The Devil Has a Name is a master class in casting.

If McEveety really wanted to give the topic its due via investigative reporting, the runtime would need to be much, much longer. His choosing to ignore that route for pulpy entertainment shouldn’t, however, have you thinking he did the topic a disservice.

Any poignance Stern’s David-v-Goliath fight might have possessed is undermined by a flowery script that’s over-fond of quick comebacks. To hear Bosworth curl her lips around some of these zingers though, almost makes for a fair trade-off.

The playful sparring that Strathairn does with both Olmos and Sheen feels like everything you want to see from seasoned actors at this stage in their careers, and the dialogue always rings truest when Strathairn, Olmos and Sheen get to play against one another. The significant acting chops of this trio of leads is the primary reason the film is worth seeing.

The Devil Has a Name has an important message if you can get past the unwieldy melodrama of the film, but the second coming of “Erin Brockovich” this is not.