With Jim Sabatini

Stolen

Rated: R a scene of sexuality
Reviewed by: Jim
Release date: March 12, 2010	Released by: IFC Films

This low-budgeted mystery thriller once called "Stolen Lives" feels too stale and predictable for its own good, earning what it can in a probable quick theatrical run.

Stolen stars Jon Hamm and Josh Lucas, and actually has been in the can for a while, as Hamm's dogged detective Tom Adkins continues to be tormented with the loss of his son. His current caseload touches his personal life in trying to find out about a young boy during a demolition project.

Buried for fifty years in a box, the corpse of a boy (through flashbacks) has a dad, Matthew Wakefield (Lucas) who worked with a criminal (James Van Der Beek of Varsity Blues and the TV show "Dawson's Creek") that Tom (in the present) finds suspicious.

The undextrous helming of Anders Anderson doesn't help what should have been more taut with its emotional undertow as Hamm (acclaimed for his riveting "Mad Men" the last three years) and a versatile character actor in Lucas (Glory Road, Poseidon) playing down to the level of this material.

On the lower scale of full-length feature running time, this wide-screen shot meller feels almost made-up like Van Der Beek's physical appearance years after the summer before tragedy struck U.S. soil. A sly, insinuating cold-case tale is kidnapped from the viewers in Stolen.