HANGMAN (2017)

Karl Urban and Al Pacino

HANGMAN (2017). Director: Johnny Martin.

Detective Will Ruiney (Karl Urban), whose wife was murdered, is a former FBI profiler now working with the NYPD. Ray Archer (Al Pacino), a retired cop, agrees to help Will investigate a series of baffling murders wherein various people are killed and hanged, murders tied into the old "Hangman" game played by children. Traveling with them as they interview people, visit crime scenes, and nearly trip over corpses, is reporter Christi Davis (Brittany Snow). A person is murdered every 24 hours, and the detectives race against time to prevent each new slaughter. 

Brittany Snow

Hangman has an interesting premise, but it just doesn't stand out as a classic serial killer film, especially when compared to tauter moves like Se7en and Copycat. Pacino, who is the only actor billed above the title, employs the same dubious Southern jive/drawl that he used in his last thriller, Misconduct, and it adds nothing to his comparatively disinterested performance. Urban is a bit better, and Snow has at least one good scene when she tells of how she was assaulted and the cop who came after her assailant was shot and killed. Otherwise, her character doesn't add much to the movie.

There is at least one exciting scene, when Will tries to save a man who has been placed, hanging, over a track as a train approaches, and Ray, realizing there's not enough time to do so, opts to save Will instead. Hangman has a workable premise, and is not badly directed or photographed, but despite some back story, the characters are thinly etched, the victims are mostly ciphers, and the killer, with his dubious motives, never emerges as a villain of classic proportions. 

Verdict: Another mediocre Al Pacino "paycheck" movie. **1/2.