How To Be A Serial Killer (2008)

How To Be A Serial Killer (2008)

How To Be A Serial Killer was both written and directed by Luke Ricci which was the second movie he has written and first to direct. Honestly with the creative style and direction he went with the film I could see Luke coming up with some interesting property down the line and only hope he has the chance to get another film in the works as this one didn’t receive nearly the praise that it should have.

I’m usually down on comedy films that are also horror. There have been multiple ones the past few years that have actually been able to pull it off successfully I’m very jaded against the thought of mixing these two genres. It’s most likely due to movies such as the “Scary Movie” franchise having completely turned me off of the idea of mixing the two types of film but there have been just an increasingly large amount of movies that just did it right – How To Be A Serial Killer is exactly one of these movies. It is a black comedy that not only is about a serial killer but also mixes in an ongoing running gag of an ongoing late night infomercial selling the idea of being a serial killer to increase your self esteem and be a self help program.

The movie revolves around Mike (Dameon Clarke) who is running this mental self help program for himself. Near the beginning of the film he runs into a video store clerk who is being berated by customers and is exactly the kind of person who is in need of guidance and self help in their life named Bart (Matthew Gray Gubler.) Mike is quick on the uptake to sign Bart up for his course and slowly attempts to turn him into a serial killer. While Bart is completely hooked on the idea of being a killer he is unable to take the step to push him into that realm and continues learning until the very end of the film.

Mike’s character is so well played its disgusting. He is energetic, endearing, and charismatic – the perfect combination to play a sociopath and he pulls it off to perfection. He is able to lure you into wanting to follow every aspect of the story including being completely sold on everything he is going and everything he is doing is killing his victims. Not only do we get a lot of murder running throughout the movie but the murder is honestly creative. We get so many various ways that people are killed from hand to hand weapons, blunt object, guns, to household appliances. What differentiates him from almost every other serial killer you see or read about is that he doesn’t kill his victims in the same way which is completely against the standard view of how serial killers off their targets. With top notch casting and acting you’ll be shocked when remembering that this is an independent film. Luke Ricci is going to have an amazing career ahead of him in writing horror and Demeon was born to play in horror movies. I can’t wait to see what they both do next in the genre.