The Killing Mind

This was a movie that I learned about thanks to a movie set that I won from a podcast. It was part of the 8 Midnight Horror Movies - Hatchets & Cleavers, even though almost none of the movies' feature either. The Killing Mind is a mystery thriller television movie. If anything, this is closer to a police procedural.

We start this with a young Isobel (Danielle Harris) seeing a woman, dressed as a ballet dancer, dead on a fence. She screams. We then shift to the present where Isobel Neiman (Stephanie Zimbalist) is returning to Los Angeles. She used to work for the FBI but has decided to take a position with the LAPD. She is met at the train station by Sylvia (Candy Ann Brown), who allows her to sleep on the couch until she can find a place.

There's a specific reason for the career change. Isobel wants to solve this case that traumatized her as a child. It has gone cold. She joins an investigative unit that is led by Captain Harris (Stan Ivar). On the team are Dennis Jepson (Daniel Roebuck), Fred Robinson (K. Todd Freeman) and Ron Donoho (Lee Tergesen). They don't think that Isobel should waste her time on this specific case, but she is determined.

Isobel gets herself in hot water when she meets Thomas Quinn (Tony Bill). He's a reporter. He reveals in his column what she is working on and this draws scolding from her captain. That doesn't stop her though. Updates in technology creates a lead in this ballet dancer murder, but it also could make her a target of the killer.

That is where I'll leave my recap and where I want to start is that this has interesting ideas. I know that criminal profiling started back in the 1970s. Being that this is 1991, it was already done in movies like Manhunter. I like having Isobel move from a job like the FBI to take her talents to the LAPD. She has this case that has haunted her and she's now ready to take it on. I like that by doing so, she gets in over her head. She also does things differently, which draws issues with her new co-workers. I did think this worked in its favor though.

I do have an issue. I guessed who the killer was almost at once. Now I'm not going to spoil it, but there were things that Isobel said that made it click for me. There is a couple red herrings that get brought up, but I just felt they were there to help pad out the runtime for the movie. Knowing that this was made for TV, I'm not shocked there. There's a limited budget. You can do less, especially since this came out in the early 90s.

What shocked me was this cast though. We have character actors I recognized here like Roebuck, Tergesen and Tim DeZarn. They were all young at the time, so that makes sense. There's also small roles here by Gordon Currie and Harris. Crazy to see her so young since this would have been not too long after the Halloween sequels she was in. I also thought that Zimbalist and Bill were solid for what was needed. The acting isn't great, but it works.

I'll end this out by saying that this is made well enough for the resources they had. It does feel like this was shot in LA. They do well with exteriors. I also liked where this unit that Isobel joins is set up. It is in the basement and quite huge. They feel like a group that is a dark secret, which we learn was set up to fail, but they've been able to solve cases due to the resources. This has limited effects. It also doesn't need them as it isn't that type of movie. A drawback though, this comes off as a boring. I think for me, since I guessed the reveal, this doesn't do enough to sway me and hook me back in unfortunately.

Not the worst in this set of movies, but not great by any stretch. Tweaks and this would be better. Still worth a watch if you like these films and want to dive a bit deeper.

My Rating: 5 out of 10.

Yawn. A young girl comes across a crime scene where LAPD have discovered a dead woman dressed as a ballerina hanging over a hurricane fence topped with razor wire right by their station. Blood is still dripping from her.

Twenty years later, the young girl is now an FBI profiler, who is transferring to that station as a Sergeant to work in their Special Investigations Unit. The SIU is where all the bad cases are transferred, the ones the LAPD as a whole doesn't want to be blamed for not solving. SIU apparently also covers cold cases. She helps with a home invasion/burglar case, but is mainly concerned with reopening the ballerina murder case. She enlists the help of a reporter who had covered it, and some of the SIU cops.

This movie isn't terrible, but nothing struck me as too terribly interesting either. The murderer for me was pretty predictable. Oh well.

One of Stephanie Zimbalist's best turns as detective. Her character Isobel drives the story forward to the end.

Los Angeles is the setting.

The mystery has a good pace. You find out along with the characters who the "bad guy" will be.

The scenes with no dialogue is played well with just music, lighting, and acting. The audience is saved from too much exposition.

This was really a great movie. Great plot, characters, locations, etc... The actors and actresses were also just as great. Stephanie Zimbalist at her best. 5 out of 5 stars! Watch this movie!

If you like detective movies, you will like this movie. Each character works well with the other characters and there is nothing at all bad about this movie. It's like Perry Mason and Matlock. Stephanie Zimbalist is great as a female detective and she should do some more detective movies. Watch this movie!

A beautifully dressed, frightened young girl seems to be running away from something. Actually, we can't tell how old she is at first because we don't see her face, but she is apparently female. Then she sees the bloody ballet shoes. And the chilling face of the dead girl attached to them. She screams.

FBI profiler Isobel Neiman is hired by the Los Angeles Police. Det. Donoho shows her the depressing basement where her unit works. It seems the special unit was "set up to fail" but they fooled everyone by excelling at their jobs. The newbie is the victim of several practical jokes, but she's a good sport.

Capt. Harris shows Isobel a room full of unsolved cases. She has a lot of work to do, but it just happens that she sees those ballet slippers again. Yes, I said SHE sees them again. And with them is a photo of the girl.

Against the advice of everyone she talks to, Isobel decides to work on the "ballerina murder" (actually, it was believed she wore the costume when she was a hooker). She spends a lot of time with Tribune reporter Thomas Quinn, who wrote numerous stories about the 20-year-old case. Her obsession with the case, which includes living in the girl's old room at the once-elegant Hotel Rosslyn, becomes unhealthy in the eyes of some.

Fric and Frac (Detectives Jepson and Robinson), who provide comic relief but are good at their jobs, work with Isobel. She participates in their investigation of burglaries. Notice I didn't say "helps".

The central mystery of this movie becomes somewhat complicated, and the investigation starts out interesting, though toward the end I got bored. Perhaps this was just suspense. The thrilling ending, which I actually saw before anything else, made up for any weaknesses.

Stephanie Zimbalist showed a lot of confidence and her character was easy to like. I especially liked Detectives Fric and Frac, and Lee Tergesen was good as a street-wise detective. Danielle Harris was also good at showing fear in her brief scene as the young Isobel. I liked the friendly old manager of the hotel, but I didn't catch his name or that of the actor.

One other weakness--Isobel's friend Sylvia, who drove her to her new job when she first arrived in Los Angeles. Candy Ann Brown seemed like she was acting and didn't quite convince me she was a character. This was only a problem because it hadn't yet been established how good the movie would be.

But it was good. For a TV-movie mystery.