Really Surprised!

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

***SPOILERS***Sean Young as Chicago police sketch artist Gwen McGerrall looks so bored to tears in the made for TV movie "Evil Has a Face" that at times she looks as if she's about to nod off and pass out right there and then.Given an assignment to travel to far off Redmond Minnesota to help the local police track down a child kidnapper Gwen is about as interested in going up there as she would be in going to the Arctic but does it anyway. As we soon learn Gwen has very personal reasons for going to Redmond beside all her expenses being paid by the Redmond Police Department. It's there in the "Land of Ten Thousands Lakes" where Gwen was brought up.Gwen had been abused by her step father Henry Wills McGarrell, Cheicie Ross, who died in a car crash back in 1964 when Gwen was five years old. It was that the unknown serial child killer and kidnapper who's on the loose in that part of the state that reminds Glewn of her long dead "Daddy" whom she hates with a passion.With the help of local Redmond cop Tom Sawyer-yes that's his real name- played William R. Moses and kidnap victim Bria, Brighton Hertfort, Gwen gets wind of who the serial killer and kidnapper really is! Or does she! The evidence that Gwen comes up with later turns out to be bogus in that Bria, the only survivor of the serial killer,described him to be Gwen's own father who been dead for at least 30 years!***SPOILER ALERT*** It soon turns out that Bria accurately described the person who kidnapped her, which Gwen did a police sketch of, but she was off in how old he was supposed to be by almost a generation!The movie started getting itself lost in time and space by the time Gwen finally realized whom the mysterious serial killer was. In that it showed that Gwen wasn't anywhere near the sharp and smart cookie that we were lead to believe, by both the Chicago and Redmond Police Departments, that she was. The killer himself was anything but a master criminal in that he was so out in the open and clumsy in his actions it was almost a miracle that he wasn't spotted and caught before he committed his first of a string of some dozen crimes.Even though she was anything but convincing in her acting I have to say that Sean Young, as cold and icy looking as she was, was a real turn on even, it gets pretty cold up there in Minnesota in the wintertime, with enough clothes on to withstand 30 degree below zero wind gusts.

This is one of many movies that were 'prescribed' to me by my shrink who believed in their effectiveness in therapy. At first I could not understand the connection between a film and a psychological problem. But then it became clear that both are about a 'fantasy'. Almost everyone in society is living a fantasy that can be as far removed or as close to reality as the person wishes. Of course, if the that person is a head of state dragging his country into war or running after Utopian dreams then the harm done is that much more greater.Now a film is also a fantasy, but it is the very exact and deliberate fantasy of the director. When we see a movie we are transported into that fantasy and we live it in vivid detail and color in all our visual and mental senses. We also live it in our subconscious senses as well, and herein lies its value. Seeing what has been thus far deeply embedded and intertwined inside us now on screen and out in the open helps begin the separation process (between reality and fantasy). Since the distinction between the fantasy of the movie and your current reality is very clear, and since you willingly entered the movie fantasy by your own choice until it overlapped with your inner similar fantasy; you can get to experience the willful 'exiting' of the movie fantasy that would subsequently help you to 'exit' your inner fantasy in the future. Well, it's a little more complicated than that, but this isn't the best place to discuss in deep psychotherapy techniques.Of course I'm not suggesting that, in and of its self, a movie would cure anybody of anything; that has to be the work of a professional, and it's his or her decision as to whether or not to incorporate it into the therapy process. But I am curious as to whether anyone else has ever 'used' this film (or any other movie) in this sense or at least experienced their psychological effect either consciously or subconsciously.

I'm just gonna comment on the actors in this film. They were all excellent! Billy Moses as the Sympathetic Sheriff Tom Sawyer, looked very good and did a wonderful acting job as always!The film takes place in a small rural Minnesota town, where a kidnapping of a little girl has taken place. The little girl is found and Police Sketch Artist, (Sean Young), spends time with the girl and gets a good sketch of the suspect. What she finds out is shocking. I highly recommend this film!

Good yarn about a series of child molestations/murders taking place in a small Minnesota town. When the most recent victim goes missing the police call in a sketch artist who has had success in bringing criminals to justice with her detailed drawings. When a witness is found and the sketch is completed the artist is confounded because she thinks she knows the felon. A manhunt is started for the man leading the authorities down a road to a series of misleading conclusions. Exciting, although unrealistic, finale.