It's not everyday that a Dateline episode gets put on celluloid but here we are with 2025's A Deadly American Marriage. I mean the only things missing are the commercials, those aerial shots of Podunk towns, and Keith Morrison's legendary creeper alert. "It's one of the bloodiest crime scenes I've seen in a long time." Yeesh!
Anyway "American Marriage" is a documentary, fact-based and quite disturbing when you realize that the people doing the crime never actually did the time (talk about a dead giveaway and/or spoiler alert). The film is about the murder of Irish gent and North Carolina native Jason Corbett, who supposedly was offed by his wife Molly Martens and his wife's father Michael Martens.
Yeah there's some interviews, some barbarous scenarios, and that compulsory trial. Sound familiar? Well it should. I mean I would've written "American Marriage" off completely (pun intended) had it not been so darn well done and involving. Case in point: when's the last time you pooh poohed an installment halfway through of that long-running, NBC reality legal show to do some knitting on a Friday night? Exactly.
So OK, you're probably thinking do I plan on recommending A Deadly American Marriage? Sure why not. But I'm recommending it for its craft and veritable, visual spiel as oppose to its almost non-existent level of freshness. For instance, if "American Marriage" predated Dateline and a young Josh Mankiewicz rolled in to be the moderator I'd probably call the flick a masterpiece, a real innovator of the probing of true crime. But here we are in the present, where there are 6 NCIS shows, 6-7 shows like 48 Hours, and thousands and thousands of podcasts about real torts and such. A Deadly American Marriage is oddly akin to the cinematic equivalent of the guy (or girl) who still buys CDs at Borders bookstore. "Marriage" mart.
Written by Jesse Burleson
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