Murder by Numbers
2002 Directed by Barbet Schroeder
Synopsis
The only flaw in their plan was her.
Tenacious homicide detective Cassie Mayweather and her still-green partner are working a murder case, attempting to profile two malevolently brilliant young men: cold, calculating killers whose dark secrets might explain their crimes.
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Popular reviews
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Completely forgettable! In fact the only thing I can remember about this film is that I didn't like it.
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I watched Murder by Numbers solely because I knew Ryan Gosling and Michael Pitt played killers. They're unsurprisingly terrific; the film itself is your basic clichéd Hollywood thriller, playing sort of like Rope for dummies.
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The two young male talents, Michael Pitt and Ryan Gosling, provide good performances portraying confused and psychopathic high school students.
However the poor execution of this badly written crime drama, that believes it's much more intelligent than it is, makes for a dreadful watch. Unaided by a below par performance by Sandra Bullock playing the protagonist of the film.
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More like MOVIE BY NUMBERS hahahahaha oh I slay myself. Speaking of slaying, Ryan Gosling and Michael Pitt kill some poor woman in this film, and their performances as the cold-hearted killers outact Bullock's below-par performance here every day of the week and twice on Sundays. Still, while the on-screen talent is mixed, and this is no original plot, it's certainly more than fun enough to watch once.
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Why watch this again I hear you say, if you knew what a low score you were going to give it.
Well I'd completely forgot how much I'd disliked this forgettable murder investigation thriller the first time around.
A great cast try their hardest in a poorly directed cliche ridden mess of a film that believes it's way more sophisticated and intelligent than it actually is.
If you've seen Alfred Hitchcock's Rope (1948) you will understand what they were trying for and just how far they fell from the target.
Please let me remember the next time this crosses my path and I start wondering whether I liked it or not.
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A scrappily put together affair, this is a homage to Alfred Hitchcock's excellent movie 'Rope' with the police investigation added in to make it seem different. It's not at all bad though, if you can get past the nonsensical cohesion and Sandra Bullock-ness.
Sandra is the female cop, made fun of by her male colleagues as female cops always are, who begins an investigation into an apparently motiveless murder carried out by Ryan Gosling and that bloke who used to be Henry in Dawson's Creek, who think they have got away with a perfect murder, committed just for the sake of it.
The young pair do a fine job of imitating Hitchcock's protagonists in Rope and Gosling in particular comes…
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More like MOVIE BY NUMBERS hahahahaha oh I slay myself. Speaking of slaying, Ryan Gosling and Michael Pitt kill some poor woman in this film, and their performances as the cold-hearted killers outact Bullock's below-par performance here every day of the week and twice on Sundays. Still, while the on-screen talent is mixed, and this is no original plot, it's certainly more than fun enough to watch once.
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Two surprisingly strong acting performances saved this movie from absolute failure. Michael Pitt's performance is haunting and terrifying as usual, and it's refreshing to see Ryan Gosling play the psychopathic killer. For such an odd pairing, it works. The film itself is badly written and there's a really bad attempt at Alfred Hitchcock's Rope.
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By the numbers indeed.
Any real suspense was ruined when they showed the end at the beginning.
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Like a young Leopold and Loeb, Gosling and Pitt plan and execute the perfect murder. Trouble is, their consciences kick in so mechanically when detectives Bullock and Chaplin start grilling them, we cease to care which one of them performed the actual killing. (And am I the only one who wondered, is that really the point, anyway?). Stranglehold of tired notions never lets up, instead, we watch in horror as the obsessive (and forced into sabbatical) cop with the mysterious past who has gut instinct instead of problem solving skills (and rattles off secret facts of the murder case as if she's read the script herself) dissolves the interesting part of the film: namely, the killers' A-Z knowledge of crime…
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I watched Murder by Numbers solely because I knew Ryan Gosling and Michael Pitt played killers. They're unsurprisingly terrific; the film itself is your basic clichéd Hollywood thriller, playing sort of like Rope for dummies.
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Why watch this again I hear you say, if you knew what a low score you were going to give it.
Well I'd completely forgot how much I'd disliked this forgettable murder investigation thriller the first time around.
A great cast try their hardest in a poorly directed cliche ridden mess of a film that believes it's way more sophisticated and intelligent than it actually is.
If you've seen Alfred Hitchcock's Rope (1948) you will understand what they were trying for and just how far they fell from the target.
Please let me remember the next time this crosses my path and I start wondering whether I liked it or not.
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A pretty "by-the-numbers" film. Sandra Bullock is okay in the lead, but like most of her roles, does nothing to really impress me.
The story is decent and compelling enough but again, nothing special.
What (or rather who) does stand out in this middle of the road thriller are the film's two teenage stars - Michael Pitt and Ryan Gosling.
Both provide an interesting and compelling performance, and provided evidence that they were stars on the rise and young actors to watch.
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huh? what? numbers? murder?
i was watching ryan, what else happened?? :)
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Psychological Thriller, Action