Posted: 04/26/2002

Murder by Numbers

(2002)

by C.E. Pelc

Sandra doesn’t even get to be cute in this overly serious murder mystery that misses the target completely.

Murder by Numbers is exceptionally lame. It will probably be one of if not the lamest movie you will see this year. Now granted it took me a little while to come to this conclusion because I went in with really high hopes for Sandra Bullock’s latest venture and left it having been entertained, yet unfulfilled. And as the days past and I thought more and more about this movie, I realized it was, well, lame. Thus my conclusion on how lame Murder by Numbers is.

So why is it so lame? Well, that’s because this movie had the potential to be something fantastic. The storyline itself is great - two school-aged kids from opposite sides of the high school social chain team up to commit a murder planned to be random just for the hell of it. This in itself I find fascinating and could be a great movie with dynamic characters about how they evolve and interact. But no. We have to get a movie about a cop that has oodles of personal problems that just happen to be coming back up to haunt her as she’s investigating a strange murder that she believes was committed by these two kids. She becomes too personally involved with the murder victim, causing her hard-ass boss to tell her she’s off the case. But can she back away now? Of course not - she goes on to prove that she was right all along by breaking the rules and using her own inner conflicts to get through. Haven’t we seen this movie, like, 20 times already? Sigh.

As far as I’m concerned, Bullock was not correctly cast in Murder by Numbers. Although it was interesting to see her play a more dominant female role like this, I didn’t find it very believable. She’s much more suited to roles like those she played in Miss Congeniality, 28 Days and Practical Magic -here her womanly charms and great comedic timing are key. I just don’t see her as tough a broad as they wanted Cassie Mayweather to be in Murder by Numbers.

The best parts of this film were definitely centered around the relationship between the two high school students. Ryan Gosling (Remember the Titans) plays Mr. Popular Richard Haywood - a closet homosexual who just loves to lure both men and women with his charms and use them until they’re no longer needed. Justin Pendleton - played by Michael Pitt of Dawson’s Creek fame - is the high school weird kid who is enticed by Gosling to help him plan and execute a murder. The unlikely relationship between these two is both exciting and seductive as you can tell the only reason why Pendleton stays is because for the first time someone honestly needs him for his brains. After they commit the murder and corroborate each other’s stories, things get murky as Pendleton wins the affections of schoolmate Lisa (Agnes Bruckner), who was also once seduced and used by Hayward. And when Hayward finds out about the affair, he is less than pleased that someone may be coming between him and Pendleton.

All in all Murder by Numbers should have been so much more and really falls short. The only saving grace to this movie are the scenes between Pendleton and Hayward as that relationship is unique - you want to know why two people like that are secretly friends and what it all means. And as the murder takes place and new problems arise, their connection becomes uneasy and even more interesting. This is where the real emphasis should have been placed, not on Bullock’s character. We all know the story of the rebellious troubled cop who saves the day…now we want to know the story behind those that are causing them to rebel.

C.E. Pelc lives in Northern California. She would like to volunteer to help Ms. Bullock when choosing her next film.

Got a problem? E-mail us at filmmonthly@gmail.com