Blood Work

Clint Eastwood has played a cop many times, most notably Harry Callahan. He plays an FBI agent in Blood Work, 2002 film he also directed, and while he's convincing, and the film is based on a novel by the great crime writer Michael Connelly, the film is merely competent.

Eastwood plays a celebrated FBI agent who always gets his man, but is stymied by a serial killer who leaves numerical clues. Eastwood spots the killer in a crowd surrounding the latest crime scene, and chases him, but has a heart attack.

Cut to two years later, when Eastwood has just had a heart transplant. He is retired and living on a boat. But a woman approaches him and asks him to solve his sister's murder. Why him? It's her heart that is inside his chest.

That's a good grabber, and we go through much of the usual--a couple of false suspects, and the killer is someone we wouldn't have guessed, for reasons that connect to Eastwood.

If the script is merely ordinary, Eastwood's direction is crisp. He is, of course, his stoic, grouchy self, but also shows his tender side with the son of the murder victim (who gives him an insight into the code of the serial killer, which expert decoders couldn't figure out).

Jeff Daniels plays Eastwood's boat bum neighbor in a very good performance (I don't think I've ever been let down by Jeff Daniels).

Blood Work, among Eastwood's many films, is not far from the bottom. But Eastwood hasn't made too many clinkers, so that's okay.