Jesse Stone: Death in Paradise

Plot synopsis:
In the small town of Paradise, Massachusetts, Chief of police Jesse Stone (Tom Selleck) and his men investigate the death of teenage girl found floating in a lake. Officer Luther "Suitcase" Simpson (Kohl Sudduth) discovers a high school ring bearing the initials "HR". In the coming days, Jesse is haunted by disturbing dreams about the girl's murder. Since moving to Paradise, his private life involves drinking alone at his isolated house on the water with his dog Reggie looking on, occasionally talking on the phone with his ex-wife in California. Forced to resign from the LAPD for a drinking problem that began following his divorce, Jesse is still in contact with his ex-wife Jenn, who calls him regularly. Concerned about his drinking, she convinces him to see psychiatrist Dr. Dix (William Devane), a former detective and recovering alcoholic himself. Following his first session, Jesse visits the grave of his former girlfriend, Abby Taylor, for whose death he still feels deeply responsible.
State homicide commander Captain Healy (Stephen McHattie) delivers his autopsy report to Jesse, who learns that the girl drowned, and alcohol and muscle relaxer were found in her blood. The fourteen-year-old girl was probably in the water for three weeks, and was pregnant. Soon after, Jesse goes to the high school and meets with head mistress Dr. Lilly Summers (Orla Brady) who identifies the owner of the ring, William Hooker Royce (Matt Barr), an all-American athlete at the school. Later, when asked about the ring, Hooker tells Jesse that he briefly dated a girl named Billie Bishop and had given her his ring when he broke up with her. Jesse returns to the school and learns from Lilly that Billie was a former A-student before coming to Paradise two years earlier when something changed her. He visits her parents and learns that she was thrown out of her home following a dramatic change in her behavior and academic performance. In the coming days Jesse and Dr. Summers become involved romantically.
While working to solve Billie's murder, Jesse deals with a domestic violence case involving Jerry Snyder (John Diehl), a loser who enjoys viciously beating his wife (Debra Christofferson). Jesse and officer Molly Crane (Viola Davis) try to convince Mrs. Snyder to leave her husband and she eventually does. Meanwhile, Jesse's investigation leads him to Sister Mary John (Kerri Smith), a Catholic nun who runs the shelter where Billie sought refuge. Sister Mary provides Jesse with a phone number that Billie gave her in case of an emergency. Jesse soon dismisses Hooker as a suspect and turns his investigational focus on local writer Norman Shaw (Gary Basaraba), a well-connected citizen with ties to the Boston mob, as the prime suspect. It was his phone number that Billie provided to the Sister Mary. Shaw purportedly has a predilection for young girls.
Jesse and Luther pay a visit to Norman Shaw who is hosting a fundraising party with influential politicians and prominent citizens. Afterwards, Jesse learns from Captain Healey that Shaw is writing a book on Boston mobster Leo Finn (Steven Flynn) who has a very dangerous gunsel working for him. Jesse visits Development Associates and meets Finn and his strongman Lovey Norris (Brendan Kelly). Asked about his relationship with Shaw, Finn reveals nothing. Soon after, Jesse and Luther respond to an armed robbery in progress at a local supermarket. Inside, Jesse encounters Jerry Snyder holding his wife hostage after shooting Mr. Kim (Michael Ha), the store owner. When Jerry fires his weapon to the side, Jesse shoots him dead. However, Luther had been shot by Jerry. At the hospital, Luther is in critical condition and in a coma. Molly stays at Luther's side and reads to him.
Jesse returns to Shaw's house asking where he was the night of Billie's murder, and Shaw offers an alibi involving a meeting with Leo Finn. Later Finn tells Jesse he refused to meet with Shaw, saying that Shaw molests kids and uses his fundraisers as cover, so he didn't want such a person as his biographer. With a motive now established, Jesse returns to Shaw's house where he finds evidence that he committed the murder. After arresting Shaw, DNA from his discarded cigar confirms he was the father of Billie's unborn child. Despite the evidence, something doesn't make sense—a yachtsman like Shaw would never have used a slip knot to tie Billie's body to the cinder blocks that weighed her body down. Jesse arranges another meeting with Leo Finn, who shows up with his henchman Lovey. Jesse speculates that Shaw was working on an expose of Finn rather than a biography, and that he now knows Finn had Billie killed and framed Shaw as the murderer in order to stop the publication of the expose. When Lovey pulls his weapon, Jesse steps behind Finn who takes Lovey's initial shot in the back, and Jesse returns fire, killing Lovey. Later, after visiting Billie's grave, Jesse returns to the hospital, sits at Luther's side, and begins reading to him the story of the baseball player named Harry "Suitcase" Simpson.

