Creepy, loud, intricate and interesting, "The Bone Collector" is an involving film. I suppose if your one of those people who loves the "serial killer on the loose" type mystery films, you could find some holes here. If you enjoy disecting plots to the extreme, perhaps you will see the perpetrator of the crimes coming from a mile off. I'm not particularly intuitive in these matters. I don't necessarily like to disect mystery plots as they unfold. I do enjoy trying to figure out whodunnit, just as much as the next guy, and I didn't figure this one out. Still, if this is your favorite genre, "The Bone Collector" is probably only as good as "Copycat." Maybe a bit better. It's not "seven." It's not "Silence of the Lambs," Not by a longshot.

Denzel Washington plays a paraplegic forensic expert, ex-cop, and author whose intuitive skills and intelligence has led him to be an expert in his field. An on-the-job accident has left him paralyzed from the neck down and bed- ridden. Young rookie cop Angelina Jolie, in discovering a crime scene, shows she has some intuitive skills in forensics as well. When Washington is called upon, by his ex-colleges, to help with this new case from his bed-ridden state, Washington insists on Jolie as a helper. Using modern technological folderol, she becomes his eyes and ears in the field as they investigate further crime scenes.

Washington has a hard go of it early in the film. It's like we're watching Malcolm X as a paraplegic forensic expert. Washington just has too much actor's baggage with him to be effective at first. Jolie even makes fun of this, early on, as he speaks in his seemingly righteous, mellifluous, poetic tones, by quipping, "You really do like the sound of your own voice, don't you." After that, the gloves are off and we really enjoy the chemistry these two evolve. Others in the cast, Queen Latifah, Luis Guzman, and Ed O'Neill in particular, also work well with Washington, holding their own in his overt thespianism.

What works best, surprisingly, is Phillip Noyce's terse direction. The film has way too many loud sounds in it, hoping to jolt and surprise us, but it's overall crafted feel is quite effective. Noyce can eek much suspense out of the plot. The film's perfect pacing echoes the plodding attention a detective would pay to a crime scene. His claustrophobic opening, foreshadowing Washington's current state is quite tight. Jolie turns in an awesome performance and Noyce uses her well. She moves as purposefully as his film does. She makes moments of skilled direction and intricate design come to life with her facial expressions and her feminine sensibilities. Sure, her lips do as much of the acting as she does, but it doesn't mean she's not good here. And that is Noyce's best asset, using a large, moving, evolving cast of characters to delve purposefully and instinctively towards finding a killer.

"The Bone Collector" is an awesome mainstream thriller that is quite likable. It will have it's detractors. Those who are hoping for David Fincher's gritty hyper-realistic gruesomeness will be sorely disappointed. Those expecting some new thrill, some new kink will also find nothing here. But for those of us who enjoy watching a plot unfold while taking gentle stabs at trying to figure it all out, it's a damn good film. Hell, while watching it you forget O'Neill was ever Al Bundy. That's gotta say something.

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