on easily one of the most predictable premises around, which makes its characters look like idiots as well as the audience for having to endure it. There will always need to be these type of thrillers out there, but it's just sad to see when the big-leaguers throw themselves into an already over-populated ring of sexy mind-bending bores.