Citizen X

(1995) ****

Andrei Chikatilo murdered a minimum of 52 women and children in Russia between 1978 and 1990. His victims, primarily young boys, were stabbed to death, ejaculated upon, had their eyes removed because he thought the investigators would see his image in them and had their genitals consumed. Here’s the Wiki link if you’d like any more details. This guy is right up there with Albert Fish and the saddest thing is, they had the bastard in custody in 1984 but he was released due to a mismatched blood typing that was screwed up somehow at the lab. This film gives insight into the painstaking investigation that eventually led to the arrest and execution of the man known as the Rostov Ripper. What made this investigation particularly difficult, were all the roadblocks they encountered due to the rigid Russian government. To ask the FBI for help would have meant admitting that their technology wasn’t as good as ours, to alert the public that a serial killer was on the loose meant telling them they were not in safe hands of the government. So the investigation trudged forward with one very smart and intuitive man at the helm, Lt. Victor Burakov, who eventually caught Chikatilo and with the help of psychiatrist Dr. Alexandr Bukhanovsky, the beast finally cracked and confessed to 52 murders.

This film stars Stephen Rea, Donald Sutherland and Max von Sydow, amongst a slew of other fine actors. It’s deep and gripping, and gave me a better understanding of why it took so damn long for them to finally nail this psycho. A heavy topic but this is so well done, I strongly recommend this film, even the biddy’s could handle it, the gore is kept at a minimum, the real focus being on the investigation.

This is no actor, this is the real monster.