Kevin Costner is deeply flawed, and William Hurt likes it that way.

Kevin Costner may be trying to reinvent himself as a darker, edgier leading man but when he introduced costar Demi Moore before unspooling "Mr. Brooks," his new serial killer thriller, he sounded more like a host on a plastic surgery reality show.

"With the way she looks, she's gonna be making movies a lot longer," the actor said, as the 44-year-old Moore glided across the stage to the delight of hundreds of theater owners Tuesday night at the Paris Hotel & Casino here.

Good looks aside, never mind the talent of its stars, "Mr. Brooks" is one gory movie. It follows the blond all-American everyman — who runs, get this, a wildly successful box factory — as he wrestles with a bloodthirsty alter-ego played by William Hurt, who spends much of the movie intoning blood lusts from the back seat of a Volvo while Moore dukes it out as a rich heiress who prefers bagging killers to Bulgari sapphires.

Clearly, some of these conceits, including the killer's lavish dissection chamber — outfitted with sexy track lighting secreted away in a pottery shed — were a little tough for the audience to swallow. In fact, if there were a giant thought-bubble above the throng gathered after the screening, it would have read: "What the ... ?" Packs of cinema owners hung around to canvass each other, trying to figure out if "Mr. Brooks" has an upside. That the movie is truly scary was seen as almost unanimously positive.

"It's really surprising ... ," said Linda Zurich, a fiftysomething multiplex owner from upstate New York. "I know it's way too bloody and edgy for most of my contemporaries and that will make it tricky to book. I'd say it would probably play better in urban areas, but I'm not sure if [Costner] attracts a sophisticated crowd."

At an after-party, a sixtysomething couple, owners of a small circuit in Washington state, said the movie had them rethinking their yard. "I've got a shed out back where I do some pottery. I think now my wife wants to monitor my daily activities," the man joked. "Yeah," his wife said, "but only from a video surveillance system."

Kevin Costner is starring in the film SWING VOTE this October:

http://imdb.com/title/tt1027862/synopsis

"In a remarkable turn-of-events, the result of the presidential election comes down to one man's vote."

ohhhhh, this movie.

This had SO much potential to be the awesome piece of badness its trailer promised.

Costner better have his Osc...err...Razzie speech ready

he made his bad turn forever ago, with "a perfect world" which is great!

thought he was really good in Mr. Brooks....and I'm not really a fan of his

Open Range was a good Western.

TS: Swing Vote vs. Man of the Year

was there an adult 12-year-old daughter who wants to be Chairman of the Fed in Man of the Year?

I wish!

Swing Vote is a sorry chickenshit excuse for a "political comedy."

open range was great.

i liked K-Cos in the upside of anger.

Kevin Costner sings!

If Kevin Costner was into cosplay he'd be Kevin Cosplay