It's July 4th Houston. A dismembered hand is washed out from the sewer. Captain Swaggert (Martin Sheen) leads the investigation of seven neatly severed hands with tattooed numbers. Special Investigator Audrey Macleah (Ally Walker) is a profiler from the State Crime Division and brought in to aid the team. The state mental hospital has a mute boy Jordan Thomas (Tara Subkoff) with mysterious lines around his wrists who draws hands on the walls. Macleah suffers from claustrophobia. Jordan writes the name of Jennifer Lynn Eben, twin daughter of Dr. Douglas Eben (Ron Perlman).It's fascinating that Ally Walker is playing a profiler a couple years before getting her TV role as a profiler. This is a mix bag of interesting characters and unreal over-stylized characteristics. One can't go wrong with Martin Sheen. Ally Walker is pretty good as this driven profiler character. Giving her claustrophobia is a nice touch. The teen in the mental hospital is too much and too cliché. I wish the case is better written for these characters' sake. The scenes in the hospital are too slow and the movie drags in too many places. This movie doesn't have the flashiness and I actually don't mind. Although I wish it is edited better with some semblance of style.

When the Bough breaks Really is a Film that could Compare to "Silence of the Lambs". It has all of The Criteria. Good Scares, A Freaky Killer, and Scenes that Remain in your Head for Years to Come. Of Course, The killer is a Complete Genius, and he Uses his Knowledge of Trickery to Fool You and Keep you on The Edge of Your Seat from Beginning to End. Without Doubt a Five Star Movie. Fans of Hannibal will not be Disappointed. Fans of This Movie should see "Copycat".

This is not a bad movie actually, but it just lacks those certain things to pull it to a 'good' level. The early 'Sam' of Ally Walker is quite good, but I must say not as good as Sam. The last thing I'd like to remark is that I could have sworn that boy was a boy and that girl was a bloody boy too. But the girl was a girl and the boy, was a girl too. VERY ODD!6,5 out of 10

When the Bough Breaks sets an all-time record for unresolved loose ends: scars on the back, birth defects, numbers on the palms, role of the full-time ice cream clown, and on and on. Of course, there are suggestions of untold stories that parallel and bisect the story. But there's enough here to feed a decade-long TV series. (Oops. There goes my chance to make a killing on the spin-offs.)There are signs of a heart beat in the characters of Audrey Macleah and Jordan/Jenny--but the pulse is weak.