One For The Money
Julie Anne Robinson
The story: Broke and jobless Stephanie Plum (Katherine Heigl) turns to bail enforcement to pay the bills. Even though she knows nothing about being a bounty hunter, she sets her sights on Joe Morelli (Jason O’Mara), a former vice cop who is wanted for murder. Along the way, she gets help from Ranger (Daniel Sunjata) in learning the ropes of her new profession. Based on the 1994 novel of the same name by Janet Evanovich.

Perhaps One For The Money is Katherine Heigl’s bid to break away from romantic comedies.
The actress, best known for her turn in the TV medical drama Grey’s Anatomy (she was in it from 2005 to 2010), has appeared in a string of them, including 27 Dresses (2008), Life As We Know It (2010) and New Year’s Eve (2011).
Maybe she wants to broaden her appeal. If so, she needs a better vehicle.
This film has some action, some comedy and some romantic sparks between Heigl and Jason O’Mara (from TV’s sci-fi adventure series Terra Nova).
Unfortunately, it is let down by a lazy ending which has major characters conveniently congregating in one location so the story can be neatly wrapped up with a bow on top.
The set-up here actually feels like a romantic comedy. It turns out that Morelli and Plum had a thing back in high school – they slept together and he later dumped her.
The dynamics of a small-town setting where everyone knows everyone else is one of the more enjoyable aspects of the film.
And it also makes the relationship between hunter and hunted more complicated, particularly when Plum finds out that the case against Morelli is not so simple.
Luckily for her, there is the cool and somewhat mysterious Ranger to get her out of tight spots at a moment’s notice.
Though he seems attracted to her, it is never quite clear why he is so eager to help out a competitor.
Since this is meant to be more than a romantic comedy, there is also the murder mystery part of things to get through and this is where the movie feels pedestrian.
With so many crime procedurals on the small screen, a big screen outing needs something extra to set it apart. Otherwise, why bother?
Novelist Evanovich has also penned Two For The Dough (1996) and Three To Get Deadly (1997) all the way to Explosive Eighteen (2011).
The book franchise may be thriving but as for hopes of a film series, one might say that the buck stops here.
(ST)