This is a pretty good courtroom drama, maybe not right up there with "Anatomy of a Murder" or "Presumed Innocent", but with enough twists and turns to make it stand out from the crowd.
If the film reminds me of any it is "The Lincoln Lawyer" with Matthew McConaughey.
Without giving too much away, the story involves the murder of Boone Lassiter (John Belushi) a prominent lawyer, and the attempts of another lawyer, Richard Ramsay (Keanu Reeves), to defend the person accused of the murder, Boone's son, Mike Lassiter (Gabriel Basso).
The film has an interesting cast including Renée Zellweger as Loretta Lassiter, Boone's wife. Renée Zellweger is an amazing actress who dissolves into her characters, she does it so well here that I didn't recognise her at first.
Keanu Reeves is fine as Richard Ramsay. I thought his narration was a little heavy-handed at first, but later we see how it helps set the scene for the revelation at the end.
Beautiful Gugu Mbatha-Raw, so memorable in "Belle", is a surprise as a young lawyer overcoming past issues.
I don't know if anyone else has noticed, but after watching hundreds of crime movies and series on television, I feel that stories with a low murder count often have more weight than serial killer dramas with corpses all over the place. Just look at any of the really good series such as "Wallander", "Jesse Stone" or "Vera" to name three; it's usually only one murder, two at the most, allowing for more complex character and story development. Shows with big murder counts, unless based on real cases, often lead to over-the-top dramas with extreme, unbelievable behaviour.
"The Whole Truth" bears this out. It is tricky with an appealing cast and a classy score by Evgueni and Sacha Galperine, which helps set the mood for this fairly intimate movie, set for the most part in either the courtroom or the bedroom where the murder took place.
It may not raise the bar to the heights of the great courtroom dramas, but "The Whole Truth" gets you in and keeps you there until it delivers a killer blow at the end.
