Relentless

Trailer—Relentless

Judd Nelson stars as Buck Taylor, a psychopath who picks his victims out of the telephone book. New LA detective Sam Dietz (Leo Rossi) and grizzled veteran Sam Malloy (Robert Loggia) are tasked with bringing him down in this thriller from Director William Lustig (Maniac, Vigilante) and writer Phil Robinson (All of Me, Field of Dreams) With the kind of pedigree and talent of those involved, I was expecting more of this film then what I got. I was hoping for a film that stood out from the vast myriad of serial killer films out there. What I got was more of the same and this film was as interchangeable with all the other average films of it's ilk. The only thing notable whatsoever about this movie was the fine performance that Judd Nelson gave, but it was totally unremarkable otherwise. Not really a bad film, merely one you'll feel like you've seen before. Eye Candy: Elizabeth Lambert gets topless My Grade: C+ DVD Extras: Trailers for "Trapped", "Panic Room", & "Secret Window"

This one's funny because it's your basic procedural potboiler about a hotshot rookie detective and his grizzled old partner tracking a murderer, which, yeah, is pretty standard, except here the grizzled old partner doesn't really do anything. He doesn't help solve the case, he doesn't mentor the rookie in any meaningful way, he doesn't offer any profound insights into life… all he does is sit around and bitch and moan about how work sucks and how the boys at the crime lab can take care of it. It'd be like if Morgan Freeman had spent the whole run-time of 'Seven' playing cards with that crew in the library and let Lab Tech #1 do all the work.

RELENTLESS introduces us to Sam Dietz, a policeman whose been promoted to detective, his first case he's assigned is to track down a ruthless serial killer whose been targeting innocent people. I'm not going to elaborate on the synopsis but what I will say is that this is a good film if you like a good crime thriller, Leo Rossi and Robert Loggia are both very likable in their roles, Judd Nelson was certainly a great choice for the role of the serial killer, you wouldn't say that today but yeah, the direction by William Lustig is definitely rock solid and as you may or may not know his other credits includes films like the MANIAC COP trilogy. Certainly worth seeing for fans of the genre, it doesn't offer anything in terms of originality but in this case all that doesn't matter when its all nicely done.

Judd Nelson rules in this flick. I'm surprised nobody seems to know about this one. If you see in the store, give it a try. I think you'll be entertained. Rossi is pretty good in this too. His banter with Loggia is straight out of a buddy-cop movie encyclopedia, but it works.

I am a really big fan of Judd Nelson and he ruled in this movie. He's so good at being the bad guy. Judd plays Buck Taylor, a demented serial killer who picks his victims from a phone book and calls them before he enters their house and kills them. And the victims' names resemble his. And he tears the pages out with the victims' names underlined in red with messages like "catch me if you can" that he leaves on the dead bodies for the police. Buck does these horrid things because his father was abusive and he kills to show his dad that he's good at something. I really enjoyed this movie and it showed how good of an actor Judd is. Great film!

The first entry in this series is mediocre. Although it's okay to watch if you have nothing else to do or watch, it really isn't more than that. Resembles a made-for-tv movie.

This crime story has some scary scenes, with an especially memorable one early on with a woman hiding in a clothes dryer. In fact, the first half of this is excellent but it peters out that point with two typical Hollywood clichés of crime movies of the period. They are: 1 - the good cop (Leo Rossi as "Sam Dietz") going it alone despite the orders of his superior; 2 - the killer going to the good cop's house to kill his family. Too bad it stooped to these obvious story lines because this could have been an outstanding serial-killer movie. As it is, it would up being slightly better- than-average. By the way, what's with Meg Foster's eyes? It looks like they have no pupils. It's eerie to look at that woman's face. This movie spawned several sequels and the sequels were better and better as they went along.

A demented serial killer is wrecking havoc on the streets of L.A. It's up to a rookie and a veteran cop to stop him. Sound familiar? You bet. Yet this film seems to creep up above most other films of the similar genre, thanks in most parts to an unusually effective performance from Judd Nelson. Most of the times I don't particularly like him, but here he fits the bill perfectly. The supporting performances are also quite good. Robert Loggia plays it straight as the veteran cop and Leo Rossi has never been as appealing as here. Director William Lustic creates a reasonable amount of suspense and keeps things moving at an adequate pace. But mostly, this film will be remembered (by me anyway) as the best Judd Nelson film, and his best performance. He plays a psychopath to a tee.