Small Town Murder Songs (2011)

79% of critics liked it
(19 reviews)
43% of users liked it
(995 ratings)

A modern, gothic tale of crime and redemption about an aging police officer from a small Ontario Mennonite town who hides a violent past until a local murder upsets the calm of his newly reformed life. -- (C) Official Site

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Rating, Runtime: R, 1 hr. 15 min.
Directed By: Ed Gass-Donnelly
Written By: Ed Gass-Donnelly
Genres: Mystery & Suspense, Drama

In Theaters: Jun 3, 2011 Limited
On DVD: Jul 19, 2011
Studio: Monterey Media

Critic Reviews

Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal
"Small Town Murder Songs" moves so deliberately, with such confident authority, that every small event takes on cumulative significance...
Stephen Holden, New York Times
Beneath a deceptive calm, it uncovers a core of fear and loathing as ominous as the backwoods world of "Winter's Bone."
Mark Holcomb, Village Voice
Boldly succinct yet confident enough to take its time.
Stephen Cole, Globe and Mail
STMS succeeds as an Ontario Gothic mood piece, a story of alternately repressed and exploding passion.
Peter Howell, Toronto Star
Rarely does cinema sight and sound mesh as boldly as this, and it's all to the good.
Michael Rechtshaffen, Hollywood Reporter
An effective ensemble backed by a bracingly haunting soundtrack strike a compelling chord in this rural Canadian crime drama.
Richard T. Jameson, Parallax View
... the film is only an hour-and-a-quarter long, and that's just as well; spells are hard to sustain. Yet it's big enough.
Nora Lee Mandel, Film-Forward.com
Atmospherically steeped in rural noir. . .Stormare's agonized face keeps the focus on more a tormented character study than a mystery. . .greatly heightened by rootsy songs.
Chuck Bowen, Slant Magazine
Peter Stormare is a limited actor who only manages to exude the resolute nothingness of the role.
Alison Willmore, AV Club
The soundtrack ... goes miles toward making what would be an unmanageably dour experience into an acute emotional resonance; the songs are freed to say more than the characters onscreen.
David Fear, Time Out New York
A redemption parable that occasionally finds balladlike lyricism in its biblical solemnity and oddball Lynchian rhythms.
Keith Cohen, Entertainment Spectrum
Stormare's performance towers over the flimsy story. Besides the effective ensemble acting, another asset is the outstanding cinematography. This captivatingly haunting crime drama never gets tiresome and knows when to bring the...
Jason Heck, Kansas City Star
Why are recent movies about small towns with murderous secrets so good?
Pam Grady, Boxoffice Magazine
A lawman seeking redemption can't seem to escape sin in Ed Gass-Donnelly's haunting, rural drama.
Liz Braun, Jam! Movies
For all that Small Town Murder Songs hints at, there isn't enough delivery here.
Jason Anderson, eye WEEKLY
The force in Stormare's performance is enough to suggest we've witnessed only a fraction of the character's anguish.
Radheyan Simonpillai, NOW Toronto
While it's easy to admire the unique stylistic accents director Ed Gass-Donnelly fearlessly applies to his northern Ontario murder mystery, it's not so easy to enjoy them.
David Nusair, Reel Film Reviews
...Small Town Murder Songs [features] an oppressively deliberate pace that effectively holds the viewer at arm's length from start to finish...

Read all 18 critic reviews

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Featured Audience Ratings

danny d

if not for the terrible soundtrack i might have even rated this film a half a star higher. the music didnt fit in almost any scene of the entire film. having said that, this is an excellent small budget character study. in some spots the script left some things unsaid, and with a… More
if not for the terrible soundtrack i might have even rated this film a half a star higher. the music didnt fit in almost any scene of the entire film. having said that, this is an excellent small budget character study. in some spots the script left some things unsaid, and with a slightly longer running time the film could have fleshed out a few ideas better, but for a 1 hour and 16 minute movie this little crime story delivered extremely well. stormare was very good in the lead.
Daniel P

FIRST FLIXSTER REVIEW! I liked this gritty little film. Understated performances all around in a dark and quite depressing story about a town a lot like the one I grew up in, and write bad fiction about... a body turns up, a cop finds it, the trail seems to point to his… More
FIRST FLIXSTER REVIEW! I liked this gritty little film. Understated performances all around in a dark and quite depressing story about a town a lot like the one I grew up in, and write bad fiction about... a body turns up, a cop finds it, the trail seems to point to his ex-wife's new boyfriend. Shit, meet fan. Tough and engrossing work, by times cliched or overwrought, but in other times strong for its simplicity. Thank you, Air Canada, for airing Canadian films. I don't know how else I would have wound up seeing this. On the whole, I'm glad I did.
Francisco G

It wears a bit thin even on it's short running time. Would like to see more on some secondary characters.