When someone says the words "serial killer", most of us remember the most horrific examples of these murderers come to mind. Charles Manson, John Wayne Gacy, Jeffrey Dahmer and so on. What doesn't come to mind is a likable, personable young man. But that is what we are given in The Minus Man the directorial debut of Hamilton Fancher, who also wrote the screenplay. A nice, friendly cold-blooded murderer.

What makes this film so interesting to me is that we never do find out why Owen Wilson's "Vann Siegert" is killing people left and right. In the opening of the movie, he kills Sheryl Crow and leaves her to be found in a rest stop restroom, the apparent victim of a drug overdose. Like every other murder Vann will commit throughout the course of the movie, we are never told what is driving him, in spite of the narrative style that Fancer duplicates from Blade Runner for which he wrote the screenplay adaptation of Philip K. Dick's novel.

Wilson is perfect as Vann. Vann is almost a cipher, his blank, bland personage adapting to fulfill the image others view him in. To Doug and Jane, who rent Vann a room in their home, he is the perfect tenant. To Ferrin (Janeane Garafalo again proving she's a much better dramatic actress than anyone gives her credit for), he's a co-worker that attracts him even more when he doesn't respond to her obvious interest.

As the body-count begins to grow in the small town where Vann now lives, working in his dream job at the Post Office, we see Vann confronting his own internal demons. Two detectives, who apparently exist only in Vann's mind, question him about what he does and why. But he never really answers.

Meanwhile, the relationship between his landlords is deteriorating. Brian Cox as Doug and Academy Award Winner Mercedes Ruehl are struggling. He beats himself up physically while she tortures herself emotionally about how she's failed her husband and her daughter, who we are told is away at college but she really isn't. Where she really is, is just another unanswered mystery.

This is a dark film, made even darker by the lack of explanation as to why Vann is doing what he is doing. Between wondering who will be his next victim, and whether or not he'll ever get caught is enough to keep you on your seat. But there is much more to the movie than that, I'm just not willing to spoil it by giving too much away. Suffice it to say this one is a winner.