"Murder by Numbers" coulda been a great movie, but it'll have to settle for pretty good. It suffers from too much exposition (when information about characters or plot are being told to the audience) and not enough action. Actually, it doesn't even have to be action. I got a kick of watching the forensics stuff, maybe they shoulda shown some more of that.
I find forensics fascinating. I like that TV show "C.S.I.", and I'm looking forward to the spin-off, which I'll probably enjoy more simply because it's set in my hometown ("CSI: Miami" will star David Caruso, and if he's a wise man, he'll stick around after the first season). Also, I've been reading the "Kay Scarpetta" novels by Patricia Cornwell. Lemmie tellya, if you're interested in forensics and all that Medical Examiner stuff, read those books, especially "Postmortem." But yeah, I find forensics fascinating, so I really enjoyed those parts of the movie. There wasn't as much as I woulda liked, though. Too bad.
It might seem like I'm ripping on this movie, but I liked it quite a bit. I'm just bitching because as good as it was, it coulda been better. But that's okay, because this movie is pretty damn good on it's own. Sandra Bullock plays a character completely different from the kinds of characters she usually plays. She does an admirable job, though, and I'm happy anytime I see her outside of a romantic comedy. I like her as an actress, and she seems like a cool person in real life. That's pure speculation, though. Her partner in the movie is played by Ben Chaplin (no relation to Charlie... he co-starred with Nicole Kidman in "Birthday Girl"), and he's very good. The key roles of the two teenage killers (don't worry, that's not a spoiler) are played by Ryan Gosling and Michael Pitt. Michael Pitt was really good, but I had a hard time believing him as a genius. Maybe I still had the image of his character in "Bully" in my head, I dunno. The standout, and the best actor in the movie, is Ryan Gosling. He was in "Mickey Mouse Club" with Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake, Christina Aguilera, J.C. Chasez, and Keri Russell. He starred as "Hercules" in the TV show, "Young Hercules," but what got him the most attention was his role in a recent film called "The Believer," where he plays a Jewish kid who becomes a neo-Nazi. Pretty crazy stuff. Oh, here's some trivia you may or may not care about. Henry Bean, the guy who directed Ryan Gosling in "The Believer," did several uncredited rewrites for "Murder by Numbers."
The director of this movie is Barbet Schroeder ("Single White Female," "Reversal of Fortune," "Barfly"), and he did a pretty good job. The script was written by Tony Gayton. He's new to the world of screenwriting, but the script was pretty good. In time, I think he'll be writing great things.
"Murder by Numbers" is a really good movie, and the acting is great, but I was really hoping for some more cool forensics stuff. There was some, but not as much as I woulda liked. The movie is a good way to kill two hours, though.
Scale of 1-10: 7