Small Town Murder Songs

Small Town? Very. Murder? Shocking. Songs? Rousing. Put it all together and you have a fiendishly good film about death and redemption in a pacifist farming community. Peter Stormare plays a seemingly placid cop named Walter, the black sheep of an Ontario Mennonite family who's trying to atone for his violent past. A brutal act he committed has caused his father and brother to reject him. Walter's relationship with the desirable Rita is over and she currently lives with a thug named Steve, who hates cops in general and Walter even more. Meanwhile, Walter lives with Sam, a god-fearing waitress and good influence played by Martha Plimpton. When Steve finds the body of a young woman dumped near a lake, it's Rita who phones in the emergency call. Do they know something about the murder? All Walter's leads are dead ends. It seems that no matter how hard he tries to be good, the devil won't let him go. SMALL TOWN MURDER SONGS features amusing chapter titles based on Biblical admonitions (“The Lord will fight for you; you have only to be still”) and hand-clapping gospel music by Canadian indie-rock band Bruce Peninsula. – B.B.