Conviction tells the true story of Kenny Waters who was wrongfully convicted of murder in the early 1980s and how his sister, Betty Anne Waters got her G.E.D., then went to college and then got her J.D. so she could fight to get him exonerated. It falls in line with A Civil Action and Erin Brokovitch, books/movies based on amazing court cases that all end happily (if boringly).
So in this one, Kenny (Sam Rockwell) is a loser from the Massachusetts outback who gets in bar fights and is well known for acting out in his hometown. One day there is a murder and it is pinned on him. He says he's guilty and his sister Betty Anne (Hillary Swank) knows he is, so she begins fighting for him. She is married with two kids and in her mid-30s or so.
Along the way she meets a chick named Abra (Minnie Driver) who is also a bit older as a law student than the other kids in class. They become friends. At some point they get the Innocence Project involved and find out that there is no DNA evidence. They also find major amounts of corruption and malfeasance in the local sheriff's office and the county DA's office (that was Martha Coakley, the woman who lost Ted Kennedy's Senate seat to Scott Brown).
There is not much to this movie or the story itself. It seems pretty open-and-shut the way it's presented. He was fingered as the murderer by a cop who had a grudge against him; he had a record so he was easy to convict; 20 years later when DNA testing gained legitimacy he was exonerated. I guess there's some inner drama with whether Betty Anne would be able to pass all her tests and get her degrees, and later about whether she'd be able to recover the evidence that had blood on it, but there's not much tension through most of the film.
The best thing in the film, though is the remarkable performance by Juliette Lewis (really!) who plays a strung-out meth head who testified in 1983 that Kenny had bragged to her about the murder, but now is recanting her testimony, saying she was coerced into saying it. She is really remarkable in the small role. She's totally pathetic and disgusting looking, has a perfect accent and it totally, totally believable. For me this is honestly one of the best supporting performances of the year. Brava, Juliette!
Director Tony Goldwyn gives us pure vanilla here. There is no texture or particular style to speak of really. It's a totally forgettable movie.
Stars: 2 of 4
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