A Major Disappointment

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

The acting in this movie is really good.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

This is a small band of reviewers who have had the good fortune to experience this minor gem of a movie. I wasn't aware that this film was made for TV, so that was the first surprise. Further surprises followed as the film proceeded to develop into an absorbing and convincing melodrama. I can only agree with the other reviewers that this film scored very highly on most of the requirements of great entertainment. The acting was thoughtful, measured and very convincing. Was this because the actors were not "stars"? I would say absolutely so, because faces that are new to one do not distract from the thrust of the story, thus enhancing the sense of reality. The female lead, for me, managed to create one of the most erotic portrayals I have ever seen. She managed to smoulder without any apparent effort. Guess she's just a naturally sexy lady.

This movie is a classic example of "whodunnit" where a few red herrings are included and the mystery isn't resolved until the end. I enjoy this kind of movie, including this one.The challenge is that there are at least 15 key characters to the story. Some are never seen but mentioned. A few are shown in flashbacks as well as present day. Their jobs and relationships are key to the story. It doesn't take long for it to become confusing.I enjoyed the film enough to view it a second time with pauses in order to take notes and then refer back to them. The plot, acting and pace are solid. It's the script and/or amount of allotted that prevents it from being a really good movie.

While it can be refreshing to see a mystery that isn't rushed and allows actors some breathing room, "Evidence of Blood" still takes too long to start putting all it's pieces together, and then rushes to finish things up. The climax is certainly gripping (though very contrived), but it still leaves some questions hanging in the air. Was the late Sheriff murdered? The film certainly hints at it more than once. And what was the real connection -if any - between the murdered woman and the man who was wrongly accused of her death? And the film drops the device of having Strathairn's character watch the video interview of a serial killer he's using as a book subject. That device doesn't illuminate the writer's character all that much, and it's existence only seems to matter for the killer's line "You never know who you really are" (or something like that), which figures at the film's denouement.David Strathairn is an excellent actor with the uncanny ability to subtly make his characters seem more complex than they may be on paper (certainly the case here). Mary McDonnell does well enough, and both she and Strathairn are a good match (though I'll admit that Strathairn had more sexual chemistry with Julianne Moore in a brief scene in "A Map Of The World" than he does with McDonnell.

This is one of my favorite types of movie: thoughtful, shy writer pieces together events from fifty years ago, exonerates an innocent man and discovers something important about himself in the process. The movie doesn't try to do too much, gives you enough information about the primary characters without leaving you wondering if there was more background in the book.I've always liked David Straithairn and he gives an easy portrayal of the main character. Mary McDonnell is good as the unjustly convicted murderer's daughter though I could have done without the halting, "don't really care about anything" accent/tone. Definitely worth seeing if you're into the story-type movie.