Untraceable

No, no, no.... This is another endurance test! In my opinion, writers are a sick bunch. They keep dreaming up horrific ways to kill people and dodos like to read about it or watch... In fact, that IS the message in this nasty, repugnant movie.

Diane Lane ("Unfaithful," "The Outsiders" and "Must Love Dogs") is a Portland-based FBI agent who works with Tom Hank's son Colin ("That Thing That You Do" and "Orange County"). They are techies who capture Internet predators and generally live, breath and speak computers (but never very loud...).

They encounter a "streaming" website that is virtually untraceable. It displays the first attention getter, which is a cat that dies on screen. Then, with increasing brutality, you see a series of murders slowly conducted on-line with the caption that the more people log on to watch, the faster the seemingly random victim will die. A sidebar displays the swiftly climbing number of hits, while blogs from viewers also appear in a gleefully bloodthirsty stream as millions of viewers follow the torture and death of each victim. The audience in the theater was riveted, even as I writhed in anxiety (I'm not very good at on-screen torture).

This was a very, very long 100 minutes. If I were to find any redeeming qualities, I would say that at least Diane Lane's FBI agent doesn't wait around to be rescued and Portland looks photogenic. Wet, but photogenic... That's the best I can do...sorry...