Schuldig - Ein mörderischer Auftrag

and all things considered means that if you throw 6-7 idiotic characters in the movie and you have any kind of plot (someone said even a twist), you will get OK rental movie.

everyone in this movie does exactly opposite of what would make sense.

This one was very good about a corrupt lawyer-turned-judge(Bill Pullman) who is blackmailed for rape by his secretary and his son, Nathan, whom he doesn't even know(Devon Sawa) who returns from serving a bid for grand theft auto and is paid off by his father to kill the woman who is blackmailing him - Nathan hates his step-father but then finds out that his true father is the scum-bag that he should be hating. Bill Pullman does great as the self-centered and dishonest Crane - I hated him as the movie went on, and Devon Sawa gives a great depiction of Nathan, his ex-convict son who seeks him out to find out who he is. Wonderfully scripted about fate coming back to haunt you when you don't cover your own tracks. Character development in this doesn't go on unnoticed

On the up side, "The Guilty" offers deceit, infidelity, romance, rape, murder, family matters, and characters ranging from powerful and wealthy to scumbags and thugs all supported by an excellent cast. On the downside, this Simon Birch knock-off heaps coincidence upon coincidence as it weaves its very improbable story with characters behaving as necessary to make the convoluted plot work. In the final analysis, "The Guilty" makes the suspension of disbelief easy by slowly sucking the audience into its complex web of intrigue. An above average little flick good for 100 minutes of escapism with nary a dull moment.

It is funny how much Pullman and Sawa resemble each other, and that Pullman's character seems to feel it when they first meet. However...

Plot wise, it's a trash fire, but there is very solid acting here, and the directing may not quite be memorable, but it also is solid enough to make this a picture worth watching.

But it does require truly monumental stupidity for some of the "twists" to occur.

One rainy day while searching the video store my boyfriend and I came across this movie. Bill Pullman was on the cover so we hired it without reading the back of the cover and we were pleasantly surprised.

It was strange seeing Bill Pullman as the bad guy. He's certainly an underrated actor and this movie works only because of him.

Gabrielle Anwar was dull in her performance but Devon Sawa was great.

Bill Pullman plays a lawyer about to become a judge who tries to seduce his secretary, Gabrielle Anwar. She threatens to blackmail him and he hires Sawa to kill her but there are a few twists involved.

All in all this isn't a bad movie to watch and even though his performance was good, after being the nice guy for so long you have trouble believing Bill Pullman as a baddie.