| Evilenko | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | David Grieco |
| Produced by | Mario Cotone |
| Written by | David Grieco |
| Narrated by | MiBAC |
| Starring | Malcolm McDowell Marton Csokas Ronald Pickup |
| Music by | Angelo Badalamenti |
| Cinematography | Fabio Zamarion |
| Editing by | Francesco Bilotti Massimo Fiocchi |
| Studio | Pacific Pictures |
| Distributed by | Mikado |
| Release date(s) | 16 April 2004 (Italy) |
| Running time | 111 minutes |
| Language | Italian English |
Evilenko is a 2004 Italian drama-thriller film very loosely based on the Russian serial killer Andrei Chikatilo. The film was directed and written by David Grieco. It stars Malcolm McDowell, Marton Csokas and Ronald Pickup. The story of Chikatilo was also told, from a different viewpoint, in the made-for-TV movie Citizen X, released in 1995.
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In 1984, in Kiev, schoolteacher Andrej Romanovich Evilenko (McDowell) is dismissed from his position after attempting to molest a student. Driven by his psychopathic urges and embittered by the collapse of the Soviet Union, Evilenko begins to rape, kill and cannibalize women and children. It is hinted throughout the movie that Evilenko somehow gained the power to psychically influence his victims, which accounts for their lack of resistance and his continuous evasion of the authorities.
Vadim Timurouvic Lesiev (Marton Csokas), a magistrate and family man, is assigned to catch the serial killer. For years, Evilenko eludes Lesiev and psychiatrist Aron Richter (Ronald Pickup), who is assigned to profile the killer. Richter eventually finds Evilenko with a little girl and manages to break Evilenko's hypnotic hold on her, but is killed by Evilenko in retaliation; the girl, while it appears to Evilenko that she is run over by a train, escapes alive.
Almost eight years later, Lesiev finally captures Evilenko, who by now has killed 55 people, mostly children and young women. On 22 May 1992, Evilenko goes to court and, on 14 February 1994, he is finally executed. Before his execution, several governments have expressed interest in Evilenko's psychic abilities and asked for extradition of Evilenko - alive - but were denied.
The story is a fictionalisation of serial killer Andrei Chikatilo's life. Large segments of the movie were adapted from Grieco's novel entitled The Communist Who Ate Children. The character is renamed Andrei Evilenko and the film is claimed to be based on a true story.
The soundtrack was composed by Angelo Badalamenti and features two tracks with Dolores O'Riordan, "Angel's Go To Heaven" and "No Way Out".