Untraceable

America has a taste for the grotesque, and the Internet sure makes it easy to find things like videos of Saddam Hussein’s hanging or prisoners’ beheadings. Untraceable takes this curiosity a step further. In addition to watching a person die via live Web feed, each visitor to the site is labeled an accomplice since each additional visitor increases the victim’s toture, whether by extreme heat lamp or battery acid. Once alerted to the site, FBI cyber-crimes agent Jennifer Marsh (Diane Lane) tries to shut it down. Elaborate anti-security measures thwart Marsh and her partners (Colin Hanks and Billy Burke). And to make matters more disturbing, the public is tuning in at an alarming rate. The rest plays out like any other murder mystery, with clues eventually leading to the man they believe to be the killer, who turns the tables on the FBI with a certain technological flair. Director Gregory Hoblit (Fracture, Fallen) does a solid job here, as does Lane as a justifiably spooked FBI agent/single mother. The story is sluggish, however, as it becomes overly interested in pushing its agenda of crying out against America’s lust for violence.