Criminal Intent (2005) Vanessa Angel, Sebastian Spence, Linda Purl, David Palffy, Sarah Deakins, Ingrid Torrance, Tom Pickett Movie Review

Criminal Intent (2005)   2/52/52/52/52/5


Vanessa Angel in Criminal Intent (2005)

Groan Intent

Devon Major (Sebastian Spence - Eve's Christmas) finds himself under arrest for the murder of his ex-wife, Angela (Ingrid Torrance), as whilst he was the one who called the emergency services when they arrive it was a blood covered Devon cradling his dead wife with the murder weapon in one hand, that they see. In need of someone to defend him Devon turns to Susan Grace (Vanessa Angel - The Perfect Score), a former defence layer who now is a divorce lawyer who represented Angela in their divorce case as she knows he was never violent towards Angela. But not only does Susan suspect that all is not as it seems but Devon finds himself under investigation by DA Kirsten Sorensen (Linda Purl - Frozen Impact) as he is suspected of helping some big companies to embezzle money.

I reckon that anyone who cares about the detail is going to find themselves groaning with in the first few seconds of "Criminal Intent" starting. Firstly we have a prejudiced cop attending a crime scene with the attitude it was a domestic despite no evidence to suggest it. But secondly we have the woman on the phone telling Devon to start CPR despite not having ascertained the state of the victim. And those are by no means the worst groan scenes you will come across in "Criminal Intent" as this ends up a movie riddled with the sort of scenes which are not realistic but are cheesy.

Sebastian Spence in Criminal Intent (2005)

There is a reason why "Criminal Intent" ends up a movie of groans as this is also one of those movies which after the opening scene it goes on a journey of twists and turns as what starts of as a murder then brings in embezzlement and at one point a dark van pulls up with men in masks who abduct and threaten Susan. And it is because of these twists, turns and unbelievable revelations that we get all these slips from being realistic. It is also because of a storyline built on twists and turns that this ends up convoluted and sadly laughable with every new revelation.

Part of what contributes to "Criminal Intent" being laughable is the acting, although the writing of the characters is a big problem. What we get through out is over acting, over emphasising every fourth word in a sentence and people spending many a scene glaring at someone. Maybe the appeal of a cast of familiar TV movie actors and actresses might be enough to keep some entertained but for me that didn't help to lift this from being weak.

What this all boils down to is that "Criminal Intent" is twisted but it is also convoluted and messy with the final product featuring far too many groan scenes to entertain.


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