Murder by Numbers

source: Murder by Numbers

So, I'm wondering while watching this film, did the producers of this movie get to save money on Sandra Bullock's wardrobe by dragging out her "before" clothes from Miss Congeniality? Did Ms. Bullock also get to sleepwalk through the role by channeling the "before" Gracie Hart? As many reviewers have noted before, the film is very formulaic. Add to that the deja vu viewer experiences with the character of Cassie Maywether as a somewhat darker Gracie Hart with more back story and it rapidly become a snooze fest. The two bad boy serial killers have been done before (and better) in other films. As has the "good guy partner trying to protect his partner despite the evidence" character been seen before. In fact none of the characters in the film ever get beyond two dimensions or try to be anything but trite stereotypes. One last peeve - using the term serial killer is false advertising. Murdering one person - even if it's a premeditated murder - does not make you a serial killer. You may have the potential to become a serial killer but you are not a serial killer or even a spree killer.

Murder By Numbers has detectives Sandra Bullock and Ben Chaplin assigned to the murder of a young woman who was blitz attacked by an intruder in her home. Bullock gets the right scent on things, but the 'facts' keep getting in her way. This updating of the Leopold/Loeb story that has seen such films as Rope and Compulsion inspired by that famous true thrill kill story has as its protagonists Ryan Gosling and Michael Pitt. I think that the author gives us a big hint to the characters of these two right in the beginning when we see Pitt reading a paper he's written for a class about Nietschean superman philosophy and Gosling just pretending to be asleep in class. The homoerotic tension crackles off the scene with Gosling and Pitt. They are truly into each other until Agnes Bruckner enters their lives. After that it's every bisexual for himself. These two go far beyond Loeb and Leopold. Not only do they randomly pick some poor women for their kill experiment, but Pitt is a science wiz and he manufactures the forensic evidence that throws suspicion on Chris Penn the school janitor. Unfortunately Gosling really rubs her the wrong way when he's questioned. He's the kind of rich kid you love to take down. But speaking of rubbing the wrong way, Bullock is rubbing her own superiors just that way. Part of it is male chauvinism, part of it is they don't want to ruffle the feathers of Gosling's father who's the richest guy in town. Bullock and Gosling dominate the film. Her with her dogged determination to take down the rich kid and him with a terrifying charisma that just about everyone is taken with. Loeb and Leopold never had problems like these.

slowest moving film I've seen in a long time. Include this with the fact it's basically boring (especially Sandra Bullock) throughout, and you've got a film that starts out with lot's of potential, but drags along with plot holes that are so evident...it's a "crime" in itself. The two boys in the film do a great job though..and make up for Sandra Bullock's obviously "over the top" acting as the "tough guy" female detective. If it wasn't for the two adolesent plotters...this movie wouldn't of even attained the 5 rating I gave it.

Can some one tell me the point of this film!!??!? You know exactly who did it right at the start, Bullock plays a 'character' who you care nothing about, Ben Chaplin is wasted, it slow boring and has no climax, the one small twist at the end is just that small and does not make up for what seems a life time to get to I beg you do not waste your valuable life on this!!!

This is exactly what Hollywood does badly. Very Badly. Typically awful who-dunnit featuring more bluffs and double bluffs than you could shake a stick at. This movie is up there with horrendous plotless rambles like Copycat, Along Came A Spider and even Kiss the Girls. Horrendous in that it is possible to work out just about every plot detail in the first 25 minutes. The constant "twists" and "surprises" are tedious to say the least. Don't get me wrong I like Sandra Bullock but when is she going to get a role that truly makes her shine. She seems to manage to choose the wrong movies time after time. I think she should maybe look to more comedy roles as I feel some of her best parts have been in films like Demolision Man and even last years Miss Congeniality wasn't too bad (ok it was was that bad but not as bad as Murder By Numbers). Michael Pitt on the other hand is awesome. I saw him in Bully not so long ago in which he was fantastic and also last years Hedwig and the Angry Inch. He does evil particularly well. I think he could be destined for very great things. And what the hell is Chris Penn doing in this tripe?! Nice guy Eddie is far better than this! It was worth going to see this movie just for the guys walking around in the Slipknot costumes whenever they were going to murder someone. On the whole this film was very poor, it scores only a ** out of ***** on the Meejoir-meter. But if Sandra Bullock is reading this, I still love you!

There's something frustrating about watching a movie like 'Murder By Numers' because somewhere inside that Hollywood formula is a good movie trying to pop out. However, by the time the credits roll, there's no saving it. The whole thing is pretty much blown by the "cop side" of the story, where Sandra Bullock and Ben Chaplin's homicide detective characters muddle through an awkward sexual affair that becomes more and more trivialized the longer the movie goes on. Although Bullock is strong in her role, it's not enough to save the lackluster script and lazy pacing. Ben Chaplin's talents are wasted in a forgettable role (he did much better earlier in the year in the underrated 'Birthday Girl') as well as Chris Penn, who has a role so thanklessly small you feel sorry for a talent like him. Anyway, the plot really isn't even a factor in this movie at all. The two teen killers played by Ryan Gosling and Michael Pitt are the only real reasons to see this movie. Their talent and chemistry work pretty good and they play off of each other quite well. It's too bad they weren't in a much better all-around film. Barbet Schroeder is treading way too safe ground here for such a seasoned filmmaker. Bottom Line: it's worth a rent if you're a genre fan, but everyone else will live a fulfilled life without ever seeing it, except maybe on network TV with convenient commercial breaks.

Cassie Mayweather (Sandra Bullock) is a homicide detective with a disturbing past, she and her partner Sam Kennedy (Ben Chaplin) are called in to investigate the murder of a young woman found abandoned in a ditch. When everything seems to point at the killer, Cassie's gut tells her that things are not quite as they appear, and the real killers find that they can't hide as easily as they first thought. Murder by numbers does have some good intrigue and suspense in the plot, and yes it does try very hard to do something a fresh and different, but in the end it just seems pretty run of the mill. 6/10 It entertains and it does have a good cast, but its just not quite sharp enough on the details.

Alfred Hitchcock invented any kind of thriller you could think of:he set the standards so high that any director who makes a suspense movie will be fatally compared to him. The main subject of this Bullock vehicle ,all the ideas,almost everything was already in Hitchcock's classic " Rope":the two students who commit a gratuitous crime, Nietsche's philosophy,and the clues that the boys disseminate ,the Master was the first to transfer them to the screen.And with an eighty-minute movie which was a riveting technical tour de force. "Murder by numbers " does not take place in a single room,like "the rope" ,mind you.And ,what a supreme originality,it pits two cops against the evil youngsters;and ,you would never guess it,these two cops are very different:actually,Bullock plays the part of woman living like a man ,and her partner (Chaplin) is as shy as a clueless girlie.The two boys' performances are not really mind-boggling ,not as good ,as ,say ,that of Edward Norton in "primal fear" . Well,you know ," Rope" was so good ....

I predicted too many things in this movie and the only thing that kept my interest were the two young actors playing teenagers. They seemed to have the stronger and by far, more interesting scenes. They definitely seemed to have more to do than our star, Sandra Bullock. Bullock always plays this independent character that lives alone and has predictable "back story" issues. I would like to see her do something a little more challenging. Not bad, just not great. 6/10