Psicópata: El Asesino del Conejo Blanco Review: Folded Flat

Is Psicópata: El Asesino del Conejo Blanco worth watching?

No. Psicópata: El Asesino del Conejo Blanco has a genuinely interesting idea at its core, but the execution is too clumsy for the film to work as either a thriller or a psychological study. It wants to trace a killer’s violence back to the damage done to him in childhood, which is a more thoughtful angle than most serial-killer films bother with. Unfortunately, a disorganised script and a villain performance pitched in a completely different key from the rest of the film sap the tension from nearly every scene.

What is Psicópata: El Asesino del Conejo Blanco about?

A serial killer is terrorising a Mexican city, and he leaves a calling card at each crime scene: a small white rabbit folded from paper. Nora Sierra, a criminal psychologist who lives with dissociative identity disorder, is brought in to help understand him. She is partnered with Eder Ballesteros, a veteran investigator who has recently received a terminal diagnosis and has little time left to close the case.

Together, the two try to decode the killer’s logic and anticipate his next move, while their own struggles, one with a fractured sense of self and the other with mortality, colour how they see the case.

Psicópata: El Asesino del Conejo Blanco is directed by J. Xavier Velasco. It is a Mexican production in Spanish, runs 99 minutes, and features Adriana Llabrés, Hoze Meléndez, Andrés Almeida, Horacio García Rojas, Ruth Ramos and Nailea Norvind.

Big ideas without a structure to hold them

The film’s ambitions are clear. Rather than treating its killer as a pure monster, it wants to ask how violence is made: what childhood trauma, neglect and social failure do to a person. Pairing that with investigators who have their own wounds is a promising setup, and there are moments when the film hints at a darker, more serious drama about damaged people recognising each other.

The problem is the screenplay. It jumps between investigation, backstory and psychological theory without building momentum, and the clues rarely add up to a satisfying sense of detection. The origami rabbit is a striking image, but it feels more like a marketing hook than a meaningful part of the killer’s psychology. Instead of deepening as the story goes on, the film grows more scattered.

A villain from a different film

The biggest problem is the antagonist. The performance is broad and theatrical, closer to a pulp horror villain than to the grounded, damaged figure the script seems to describe, and it clashes badly with the more naturalistic work around it. Scenes that should be menacing become awkward, and the film’s attempt to explore the roots of violence is undermined by a character who never feels real.

The lead performances fare better. Adriana Llabrés brings conviction to her role, and the film is at its most watchable when it lets its investigators simply talk through the case. The partnership between the psychologist and the dying detective is the film’s emotional hook, and a tighter script could have made much more of it.

Where it might still find an audience

In fairness, the film is competently shot, and its interest in psychology is more thoughtful than many straight-to-streaming thrillers. The decision to centre a protagonist with dissociative identity disorder is ambitious, even if the follow-through does not match the idea. Viewers with a particular interest in Mexican genre cinema may find enough here to hold their attention. But as a suspense film, it rarely generates real fear or surprise.

Who should watch Psicópata: El Asesino del Conejo Blanco?

It is only really for completists of Mexican crime and horror cinema, or viewers curious about its premise. At 99 minutes it is not a long commitment, but it can feel longer. Expect scenes of violence and crime-scene imagery, discussion of child abuse and trauma, and strong language; it is for adults only.

Better alternatives:

• Amores Perros, a landmark of Mexican cinema that explores violence and its roots with far greater power.
• Sin Nombre, a tense, grounded thriller about gangs and migration in Mexico.

The verdict

Psicópata: El Asesino del Conejo Blanco is a disappointing thriller that wastes a promising premise. Its interest in the roots of violence and its damaged investigators suggest a better film, but a muddled script and a badly misjudged villain keep it from ever becoming gripping.