Made for TV films used to be a standard thing on Television. Every Sunday night you could catch a rather typical but entertaining film about spousal abuse or kidnappings or serial killers. Now films like that are almost exclusively saved for 'Lifetime' or 'AMC' or other cable networks. The Craigslist Killer attempts to tell a true crime story within a small budget and still entertain and tell a real story that happened. It is entertaining and it is decently made but the small budget shows and the performances are just alright making this decent but quite obviously slapped together in many ways.
The film does really revolve and rely on the performance of Jake McDorman who plays medical student and killer Philip Markoff. His performance is okay but it is also rather cheesy at times and laughable when it should be serious and really twisted. He sort of lets down. Agnes Bruckner gives a much better performance as the completely oblivious girlfriend/fiancée. Her performance makes you feel for her and really understand her character. The supporting cast are passable but really add nothing that stands out including that of William Baldwin who is probably the most recognizable name in the film.
As I said the movie is passable and watchable and reasonably entertaining. It certainly tells the story well enough and gets all the points across. I suppose the only downfall is that it is in the made for TV mentality which makes it that much less impressive that the current age of big screen thrillers. Still for a TV movie it is watchable. Director Stephen Kay is a TV director and he plays by the book. Tell the story, deal with the actors given. True crime fans will enjoy it. 6/10
The film does really revolve and rely on the performance of Jake McDorman who plays medical student and killer Philip Markoff. His performance is okay but it is also rather cheesy at times and laughable when it should be serious and really twisted. He sort of lets down. Agnes Bruckner gives a much better performance as the completely oblivious girlfriend/fiancée. Her performance makes you feel for her and really understand her character. The supporting cast are passable but really add nothing that stands out including that of William Baldwin who is probably the most recognizable name in the film.
As I said the movie is passable and watchable and reasonably entertaining. It certainly tells the story well enough and gets all the points across. I suppose the only downfall is that it is in the made for TV mentality which makes it that much less impressive that the current age of big screen thrillers. Still for a TV movie it is watchable. Director Stephen Kay is a TV director and he plays by the book. Tell the story, deal with the actors given. True crime fans will enjoy it. 6/10