American Murderer Movie Review by Josh Davis : Pop Culture Leftovers

American Murderer Movie Review by Josh Davis

January 25, 2023 1:52 pm |

“American Murderer” plays a little like the best damned episode of “Unsolved Mysteries” ever, assuming the show could vastly upgrade its acting and cinematography.

Based on a true story, the film follows Emmy-nominee Tom Pelphrey (“Ozark”) as Jason Derek Brown, a con artist who once shared a place on the FBI’s Top Ten Most Wanted list with Osama Bin Laden.

When we first meet Jason, he seems outgoing, charming, and just a little full of shit.

He moves into a suburban neighborhood, flaunts his boat and other fancy possessions, and befriends and beds his neighbor, Melanie (Idina Menzel, “Frozen”), and becomes a father figure to her son. By day, he skateboards and plays video games with the neighborhood kids, and by night he schemes his way through nightclubs and strip joints.

Eventually, Jason’s free-spending lifestyle gets out of hand, and he finds himself in debt to a local crime syndicate. In a desperation move, he robs an armored car, kills one of the guards, and tries to disappear.

Writer and director Matthew Gentile, in his feature-length debut, permeates the film with a sense of dread that bubbles and builds. He also juggles time well, moving from the 2004 setting of the murder to months, years, and even decades earlier to help flesh out Jason’s background and motivations. That includes interactions with Jason’s seedy father, David Brown Sr. (Kevin Corrigan, “The King of Staten Island”), who was also a criminal and long-time fugitive.

Helping build tension throughout is a great, moody score from Scott Gentile, brother of the filmmaker, and strong cinematography by Kalilah Robinson.

There is also a very good ensemble cast playing Jason’s family, including Paul Schneider (“Parks and Recreation”) as his brother, David; Shantel VanSanten (“For All Mankind”) as his sister, Jamie; and Oscar-nominee Jacki Weaver (“Yellowstone”) as his mother, Jeanne.

But the movie really belongs to Pelphrey. A veteran stage and screen actor, Pelphrey shows incredible range as a cocky, frosted tipped, lout who charms and cons literally everyone he encounters. In the opening scene, he conjures tears when pawning a pair of family heirlooms, flips one switch to get into a serious bidding war with the store clerk, and then flips another to skip out the back door gleefully, escaping a pursuing gang of thugs.

He’s the prancing, preening life of the party in one moment, and in the next is so damn earnest that you almost believe he would make a good stepfather, despite everything we see him say and do. He’s uber confident and the ultimate alpha male, but also the pathetic victim of a lousy childhood lorded over by a sleezy father. It’s a neat trick to add so much depth to such a reprehensible character, and that’s also a credit to the writing.

All those shifting gears happen in a relatively compact film that moves fast and has very little fat. It doesn’t exactly reinvent the wheel, but there are also very few, if any, real weak points.

“American Murderer” in short is a gripping crime drama, a promising debut for filmmaker Gentile, and a great acting showcase for Pelphrey.

PCL Rating: High Taste It

Rotten Tomatoes Rating: FRESH