The movie starts with a family falling victim to a sadistic killer who enters their house and makes a teenage girl choose between killing her mother or her father otherwise the killer kills all of them. The perpetrator is masked, has a menacing voice and uses a bloody timer. But what’s even worse is that the killer makes the girl kill her own father. The film then proceeds to introduce the main protagonists – journalist student Fiona who lives alone in an apartment. She is first shown in a shower scene reminiscent of Pscyho but thankfully, the killer does not make an appearance just yet and there is not much nudity either in this film unlike in other horror films so I guess it is meant to be viewed by even young audiences.
Fiona’s father is next introduced as a cop who tries to pacify his daughter who gets freaked by the thought that someone entered her apartment while she was in the shower. The movie also reminisces about Fiona’s past and establishes that her mom killed herself in a hotel, her suicide note is shown and in it the word choice is mentioned. This makes Fiona think twice if her mom was also a victim of this so-called serial killer. And so she starts to investigate (she is a reporter, after all).
The next scenes show the succeeding victims of the serial killer – first, is a pianist who was made to choose between his fingers and his hearing. Then, surprisingly, Fiona gets a chat/message from the serial killer that seemed to insinuate that her mom’s death may not, in fact, be a suicide. The next victim is a bitch model who is made to choose between her beauty and her eyes. Afterwards, Fiona starts to investigate and her amateurish efforts make her a better investigator than her dad since she is able to track down a hotel room where the serial killer had apparently stayed in (judging from the symbol she found in the bathroom mirror)
So Fiona decides to do more research on Choice Therapy as it seems to be a recurring theme in all the murders conducted so far. But when she tries looking for reference books in the library, she can’t find any of the books listed and so she was surprised upon returning to her desk to find the books she was looking for on her chair. But when she tries to check out the books in the counter, the librarian says the books do not belong to them. She tries (with the help of another friend) to figure out where the books came from. They eventually trace it to an already closed-down juvenile facility and Fiona reveals what she knows to her father to aid in their investigation. His dad doesn’t want her to be involved but Fiona says she doesn’t seem to have a choice since the killer chose to involve her.
Father and daughter next visit a doctor-psychiatrist specializing in choice therapy and who was once involved in an experiment in Milburne Juvenile facility. He gives them some recorded tapes of the children he studied in Milburne and the two leave, hoping to find the identity of the killer in those tapes. The entire investigating team watches the tapes and they are already tired until they get to the last boy in the tapes and realized that they have found THE ONE - because all the loose ends tie up. The boy named Nathan Jones is an orphan, adopted by the musician (that had his fingers cut off) and who allegedly molested the boy. Next, he was adopted by another family, with the daughter who later on became the model (who had her eyes gouged out). He stayed with this family for only two years because the girl allegedly was raped by the boy.
The police search the boy’s last known residence and they are greeted by an unmistakable stench from the blood and different body parts that can be found all over the house. They find the decomposing body of Dr. Pendleton (the doctor-psychiatrist from Milburne) and from the photos they find in his bedroom, the investigators surmise that the sheriff (Fiona’s dad) is the one next in line to be killed.
Meanwhile, the killer contacts Fiona and tells her there is something she needs to know about her mother’s death but she must come alone. The sheriff tries to contact Fiona but is victimized by the killer and put to sleep. Fiona reaches Milburne and she is taken to Isolation Room number 17 (which explains the serial killer’s chat name – ISO 17) and when Fiona gets gassed, she is taken to a hotel room, apparently the same one where Fiona’s mother died.
The killer eventually reveals that the he and Fiona are siblings with the same mother but different fathers and Fiona’s father made their mom choose to give him up for adoption because he doesn’t want to bring up another man’s child. He revealed too, that Fiona’s mom chose to kill herself so that Fiona may live. Then, the killer shows Fiona her father badly beaten up, and all black and blue. The killer puts a plastic bag over the sheriff’s head and proceeds to kill him until Fiona breaks loose from her bonds and gives the killer a whack on the head. But she is too late because her dad is dead. Then, when the killer attempts to get up, she pummels his head repeatedly with a gun.
But I guess I have to agree with all the reviews made on the film – it doesn’t have a good ending it was a bit confusing even. But I do like the storyline and though the story was a bit slow in some parts, it was greatly shot and had just the right amount of cinematic effect. Would I recommend this film – well, it depends if you’re looking for a Grade A horror film or a suspense thriller, this would not be for you. But if you just need to pass the time and be entertained in the meantime, then this movie might just give you that.
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