Tags: murder

Review:
In this latest Jesse Stone movie based on a novel by Robert B.
Parker, a teenage girl's badly decomposed body is found in a lake wearing one shoe and tied to a concrete block.
A class ring found at the scene points to a star athlete at an exclusive prep school where Dr. Lily Summers (Orla Brady) is the headmistress.The Bishops may be the parents of the missing girl.
Up until she went to the prep school, Billie was an A student, but something happened when she changed schools.Chief Stone sees visions of the dead girl, both while sleeping and when he is awake, but this is pointless and never means anything.Meanwhile, Chief Stone must deal with an abusive husband (John Diehl) whose wife won't leave because she's Catholic, she has kids, and no real job skills.
What makes this movie work is Selleck's usual fine performance of a character who is intelligent and determined yet stubborn and flawed.
While most of the actors are good, another standout performance comes from William Devane as a therapist Stone's ex-wife recommends to help him stop drinking--a former cop who lost his job and his wife to his own alcohol problem.
Another standout performance comes from the actor playing the Boston businessman with a bad reputation and a goon named Lovey.Officer Crane (Viola Davis) recalls how her sister was in a coma before she died.
Other cast members in the series include Vito Rezza as Officer D'Angelo, Kohl Sudduth as Officer 'Suitcase' Simpson and Stephen McHattie as Detective Healy of Boston.The violence is minimal for most of the movie, though there is some blood in a couple of scenes.
The language is stronger than one might normally hear on network TV, but not quite like 'NYPD Blue'.I liked the traditional jazz music played at the fund-raiser hosted by author Norman Shaw (Gary Basaraba).There will be more Jesse Stone movies, and I look forward to them..
Selleck fits character perfect.
This is the third in the Jesse Stone movie series and I thought it was the best.
Selleck is just perfect as the flawed, but honorable main character.
What makes this series so good is what others have written; the pacing of the films is thoughtful; the characters are adult and complex; it has plot and intelligence over car crashes and special effects though it has action and romance in it to be sure.
You like Selleck's character instantly and his scenes with his other officers,the State Police Detective and the shrink he see's about his drinking, are all terrific.In the special features on Stone Cold Selleck says people have a 'hunger' for this type of adult entertainment where plot and story are more important than rapid fire visuals--and that is so true.
It's surprising how good this series is--it's way better than 95% of what's in the theaters.
Tom Selleck in a really good cop movie or Pirates of the Caribbean part IV--it's no contest..
Tom Selleck is Jesse Stone.
I enjoyed watching the movie and have currently finished reading the next Jesse Stone book.
Hooray for TV movies that are of the quality of big screen movies with well written, defined, true to life characters.
Tom Selleck as Jesse Stone is my hero as he struggles with problems of work, alcohol, and loneliness as we all do.
The other returning actors are great as the friends and co-workers who provide their own story lines interweaving with Selleck's..
Another Simple, Credible and Effective Police Story.
When the body of a fourteen years old teenager is found in the margin of the river in Paradise, Massachusetts, the Chief of Police Jesse Stone (Tom Selleck) and his officer Simpson (Kohl Sudduth) seek clues in the spot.
Through a graduation ring of a student that they find nearby the corpse, they identity the dead girl, the local slut Billy Bishop.
Meanwhile, his department deals with a domestic violent situation with an aggressive and abusive husband that beats his wife.
Along his investigation, Stone discloses that the famous writer Norman Shaw (Gary Masaraba) was too much close to the victim and intended to write the biography of the famous gangster Leo in his next book.
Joining the pieces of evidences like a puzzle, Stone unravels the identity of the criminal."Death in Paradise" is the second excellent movie that I see with Tom Selleck in the role of Chief Jesse Stone.
Both films show simple, credible and effective police stories, with great performances, magnificent cinematography and realistic screenplays.
Jesse Stone seems to be tailored to Tom Selleck, who is perfect in the role of the cynical, stubborn and flawed but fair chief of police.
I believe this character deserves a TV series, so good these stories are.
I have just seen in IMDb that there are two other movies of this character, unfortunately not released in Brazil.
another great television movie with Tom Selleck in the role he was born to play.
Like the film before this one, "Jesse Stone: Night Passage", "Death in Paradise" is a flawless, highly entertaining television movie that is so powerful and so realistic that it almost looks like something you would have to go see in the theaters.
When a low-budget television show becomes that, then you know that you are really looking at a true masterpiece of film-making.
I've seen big budget Hollywood mysteries that weren't as good as this.
It stars Tom Selleck in another fabulous performance as Chief Jesse Stone, a troubled cop in a small town called Paradise on the eastern seaboard if I'm not mistaken.What I liked a lot about "Death in Paradise" was how it didn't just focus on one single case by itself.
