April 5–12, 2001

movie shorts

Along Came a Spider

Technically a prequel to the loathsome Kiss the Girls (it’s based on an earlier book in the series), Along Came a Spider boasts an ever more logic-challenged plot that at least wallows less in misogynist serial-killer blather. Still, it’s hard to get too jazzed about the fact that this time it’s a little girl in peril instead of a big one. Morgan Freeman reprises his role as detective Alex Cross, who’s given the usual opening-minutes mistake and dead partner to live down when he’s drawn into investigating the kidnapping of a Senator’s daughter (Mika Boorem). The colorless Monica Potter plays the FBI agent assigned to protecting the victim who horns her way into the investigation as a way of earning penance. Directed with flash but no style by Lee Tamahori (whose Once Were Warriors is now filed far behind Mulholland Falls and The Edge), Spider has nothing to offer but plot (Freeman’s given a wife for a brief scene near the beginning; she never reappears or is even mentioned), and the plot is simply ludicrous.

—Sam Adams

Watch the trailer!