Movie Review – Midnight in the Switchgrass – Average Thriller
Table of Contents
My Rating – 3 out of 5
Plot Summary – Midnight in the Switchgrass
Watching two Bruce Willis starrers back to back – Out of Death and this one, has convinced me that he is probably saying yes to a lot of movies without looking at its worth or what he is going to add to them. In this one, he has even lesser screen time than Out Of Death, and looks and sounds thoroughly uninterested! I think he only adds value to the film’s poster and marketing material and nothing else. Emile Hirsch as the Florida State Cop Byron Crawford looks under confident and under cooked. The movie, like so many others before it, traces a serial killer who targets prostitutes and other easily accessible young women and brutally kills them.
The locations are around the I-10 in Pensacola, Florida and though he arranges the bodies of his victims somewhat ritualistically, he also retains some of their clothing for his perverse pleasure. The State Cops have no success in identifying the killer and the FBI – represented by Lombardo (Megan Fox) and Karl (Bruce Willis), who are contacting the killer online and trying to set a trap for him. But the killer is both lucky and slippery, and every time Lombardo seems set to entrap him, something or the other happens and he survives.
The only little unconventionality in this film comes from the fact that the villain is outed almost at the middle of the movie, and his previous crimes shown as flashbacks. He leads a normal looking life with his family, and his dark side is carefully hidden away. As the bodies keep piling up, the State Cops want to pull out of the investigation due to lack of any substantial progress and even the FBI has also pulled the plug on the investigation. But Officer Crawford’s heart bleeds for the marginalized and socially unaccepted girls because nobody stands up for them (echoes the sentiments of Harry Bosch of the eponymous Michael Connelly series)
So, in a way, the investigation of a prolific serial killer is canned but the individual investigators don’t want to give up and continue their own investigation for differing reasons of their own. For some variety, only one victim’s mother is shown as grieving and plaintively asks Officer Crawford that he should inform her once they catch the perpetrator. FBI Agents Lombardo and Karl continue with their sting operations, hoping to nail the culprit, though Agent Karl wants Lombardo to give up the futile operation and go back.
Conclusion – Movie Review of Midnight in the Switchgrass
There are some rather large size holes in the story – while the victims are shown struggling and fighting for their lives with their attacker, there is no mention of any DNA search under their fingernails. Also, if the FBI is contacting the killer online to lay traps for him, they don’t seem to be keen on tracking his online footprints. It is disconcerting to say the least. Bruce Willis is sleepwalking through this role, Emile Hirsch looks rather under-confident and only Megan Fox and Lukas Haas as Peter have acted well and carry the movie on their shoulders.
Overall, an average watch, with not much going for the movie except the desire to find if there is anything to redeem the movie by the time it ends! It could have been much better.
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