Hangman Reviews

This thriller won't stand up to close scrutiny, but when a whodunit keeps you guessing you can overlook numerous coincidences in the plotting. It just another exaple of poor little rich girl Grace Mitchell's (Madchen Amick) streak of bad luck that her landlord is hanged at the house in which Grace lives. Detective Nick Roos (Lou Diamond Phillips) wonders why the murderer's modus operandi mimics that of a deceased serial killer, Hangman, who slew one of Nick's rookies. Nick is haunted by the fact that he didn't save his officer, while ex-psychoanalyst Grace is wracked with guilt over her affair with Daniel, a sensitive patient who committed suicide. It begins to seem that the new string of homicides by hanging may be related to Grace's troubled relationship with her stepfather and former boss, Dr. Henry Mitchell (Robert Haley). Apparently motivated by paternal concern and with the encourament of his colleague, Dr. Natalie Walsh (Rosemary Dunsmore), Henry lobbies to have the chronically depressed Grace committed. But Nick and his partner Little Joe (Vincent Corazza) discover that Henry covets the million-dollar acreage that adjoins his property and happens to be owned by Grace. Although Grace is taken into protective custody, the game-playing maniac taunts police with a videotape of Daniel's widow, Lynn (Stephanie Moore), with a noose around her neck; when Grace is forced to play a game "hangman" with the psycho, and when she loses, he hangs Lynn. Subsequent evidence points to Paul Jarvis (Grant Nickalls), a trustee at the hospital Henry oversees. Although the cops determine that Paul stalked Grace, they can't prove that he's the new Hangman — how many more innocents will die before the maniac is stopped? The plot grows more convoluted as it goes on and false clues abound, but amateur sleuths will enjoy ferreting out the psycho's identity.