Let's say you love films where cops chase super-intelligent criminals but skipped Hannibal because of the unnecessary gore.  Along comes Along Came a Spider to quench your insatiable thirst for that particular genre.  The trouble is that the genre has been rubbed into the ground, leaving Spider a silly, clichéd disappointment.  The only thing startling about the film's well-telegraphed "surprises" is how incredibly predictable they are, especially if you've seen Kiss the Girls, which, like Spider, was based on a James Patterson novel and stars Morgan Freeman as the same protagonist detective (he's this film's executive producer, as well).

First things first.  Spider was the first of six novels Patterson wrote that feature Dr. Alex Cross as a main character.  Kiss was the second book, which technically makes Spider a prequel (the film never addresses this meaningless point).  The parallels between the two films are staggering, making Spider seem almost like a remake of Girls.  The crimes are similar, the criminals are similar, and the twist at the end is, well, just about identical.

This time around, Cross is on the trail of a madman who has kidnapped the daughter of a U.S. Senator (a la Silence of the Lambs) from an ultra-exclusive D.C. school complete with a limousine drop-off area, giant flat-screen monitors on every desk and a gaggle of Secret Service agents to protect the students.  The madman – one Gary Soneji (Michael Wincott, Before Night Falls) – poses as a teacher (complete with instantly suspicious makeup and prosthetics) for two years and makes off with little Megan Rose (Mika Boorem, The Patriot) right under the noses of the agents hired to keep an eye on her.

Cross (Freeman, Nurse Betty), who has been off the job for eight months following the death of his partner, is dragged into the manhunt by Soneji, who feels Cross is the only person intelligent enough to accurately convey his own genius to the media.  Soneji calls Cross at home, using one of those voice-altering devices to make his voice lower (like Wincott's already gravelly voice needs to be lower – it's less intelligible than Brad Pitt in Snatch), and, before you know it, it's off to the cliché races.  The only one Spider doesn't use is the one where the killer jumps up after you think he/she is dead.  They even crib the phone booth scavenger hunt scene from Die Hard With a Vengeance.

Soneji purposely leaves a trail of clues that only Cross can decode, despite the presence of hundreds of specially trained Federal agents (it's almost as lame as Denzel Washington doing the same thing from a hospital bed in The Bone Collector).  You know it won't be long before Cross is taking a mere ten seconds to correctly guess an important computer password, and be prepared to hear lines like "I think he's trying to tell us something," or "He's playing some kind of game."  Holy déjà vu, Batman.  Freeman can keep saying the same lines until he's blue in the face, but he'll never be as cool as his Detective William Somerset in Se7en.

Head Over Heels' Monica Potter plays Jezzie Flannigan, the remorseful Special Agent who was assigned to protect Megan, and she buddies up with Cross to help find Soneji (the film jettisons the romance the two characters share).  Potter has never looked and sounded more like Julia Roberts than she does here, but considering the fact you can't spit without hitting a photograph or print story about Roberts, it's almost refreshing.  Jay O. Sanders is the only other recurring character from the first film. 

Spider was directed by Lee Tamahori (The Edge) and adapted from Patterson's novel by first-timer Marc Moss.  While I was glad the running time was kept in check (it only seemed like two-plus hours), I secretly wished the film contained a lot more forensic hokum.  Worst of all is Jerry Goldsmith's (Hollow Man) score, which is about as grating as a shouting match between Fran Drescher and Janice from Friends.

1:44 –

for violence and language