Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer Review

Most people don't have the time, money, or energy to watch a lot of movies, so when you do get a chance to watch something, you want it to be good. That's why Rotten Tomatoes exists: to give a snapshot of whether a movie is worth your time. But does it always work? I'll be watching all of Rotten Tomatoes’ Certified Fresh movies from this Wikipedia list starting in the year 1990, the decade I was born, and we'll see if these movies are really worth the hype.

Movie 1 of 1990

Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, directed by John McNaughton, has a mythos that precedes itself. I always heard how messed up it was, but I never really knew why. I mean, I could guess based on the title and the creepy posters, but I think there was a lot more to this movie than just showing something disturbing.

First screened in 1986, this didn't see a wider release until 1990. That seems like a long time for a movie to go without distribution, and it really puts into perspective how tame movie studios were regarding censorship and how they thought the general public would respond to something. I hate when a movie treats its audience like they're not smart, and this movie didn't do that at all. It allows its audience to experience an unhappy ending. Actually, not just unhappy, but disturbing. We're seeing this morally reprehensible character get away with the worst crimes imaginable, and the movie trusts its audience to sit with that and feel just how brutal the world can be, because the crimes depicted in this movie have happened in real life. I know it's a fictionalized version of some real-life serial killers, but the nature of the acts portrayed felt very grounded in reality.

What didn't feel as grounded in reality were the blood and gore effects, but that doesn't mean I didn't think they were well done. It reminded me of giallo filmmaking, which I'm no expert on, but based on the giallo films I've seen, they have this campy style when it comes to those effects. It honestly reminds me a lot of what you would see in a play. The blood looks like paint, very thin and bright, and the gore looks like a mixture of latex and paper-mâché. I don't think this is a negative thing, especially for an independent film, as those materials aren't as expensive. Whether it was for style or necessity, I thought this made the project feel unique when compared to other movies from this era.

Overall, I feel like this movie was a character study showing how Henry (Michael Rooker) just sees people as disposable. There are points when you wonder if the reason he's doing this is because of his childhood or to get revenge on his mother, but you realize that might not be the case. He can't get his stories straight when discussing his childhood or why he murdered his mother because this man is an unreliable narrator. Killing is just something he likes doing. He has a whole process and doesn't like when that process is interfered with. Things do start to get a lot messier when he begins to include his roommate Otis (Tom Towles), who isn't as methodical as Henry.

Otis is much more spontaneous than Henry, which Henry doesn't always appreciate because that kind of impulsivity could get them caught. We even see this illustrated in the moment when the two aren't even killing anyone. When their video camera breaks, Otis just throws it out of the car window with no thought of whether it can be fixed or not. He is also very erratic and inappropriate with his sister Becky (Tracy Arnold), who has just arrived to live with the pair for a while.

Becky is a recently divorced mother and former sex worker/dancer, which you would think would be a massive trigger for Henry based on what he claims about his childhood, but he seems to have a soft spot for her, perhaps due to relating to her abusive upbringing. I was much more concerned every time she was left alone with her brother, which turned out to be a correct assumption. Her bond with Henry grows, and it seems like they might ride off into the sunset together, but this isn't that kind of movie. Henry is incapable of love, even saying to her, “I guess I love you too.” He doesn't even know what love is and ultimately views Becky as disposable, like any of his other victims. There is certainly no happy ending to be found here.

Rotten Tomatoes Score: 89%

Is it worth the hype?:

I would say yes. I enjoy a really well-done character study, and this checked all those boxes for me. The performances were great, the story was disturbing, and the sound design in particular really aided the horror elements. I don't know if this is something I would watch again because it's definitely a feel-bad movie, but I think that was exactly the intention of the filmmakers, which is always a win in my book. I would definitely give this a watch if you think you can handle it.