Sadly Over-hyped

This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

True Crime (1999) This is a mystery drama film directed by Clint Eastwood. It was adapted from a 1995 novel of the same name. Eastwood stars in the film as a journalist covering the execution of a death row inmate, only to find that he may actually be innocent. Eastwood times two is usually bankable as a strong film. I like going back to watch older films when I can't find anything recent. I overlooked this film when it first came out. The cast was solid with known actors of the day and currently actors early in their careers. It included Clint Eastwood, Isaiah Washington, Denis Leary, Lisa Gay Hamilton, James Woods, Michael McKean, and Mary McCormack. This crime thriller is a race against the clock as Eastwood's character only comes to this realization the same day as the execution is scheduled. The way he ultimately puts the pieces together is thrilling. It really is a good film.

Steve Everett (Clint Eastwood) is a womanizing married recovering alcoholic. He returns to his journalist job at Oakland Tribune after rehab. A young reporter dies in an accident and he assigned her interview with death row inmate Frank Beechum (Isaiah Washington). Beechum was a troubled youth until he became born-again and married to Bonnie (LisaGay Hamilton). He's scheduled to be executed in a few hours for the murder of a pregnant store clerk but Everett starts to wonder about his guilt.There is a functional investigative crime mystery in this movie although the plot isn't very surprising. Clint Eastwood has filled it with too much uninteresting filler. Some of it is really cheesy. I think he wants Reverend Shillerman to be comic relief which really doesn't work. The most annoying is the Hollywood high speed chase to end the investigation. It's utterly ridiculous. Maybe he could call the governor or the prison or the wife. It's a bad attempt to make it artificially exciting.

Directed by and starring Clint Eastwood, I didn't know anything about what this film would involve, and I will be honest in saying that it was purely because of the leading star, and his good supporting cast, that I decided to watch. Basically Steve Everett (Clint Eastwood) is an alcoholic and womanising reporter and journalist for the Oakland Tribune, and he is covering the story of Frank Louis Beechum (Romeo Must Die's Isaiah Washington) who faces execution for murder. The verdict of whether he killed a pregnant woman who owed him $96 was guilty, and he will be put to death at midnight in a few days, and Steve, who is also feeling grief after the death of his wife in a car accident, has to see if the sentence is fair. As Steve covers the story closer, he unearths undiscovered evidence from the night in question, that may prove that Beechum is in fact guilty, but his boss Bob Findley (Denis Leary) doesn't want to listen to him, since he is a disruption, and he slept with his wife. It comes to the point when Steve finds the substantial evidence that proves Beechum is indeed innocent, because of missed witnesses or something, and he races to stop the execution as it is about to happen, and in the end thankfully he stopped it just in time. Also starring Lisa Gay Hamilton as Bonnie Beechum, James Woods as Alan Mann, Bernard Hill as Warden Luther Plunkitt, Diane Venora as Barbara Everett, Michael McKean as Reverend Shillerman, Michael Jeter as Dale Porterhouse and K-PAX's Mary McCormack as Michelle Ziegler. Eastwood directs reasonably well, but his screen presence as the grizzled but determined investigator is a good performance, and the other good names in the cast get just about enough time to show their talent too, it is a simple of story of reporter trying to prove a man he is writing about innocent, but it is a near enough satisfactory crime thriller. Worth watching!

True Crime is directed by Clint Eastwood and is based on Andrew Klavan's 1997 novel of the same name. Eastwood also stars in the film as journalist Steve Everett, who whilst covering the execution of a death row inmate played by Isaiah Washington, discovers that he may actually be innocent.A box office failure for Eastwood that is pretty standard film making all told. The plot we have seen a number of times before, be it a cop/detective or a journalist trying to save a death row prisoner, the song remains the same. Throw in some racial prejudice, bureaucratic nonsense and a flawed hero in waiting (Eastwood's Everett is a skirt chasing alkie who resents authority), and bingo! A by the numbers thriller with absolutely no surprises what so ever. Perhaps more annoying, tho, is that the clunky script and fodder story drags Eastwood's direction down with it. Whilst a man of such ability and integrity really should have known he would be miscast here. There's some fun to be had with James Woods' performance as the newspaper boss trying to keep Everett in check; tho that too is cliché riddled. While the best acting on show comes from Washington, notably during the scenes in prison when visited by wife and child. But this is a misfire of a movie, one that's consigned towards the bottom of the DVD pile of Eastwood completists like me. 4/10