Before he knows it, he has unraveled Lang's carefully created identity and tracked him back to a teen arrest in Kansas under another name. Faraday's mind leapfrogs through possibilities. The evidence mounts, suggesting the worst. Director Mark Pellington and writer Ehren Kruger pull the rug out from under the viewer in unsettling ways, forcing them to reassess everything that's come before. They're aided immeasurably by the performances of Bridges and Robbins, as neighbors and friends who develop an eerily adversarial relationship.
Bridges brings a canny intelligence but also the emotional sensitivity of a man scraped raw by life.
Robbins has a spooky opaqueness that can be read a variety of ways and is all the more haunting because of it. It also happens to make crackling good entertainment, though it will leave you looking nervously around at the people walking out of the theater with you. Rated R with profanity, graphic violence and adult themes. Copyright 1999 Army Times Publishing Company. All Rights Reserved.