Reviewer's grade: D-

 

This laughably overacted melodrama is based on a play by Tulsa native Tracy Letts. I haven't seen the play, but if I ever do, it will be a better production than this mess overseen by the once-reputable director William Friedkin. Ashley Judd stars as a lonely woman who takes into her home a thoroughly messed-up Gulf War veteran (Michael Shannon) who thinks that government scientists have planted mind-control bugs under the skin of him and Timothy McVeigh. His paranoid delusions are catching as Judd begins to not only believe him, but feel the little buggers crawling around in her flesh as well.

 

And now, to quote the title of an old horror flick, the screaming starts. Advertised as horror, this is just astonishingly silly. Friedkin has no control, nor do the actors. Audiences will be so under control, they won't even buy any tickets. —Doug Bentin 

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