Written by Erika Holzer, Amanda Silver, and Rick Jaffa
Directed by John Schlesinger

I can remember wanting to see An Eye for an Eye so very badly when it came out because I had read the book and been intrigued by the subject matter.  Many of us hold very definitive positions on the subject of crime and punishment.  However, what would happen if a terrible crime hit home?

Sally Field is Karen McCann.  On the day of a birthday party for her younger daughter, Megan (portrayed by Alexandra Kyle), Karen calls home to her seventeen year-old daughter Julie (portrayed by Olivia Burnette) while she’s stuck in traffic.  The two chat for a while, then Julie answers the door.  Karen listens helplessly as her daughter is raped and murdered.

The perpetrator, Robert Doob (portrayed by Kiefer Sutherland) is caught fairly quickly.  However, due to a technicality he is released.  The support group for parents of murdered children that Karen and her husband Mac (portrayed by Ed Harris) have been attending has been discussing this issue as it seems a good portion of those attending are going through the same thing.

Karen has some bad days, then she gets her hands on the case file.  She begins following Doob around.  This leads to another confrontation where Karen believes Megan could be in danger.  On a hunch she connects with someone from her support group and begins to formulate a plan to deliver what they believe is justice.

For many of us when we hear about terrible crimes and a lack of justice, it’s something abstract.  The question is if our opinions will change once it comes to our home.  The McCann’s are shown as living in a rather affluent neighborhood, and a character like Doob first comes in contact with them as the delivery man for a local food store.  Even so, later on in the film he seems to blend in to a degree wherever he goes.  The film is designed to make people not feel secure no matter where they live.

There’s never a question to anyone that Doob has committed the crime, the only problem is the way the prosecution is handles which makes it possible for him to walk.  Unlike many of the cases grabbing headlines lately where those convicted are exonerated once technology catches up to them, the DNA evidence points to Doob.  Doob learns from what caught him this time, but he still continues going after other women.

In some ways, this is too convenient.  I mean, Doob is maybe around 30 in the film.  Why all of a sudden is he committing these crimes?  Wouldn’t he have been someone known to the police before now, even as a petty and probably violent criminal?  His character doesn’t ring true as it’s written here. That’s not anything against Sutherland who is fine as Doob, maybe a bit too much in his element.  He gives him a menacing quality that is truly frightening in many ways because he’s so intelligent in how he learns from mistakes and improves on what he does.  The idea was to make a character with no redeeming qualities whom the audience would feel deserved to be put away or get the death penalty and manages to escape all of the fates due him.  The film succeeds in that respect, but I didn’t feel like the character was realistic.

Sally Field is excellent as Karen.  She’s a parent like many of us who want to go to the ends of the earth to protect our children but are often unsure of just how to do that.  It’s a helpless feeling when a child is hurt or killed and justice fails.  Everything Karen has believed in and has had faith in is gone; her insulated world where she felt safe has been shattered.  She learns and grows through the film as well, and it’s interesting to see her evolution to the end.

Ed Harris is largely underwritten as Mac.  He could have had much more to the role had it been better.  Instead he seems to be helpless to do anything but move forward while Karen is stuck in vengeance mode and he stands by watching her.  Joe Mantegna as the detective working the case is excellent.  He’s as frustrated as Karen is with the situation, but his hands are ties.  This is what makes it so satisfying at the end when the two have a discussion one final time.

The book the film An Eye for an Eye is based on resembles the story not in the least.  The only common theme is that a woman’s daughter is murdered.  In the book the daughter was older with a family of her own when she is murdered in a home invasion by an urban street-gang.  The writers of the film simply took the idea from the book and went their own way with it.  Both have good points, but also left me feeling like I was being exploited and the idea was to drive the point home that we shouldn’t feel safe anywhere.  To a certain extent that is the truth, but I think finding a balance between safety and living is something everyone needs to do.

While An Eye for an Eye raises some issues, it doesn’t seem to do anything with them except devolve into a Death Wish-type scenario.  It’s been done before and since and done better.  I would rate Jodi Foster’s The Brave One as having a strikingly similar story as well as theme and being better than this.  There are holes in the plot and it’s hard to really say the characters have the depth needed not just to themselves but to their relationships.  The acting is great, and I fault no one there, it’s just missing the connection to the audience other than feeling like one of those films that’s supposed to make everyone leave the theater clutching their pocketbooks or shut the windows and lock their doors after watching it on DVD.  That doesn’t do it for me.