The Collector Review (2009) Worth Watching?

It's about a thief who decides to break into a house, only to find that a deranged psycho killer already has.

The Collector was directed by Marcus Dunstan (who also directed The Neighbor and The Collection) and stars Josh Stewart (from I nsidious: The Last Key, Malicious, Cold Moon), Michael Reilly Burke (from Ted Bundy) and Andrea Roth (from The Skeptic, The Untold, The Stepdaughter).

He always takes one

The Collector has a cool premise. A petty criminal breaks into the house of a family he's been working for to steal some jewels. As he's cracking their safe he hears the family screaming for their lives. Turns out, another guy who had been working for the same family also decided to break into their house, but for a seriously twisted reason. The petty criminal tries to save the day, but yeah, doesn't.

This movie has a very similar vibe to the Saw franchise, due to the fact that it shares the same writers as three of the Saw movies. The Collector was originally called "The Midnight Man" and was pitched as a prequel to Saw. But the guys behind Saw weren't into it so it was released as a stand-alone film.

The Collector picked up mostly negative reviews, but this shade was mostly cast by mainstream reviewers who disliked the concept of torture porn more than they disliked the story or production value. It's a lot like found footage flicks, after the big names made their rounds reviewers started trashing new releases simply because they were tired of the concept, giving little regard to the films themselves. Same reason most action movies get snobby reviews, many critics think action films are shallow. But if you want to see a car chase, action movies will give you a dozen of them.

Same with horror, and torture porn in particular. If you like movies with torture and gore, you want to see torture and gore, than you're in luck, The Collector gives you plenty of torture and gore. It also gives you enough story to make the gore make sense, gives you solid characters, a villain, a hero and a high enough production value to make it a good movie. It's not a great movie, but it delivers on what people who liked Saw want to see more of.

Worth Watching?

If you liked the Saw movies and want to see more, but without having to see John Kramer's endless vlogging, than you'll probably have fun watching The Collector.