The Last Victim (aka Dear Mr. Gacy) (2010)
Distributor: Anchor Bay Entertainment
DVD Release date: 7th March 2011 (UK)
Directed by: Svetozar Ristovski
Starring: William Forsythe, Jesse Moss
Review by: Stephanie Scaife
John Wayne Gacy was responsible for the rape and murder of 33 teenage boys and young men in and around the Chicago area during the period of 1972 – 78, making him one of America’s most notorious and well known serial killers. After 14 years on death row, Gacy was finally executed by lethal injection in May 1994. The Last Victim is based on the book of the same by Jason Moss, who as a student befriended Gacy and formed a regular correspondence with the killer during the weeks and months in the run up to his execution.
The Last Victim (known more commonly as Dear Mr. Gacy) is the first English language film by Macedonian filmmaker Svetozar Ristovski and was made for Canadian TV then released straight to DVD in the UK and US and it certainly shows in the look and style of the film. The lurid UK DVD cover is also perhaps slightly misleading, The Last Victim isn’t really a horror film and there is very little in the way of gore, and despite being advertised as “the true story of John Wayne Gacy” it’s actually far more concerned with Moss.
It would be better described as a psychological thriller and what this film really has going for it is the performances from the two lead actors, William Forsythe (Once Upon A Time in America) as Gacy and Jesse Moss (Ginger Snaps) as Jason Moss. It examines their manipulative cat and mouse relationship to great effect. Moss is an ambitious criminology student who wants to write his thesis on serial killers; his professor is less than enthused by the idea claiming that it’s an oversaturated area that’s difficult to get a new and original take on. The determination to stand out from his peers and to truly get inside the mind of a killer drives Moss to extreme lengths. He decides to pose as the typical kind of victim Gacy targeted; a damaged, abused and potentially homosexual kid, in the need of help and friendship. Moss takes himself to the brink, ostracising himself from his girlfriend, hanging out with rent boys and at one point, under Gacy’s manipulation, he is almost driven to murder proving rather uncomfortably that they are more similar than Moss would like to believe.
This is by no means a great film, but much like the protagonist, it attempts a new take on the serial killer genre. I was unaware of Moss and his relationship with Gacy but this film is an adequate effort to bring his story to the small screen. If you’re interested in the subject matter or if you are looking for a decent thriller to waste away a few hours then I’d recommend giving this a go. But if you’re looking for a serial killer movie with lots of gore then you’ll more than likely be disappointed by this talky character study that with the exception of a couple of brief flashbacks stays away from what makes Gacy so infamous.