Instead of just Tom Selleck and his team trying to solve the main mystery, the death of a girl, they also tries to handle a second case at the same time, which enhances the power and overall authentistic atmosphere of the movie.I'll keep my review short and just end it by stating that "Jesse Stone: Death in Paradise" is like "Night Passage" and the sequel after this one, "Sea Change", a fantastic mystery movie and a delightful discovery to find.
It's really impressive that a movie this magnificent could have been made on such a small budget, if it was.
Most television movies are like that, but I can't be sure.
A couple of truly sad cases come across the desk of police chief Jesse Stone of Paradise, Massachusetts.
The first involves the appearance of the body of a 14 year old girl who had been in the water for a few weeks.
Patient and methodical as always Tom Selleck gets the job done.
The domestic couple is John Diehl and Debra Christofferson who steals acting honors here in a scene with Selleck where she talks sadly about how few options she has in life other than stay in this relationship with this dirtbag.
One of Selleck's officers is nearly killed because of the volatility of the situation.The second after long search because she was never reported missing turns out to be Mae Whitman whom we see in flashback.
She was also a few weeks pregnant.Going through her relationships is what eventually leads Selleck to a conclusion he was supposed to arrive at.
But actually it's the knot that came loose that allowed her body to rise is what ultimately leads him to her murderer.A fine film with one bad slice of humanity for Stone to deal with..
I will start off by saying the overall simple style and dialogue of this made for TV movie make it a success.
As this is the third Jesse Stone movie, and the second that I have seen, I am glad that the supporting characters returned to keep the bond they have created up.
The story remains as entertaining as Jesse Stone: Stone Cold.
The story line is a tough one to touch on national television and be appropriate, but they did a good job.
The sub-stories about Stone's alcoholism could been left out, they didn't really contribute to anything.
The third film in the Jesse Stone series which was based on the third book by Robert B.
I think retaining the same director so far for the series worked so well.
It was just a 90 minute film, but feels it runs for very long and that is not in a boring way, but from the development wise, it is a well made film.In a small town, like what Jesse says who he mostly gives out parking tickets gets a new case to get engaged.
This time it is a death of the young teen girl whose body was washed up on the river's edge, but completely unidentifiable.
Jesse follows where all the clues lead and after getting the details about the missing children around the town of Paradise, he moves on one step closer to identify the victim as well as to mark the suspect.
But then again, the twist and turns brings more interesting aspect of the story and his big city experience comes into effect after his co-worker was badly hurt in a shootout.In this, it was Mae Whitman as in a guest appearance, but it was too short as she stays for only a couple of minutes.
The other one was Stephen Baldwin, whose character adds more flavour like abolishing one film one case kind of mindset in a cop theme.
Because in the real police work, they deal multiple cases at a time.In this, as well in the lead Tom Selleck was awesome.
But while his character over obsessed with the case, the film reveals his psychological side of the desperation to bring the justice to the dead girl.
Like the girl appearing in his dream and particularly in the station, he hallucinates about her which describes him in a completely different angle for a second.
Besides, there's slight sentiments in it and so it also digs on his new romance interest for a school principal, but the Jesse is very clear on what he's seeking after leaving the LA that his job comes first."This job in Paradise is my last job.
I get off the bus here."In some case, finding the suspect alone is not valid to prove someones crimes, so what this story's notion is to find the motive which automatically going reveals everything rest behind the crime.
I think very smartly written story, I was fascinated by all the development like step by step how a death enquiry takes place.
Released in the same year as the previous film, this is another wonderful detective film made for the television.Solid performances, particularly Davis Viola and Kohl Sudduth who are the regular cast did not fail to deliver in their small screenspace.
But I expected the big contribution, and I hope in the following film they would achieve that.
So in this you are going to witness the Jesse's job commitment, his personal life was sidelined to a marginal.
Particularly his ex-wife never calls which I thought kind of annoying in the first two films to taking over than the usual.
Jesse does not drink in this, but can be seen him with a coffee mug in most of the parts.If you like murder-mysteries, then this is the film to pick, but I suggest to go for the whole series, begin with the first.
I have seen only three films, but I think it is worth giving a try.
There's only small clichés like how the police department works, but the narration was very good with the full details.
The pace was excellent against the strong story and the character developments.
He always takes risks his life, especially dealing the situation when men are armed and pose a serious threat.Sure, the film will live up to anybody's expectations and also it can be watched by everyone.
You probably have seen many cop films, but this is one of those must not miss.
Like I said in my last review, so far so good and particularly standing up to this film's standard is quite what I'm looking for in the next one.
Anyway, it won't too long for another review in the Jesse Stone series.9/10.
