Grade: C-

Verdict: A grim meditation on murder and obsession, made watchable by some fine actors.

Details: Starring Jack Nicholson and Robin Wright Penn. Directed by Sean Penn. Rated R for strong violence and profanity. Two hours, 4 minutes.

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Review: Actor-turned-director Sean Penn's latest ode to woe, “The Pledge” is as bleak and, unfortunately, as numbing as its snowy setting. Jack Nicholson plays Jerry Black, a Nevada homicide detective who gets involved in the case of a murdered girl, literally on the very last day of his career.

Jerry skips out on his retirement party to examine the frozen body of the 7-year-old, and even has to break the news to her folks. During that process, the weeping mother (Patricia Clarkson, powerful in a tiny part) coaxes the titular pledge from him: That he will find the killer of her girl.

At first this seems an easy oath to keep, especially when a prime suspect gets pulled in and virtually confesses. Still, it doesn't jibe for Jerry, and as he settles into retirement the case keeps nagging at him.

It's hard to say why. Based on a 1957 novel by German playwright Friedrich Dürrenmatt, “The Pledge” never lets us get inside Jerry's head. As good as Nicholson is, neither can he. Jerry befriends a small-town waitress, Lori (the director's wife, Robin Wright Penn, slumming with mousy brown hair and a missing tooth), and her small daughter Chrissy (Pauline Roberts). Wouldn't you know it, Chrissy is just the sort of girl targeted by what Jerry now believes is a serial killer.

The film gradually starts to fetishize the girl, doting on her just as a pedophile might. When Jerry gradually starts to suspect a neighbor (Tom Noonan) of the murders, his subsequent inaction becomes baffling: He seems to be waiting for, even wanting something terrible to happen. And so does the movie. Once a romance blossoms between Lori and Jerry, who's more than old enough to be her father, “The Pledge” becomes uncomfortable viewing on a whole new level.

Slowing to a crawl in its final half hour, the film is best viewed as a series of small acting riffs. It's loaded with a cast so good, they're almost distracting. Look over there, it's Harry Dean Stanton as a taciturn gas station owner. And what do you know, the therapist Nicholson consults is the talented Helen Mirren. Oh my God, it's Mickey Rourke (so he is still alive, wow). The ubiquitous Benicio Del Toro turns up in a long black wig as a mentally afflicted Native American, giving a mumbling performance so bizarre, it's mesmerizing. Vanessa Redgrave is the dead girl's grandmother, her memories of the child giving the flick one of its genuine emotional charges.

Penn has a good eye for the engaging ugliness of small-town locations, and the eccentric individuals who live there. But after “The Indian Runner” and “The Crossing Guard,” he's becoming Mr. Feel-Bad of the indie scene. In the end, with its morbid final plot twist and depressing resolution, “The Pledge” drags us through dark places, without convincing us it's a journey worth taking.

— Steve Murray, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution