'88 Minutes' is 87 minutes too long

“88 Minutes” is one of those hopelessly convoluted thrillers that the screenwriter himself – in this case Gary Scott Thompson – probably couldn’t explain.

The title refers to a phone threat received by Seattle college professor and FBI forensic psychiatrist Jack Gramm (Al Pacino), who is told he has less than two hours to live. Within that time, a rash of killings take place in Seattle that mimic a case Gramm worked on years earlier and implicate him.

Did Gramm do it? Is the convicted serial killer he put on death row years ago trying to frame him? Is one of his ambitious students behind the charade?

Most importantly, does Thompson, the screenwriter, realize that not a single scene makes sense?

“88 Minutes” buries us in twists, suspects and possibilities. As Gramm races around town, his cell phone rings about every three minutes with information that takes the movie in a new direction.

For his part, Pacino never looks very frazzled, even as his lethal deadline approaches. He only gets louder.

Like director Jon Avnet, who overdoses on zooming camerawork, the actor is trying to distract us from the picture’s spectacular silliness. But even Pacino in bad Al mode can’t drown that out.

Read more by movie editor Josh Larsen at LarsenOnFilm.com.