Crack FBI profiler Illeana Scott (Jolie) is despatched to Montreal to help local police track down a killer who has assumed more identities than Alistair McGowan.

His modus operandi - neatly summed up in the splendidly grungy opening - is to select a target broadly the same size, stove their face in with a rock and then live their lives.

Scott's detection methods - much to the chagrin of fellow French Canadian officers - are a sort of cross between Prime Suspect's Jane Tennison and Mystic Meg.

When we first meet she's lying down in a freshly vacated grave gleaning the vibe - which just goes to show you can take the girl out of Tomb Raider but you can't take Tomb Raider out of the girl.

She gets her first big break when local art dealer James Costa (Hawke) disturbs the killer after he's rocked his latest victim in a car park...but manages to catch a glimpse of his face.

An elaborate trap is laid to snare the vengeful chameleon - with the key witness as bait - and to complicate matters Illeana falls for Costa or, as she puts it, "might be having a reaction to the witness. A favourable one."

Drawing heavily on the style pioneered by David Fincher in Seven - no-holds barred autopsies, creepy serial killer lairs - this shakes down as a pretty satisfying thriller.

If you can accept Jolie as a maverick investigator - she'll break the speed limit if strictly necessary - then you'll probably buy the dubious final twist and the hackneyed evil twin storyline.

There's also some hard-to-swallow mumbo jumbo about psychological profiling (has nobody in Canada heard of DNA techniques?).

However, director DJ Caruso handles the tension nicely, there's some imaginative use of the Montreal locations and Hawke, with able support from French heartthrob Martinez as Ileanna's sceptical colleague, impresses.

Never less than competent and offering up the occasional jolt, this is one of the better thrillers to emerge from a Hollywood seemingly at a loss to offer something genuinely fresh.

Tim Evans