Screening Room By KEVIN THOMAS Times Staff Writer THURSDAY, April 18, 2002

Zachary Hansen's "Killer Me," which screens today in the Method Festival at 4:30 p.m. at the Playhouse 7 in Pasadena, is a striking portrait of a young man, Joseph (George Foster), who alternates between moments of the utmost tenderness with the lonely young girl Anna (Christina Kew), who has worked up her courage to reach out to him, and his impulses to strike out at others or himself.  Joseph's escalating turmoil is expressed eloquently by Foster's intensely interior performance and by the dynamic camerawork of "The Blair Witch Project's" audacious Neal Fredericks.  Contributing crucially to this ambitious film's unsettling impact are Kew's delicately shaded portrayal, Arlan Boll's imaginative sound design and an eerie, disturbing score by Hansen--he recorded it (and then distorted it) on an old PXL 2000 sound camera.  Amazingly, this beautifully realized film cost $12,000.