When it comes to true-crime stories, Ann Rules

Author’s work takes over Lifetime Movie Network

Ann Rule is a true-crimes mystery writer who takes on real-life cases and makes them very dramatic.

This past weekend marked the premiere of her “Too Late To Say Goodbye” where Rob Lowe plays a charismatic sociopath who discovers his wife is having an Internet affair and is a central suspect when she is found dead.

His character, Bart Corbin, didn’t need to be a sociopath -- he just is. He’s a dentist with a thriving practice, and he has a beautiful hygienist. His wife, Jenn, who is suffering from depression, in fact accuses him of having an affair. It’s never made clear whether the accusation is justified or simply projection, but Bart and the hygienist certainly act suspicious when Jenn’s family confronts him about Jenn’s cremation ...

Let me start over. The movie is organized only slightly better than this column. It begins with scenes of Jenn padding around her house after midnight, drinking and holding printouts of e-mails from her Internet affair. The camera cuts away as we hear a gunshot. Then Jenn’s son shows up next door with his mother’s blood on his feet.

The husband, Bart, is working out at his brother’s, having established an alibi the night before, waking his brother up because he couldn’t find the hide-a-key, telling him Jenn kicked him out.

As Michelle Hurd as Detective Ann Roche continues her investigation, it appears that Jenn did commit suicide, over and above objections from Jenn’s sister that she would never do that. It’s not until a case surfaces in a neighboring county where one of Bart’s college girlfriends died in similar circumstances that her investigation takes a turning point.

Highlighting the true-crimes element, “Too Late to Say Goodbye” closes with photos of the real-life characters from the story and a thumbnail outline of their fate.

Rule-a-palooza

The reason I’m writing about a Lifetime movie is it looks like there’s at least a couple more Rule movies on deck for the Lifetime Movie Network -- “And Never Let Her Go” tonight at 7 o'clock, “Everything She Ever Wanted” Saturday at 7 p.m., and then all three movies together in a row on Sunday.

By way of comparison, Rule had a CBS miniseries in 2001 and a USA television movie in 2003, so these reasonably high-profile “true crime” pieces airing two weekends in a row seem like a revival of sorts. Indeed, it’s a Rule-a-palooza!

So what can we expect in a Lifetime Movie Network true-crime presentation by Ann Rule? Well, for one thing, the production values are high. In “Too Late to Say Goodbye,” the scene they shot in the 1970s school of dentistry in the flashback to the case of Bart’s college girlfriend looked as authentic as anything, and generally the scenes and settings were well chosen and well appointed.

The pacing was pretty good, and the mystery itself kept you guessing. Several points hinged on how much faith you had in the detective’s analysis of events and that added a little bit to the suspense. As the story unfolded we learned more about Bart’s relationship with Jenn, how they met, how they drifted apart and how Jenn’s affair contributed to her depression.

It’s also a bit disjointed. Rule I believe is faithful to her stories, heightening dramatic tension here and there and organizing flashbacks to suit her narrative but generally she lets the cases unfold as they did. And I should note that according to her blog, Rule herself feels the directors overused their dramatic license somewhat.

Anyway, the reason I believe that she’s true to her cases is that several scenes involving the children and Jenn’s family are included which don’t contribute much to the story. Also, there are questions raised in the storyline that remain unanswered, and which somehow seem important -- for instance, did Bart have an affair himself? -- that the author doesn’t step in and resolve.

Overall I enjoyed this entry and look forward to others. Rule has a grasp of   a classic mystery, with reasonably developed characters and a pretty good sense of story. Like I suggested, the show could probably have benefited from a little more editing, but generally ... I liked it.