I like the Jesse Stone series---with generally very good acting, good production values, atmospheric photography and good direction, they are head and shoulders above average TV fare (I could do without the corny freeze-frame cuts, though).
Selleck delivers an excellent performance, and his supporting cast turns in some fine acting as well.
The movies are a bit formulaic: some big crime mixed with a human interest piece that Chief Stone usually handles by threatening someone or beating someone up, plus a romantic interest, usually the first reasonably attractive woman to walk onto the screen (although this time it was the second---my money initially was on the dog owner, but she wasn't it).
However, the small-town atmosphere comes across nicely, the plots are reasonably complex, and the human interest story lines provide some intermittent satisfaction and an opportunity for Selleck to show another side of his character.SPOILERS!
Even though a viewer might have guessed it (it was pretty clear that the false suspect would turn out to be misdirection), the piece of evidence providing the crucial insight is delivered a few seconds before the final showdown (unless I missed a clue at the false suspect's maritime experience before then), and then it's a few seconds of high noon in a warehouse and that was it: game over.Still, not the worst way to spend 90 minutes or so, which you probably have discovered for yourself already, otherwise you hopefully wouldn't read this spoiler-ridden review..
Great character studies; so-so murder mystery.
I thought the characterisation, especially of Stone, were very good.
Selleck had the right air of a good man with problems.
The relationship between Stone and Lily Summers seemed a little strange but Orla Brady was pleasant and gave the impression that there was a lot hidden below the surface.William Devane and Stephen McHattie were underused.The murder mystery was somewhat flimsy - especially the ending.
Stone works out the killer based on knots.
(And Shaw doesn't look like an experienced yachtsman, to me !) Of course, he has absolutely no evidence.
Instead, the villain's henchman accidentally shoots his boss saving Stone the trouble of proving that he planned the murder.
Then Stone has to kill the henchman (who had actually committed the murder) - in self-defence of course.That's two guys that Stone shoots in self-defence.Overall, though, I enjoyed the movie.
Another very well done Jesse Stone movie.
A dead 14 year old, pregnant teen found floating in a Paradise pond leads to some very revealing scenarios.
Turns out the girl has turned into a slut after she switches to a news school.
As the film progresses Jesse finds out that the accused, a well known writer named Shaw uses his annual fund raiser to meet and seduce young girls and is the father of the dead girl's fetus.
This leads Jesse to the real murderer's, a local drug dealer and his gunman bodyguard.
They killed the girl and planted her to get Shaw out of the picture because he was writing an expose on the dealer.
They all meet in an abandoned building where the dealer ends up shot by his guard and Jesse kills the shooter.
Just a nice old fashion detective movie..
Parker turned out easy-to-read novels prolifically, the majority featuring 'series' characters like Spenser and Jesse Stone.
Several of the Jesse Stone novels were adapted for television and all of those I have seen have been excellent primarily because the producers have had the good sense to cast most of the roles with fine actors rather than signing a half-decent lead and then surrounding him/her with a group of ho hums.
Apart from Tom Selleck as Jesse Stone the standout supporting actor is Viola Davis by a country mile, unfortunately she fell or was pushed halfway through the series and her character was renamed.
Another of its strengths lies in having Stone concentrate on one main case yet still manage to deal with others, just as a real chief of police in a small town would.
Mr Tom Selleck has often been sold short,particularly in the early stages of his career when he appeared to be just another good - looking big guy,albeit one with a sense of humour.More recently he has been flexing his acting chops and in the "Jesse Stone:Death in Paradise" he gives a performance well beyond the call of duty.
Chief of a four person police department on the Massachusets coast,he is a man to inspire loyalty and confidence,respect and obedience;a remnant,if you like of all our distant memories of what we would like small - town cops to be.
He is not a perfect man by any means,arriving in Paradise on the back of a marriage break up and he has a drink problem that he seems unable to resolve.
He is stubborn,principled,brave and flawed,not unlike Robert B.Parker's more famous character,Spenser.
Mr Selleck portrays these complicated and contrary characteristics with very little indications other than the eyes.Mostly he looks impassive but his true feelings are visible through his eyes.It is an exceedingly impressive performance of a depth rarely seen in TV productions.
The story is almost ancillary to the character development,Mr Selleck is obviously in this for the long run.
Mr W.Devane is excellent as the cop - turned - shrink who dishes out tough love to Jesse at $180 per hour.
Lovers of Mr Parker's novels will appreciate the characters that cross from the Spenser series,Commander Healey of the State Police and Gino Fish the Boston mobster with a whimsical turn of mind.
I have just read the first post - Parker Jesse Stone and the character has made the difficult transition between the authors quite flawlessly.
I wholeheartedly recommend the "Jesse Stone" series to all lovers of joined - up TV cop shows.