Maniac 2012

Nicolas Rapold, New York Times: By not centering on the victims, Mr. Khalfoun nearly makes the film about pitying the panic-prone killer; the camerawork lacks the ominous, confident glide of much Steadicam horror. Read more

Rex Reed, New York Observer: Eventually it collapses in a gore fest of nauseating brutality that makes you wonder why they bothered at all. Read more

Jeff Shannon, Seattle Times: Frodo Baggins as a psycho-killer? Why not? Read more

Rob Nelson, Variety: A shocker of a remake, equal parts stylish and scuzzy. Read more

A.A. Dowd, AV Club: If it's possible to be both impressed and appalled by a movie's pull-no-punches savagery, Maniac earns that dubious distinction. Read more

William Goss, Film.com: It's a bit like watching an amputee play hopscotch: there's no way that it's polite to stare for this long, but you just have to see if this guy's gonna make it to the end. Read more

Megan Lehmann, Hollywood Reporter: This is down and dirty genre filmmaking, and the various slaughters, excruciatingly detailed scalpings and other atrocities are no less gruesome because of the highfalutin approach. Read more

Robert Abele, Los Angeles Times: It's not clear what exactly merited an updating of William Lustig's 1980 "Maniac" - a cheapo urban grimeball about a serial killer - but like a rash's unwelcome return, we got it anyway. Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: A creepy experiment that stays with you. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: "Maniac" only takes what had merely been a disturbing film and makes it into a truly disturbed one. Read more

Ian Buckwalter, NPR: A remake that, rather than trying to fix the deep flaws of its source, just covers them in a shinier coat of paint. Read more

Joe Neumaier, New York Daily News: Ever wonder what Frodo Baggins would be like as a serial killer? Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: The film is exactly what it intends to be: the purest exploitational trash. Read more

David Lewis, San Francisco Chronicle: The sadistic proceedings here are pointless, and not very scary. Read more

Guy Lodge, Time Out: Rank even on its own terms, it's the kind of inferior remake that also invites questions about the original's cult status. Read more

Keith Uhlich, Time Out: Each killing is suffused with a strangely surreal empathy for both murderer and victim that recalls Jonathan Demme's genre-redefining The Silence of the Lambs. Read more

Chris Packham, Village Voice: The genre is adolescent as hell, reckless and pre-empathetic, picking on girls just to see what their reactions might be. Read more