Movie Review: Garage Sale Mystery - A Case of Murder

Stars: 4 out of 5

Pros: Strong mystery, characters

Cons: A few niggles, Hallmark movie

The Bottom Line:

Recorded murder

Jenn buys this important clue

In this fun movie

“I’ve Got to Say, Between You and Random Joggers, I Don’t Know Who Finds More Dead Bodies.”

As I’ve been watching the Garage Sale Mystery movies this month, I’ve been commenting on how little most have been connected to actual garage sales.  That’s not the case with A Case of Murder.  If it weren’t for garage sales, Jenn might never have gotten involved, in fact.

It all starts innocently enough for Jennifer Shannon (Lori Loughlin), when she and best friend and business partner Dani (Sarah Strange) head to a garage sale in the country hoping to score some items for their store, Rags to Riches.  They find several interesting pieces, including an old reel to reel recorder.  At the shop, Jenn starts working on the machine only to discover that the tape in the machine has a recording of what appears to be a murder taking place.  Who is on the tape?  Is it real?

This is a case where we actually know a bit more than Jenn at the beginning since we meet the victim on his last day alive before Jenn buys the recorder, but she’s discovered the recording and found the body by the first commercial break.  We appear to have a solid group of suspects, and they are quite interesting.  I was stumped on this one until right before Jenn figured it out, in fact.  And the climax is very suspenseful.

Poor Dani.  She’s just meant a potential love interest at the end of the last movie only to have that completely forgotten here.  I wish they’d give her a steady boyfriend, although it’s probably a budget issue.  She’s trying to find some goals and vision for her life in this movie, and that sub-plot provides some nice laughs.  And on the home front, the rest of the Shannon family is working hard to building a media room, although daughter Hannah’s (Eva Bourne) goals seem to be at odds with husband Jason (Steve Bacic) and son Logan’s (Connor Stanhope) desires to create a man cave, leading to some more wonderful moments.

I do need to issue the usual Hallmark cheese warning, but it’s no worse than normal.  So if you enjoy their movies, you’ll enjoy this one.  In addition, I do feel that something got overlooked early on, but it had little to do with the mystery itself, so it’s easy to ignore.

It’s been fun this month solving mysteries with Jenn.  A Case of Murder ends the month on a strong note, and Hallmark Movies and Mysteries is already teasing movies to come in October and Jenn’s return in early 2018.  I’m looking forward to both.

This movie is part of the Garage Sale Mysteries Collection Three DVD set.