The whole premise of the KKK plot behind the killings portrayed in this film is pure garbage. For one, even in the film, they acknowledge that the Mayor of Atlanta back then was black, so why would he want to suppress the news of this so called conspiracy? The film tries to explain this that anything short of a complete indictment of the KKK would make martyrs of the klansmen and/or start a race war is crap too. Even if the KKK was not directly indicted, a few of the white killers could have been arrested and tried and they may have later ratted on the KKK.Second, the killings stopped after the rightfully convicted killer was arrested. Another clue that the premise of this book and movie are bunk. the fact that no one ever saw one white man abduct any of those black kids should be cause to doubt this whole conspiracy.No slight against James Belushi, he is an okay actor but no star and Hines is the same. This is total B movie dreck aimed at a crackpot black audience who refuses to accept any responsibility for their own people's dismal lot. So there is a built in audience for this kind of dishonest dreck. Stone's "JFK" was a load of crap too, but at least that was an interesting well made movie.But just look at Mumia, another case involving a black killer, these sort of cases create conspiracies.

In the early 80s, black children began disappearing from the streets of Atlanta, only to turn up dead later, often floating in a river. The city was outraged and the rest of the country transfixed. Wayne Williams, a young African-American oddball, was caught under suspicious circumstances, convicted and put away for life.The problem, as this production has it, is that he didn't kill any of the victims, except maybe two or three who were already fully grown. Who did it? Well, there are the usual suspects -- the KKK and a child-pornography ring comprised of "the higher ups" -- who grabbed the first plausible black guy and "railroaded" him. The pornography ring abused the kids sexually and then murdered them and any witnesses to keep them from talking.If there's a cliché missing, let me know. If I hit an original thought in this movie, send up a flare.Two investigators, Hines and Belushi, are prompted by an angry black politician to look into the case four years after its close. They turn up every suspicious incident, every skulking witness, every redacted document, every despairing mother, every redneck peckerwood calling them "Boy", every bureaucratic bungle imaginable.There's an unpleasant racist element in the movie too, made explicit by one of the relatives of a victim: "You think this would have happened if the boy was white?" I believe someone said it. I vaguely remember the case, and I recall some anger and discomfort in the black community when the perp turned out to be a black man rather than a racist white guy. I recall a similar sense of sentimental perturbation when the notorious Son of Sam in New York turned out to be named "David Berkowitze" and the sigh of relief that followed among some Jews, some of whom I number among my best friends, when it developed that David Berkowitz was his adopted name, and that he was born to an Italian couple. I ought to stop here and make it clear that I'm not going to answer accusations of racism because it's infra dig.It's a movie that should appeal to today's audiences because of the prevailing paranoia. Is the bureaucracy sloppy and inept? You bet. They were equally inept in every investigation they undertook, from Hoover's denial that the Mafia ever existed, through the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Any paper trail will uncover as many bungles as you like. I strongly doubt that, should anyone examine your own official documents, you would turn out to be the same age, height, and appearance on all of them. Your name is probably misspelled. Some anonymous clerk somewhere must have been coming down from battery acid at one time and copied the wrong data.Of course Williams may have been innocent of some, or even all, of the murders. The law assumes that one is either guilty or innocent, but scientists know that life is a matter of probabilities. Will the sun rise tomorrow? The only correct answer is "probably." "All The President's Men" is a sterling example of a film about a real instance of investigative journalism, classy in all its aspects. Oliver Stone's "JFK" is a jumbled mess -- and so is this.Skip it unless you enjoy feeling enraged.

I saw this on DVD, from our public library, titled "Echo of Murder (2000) (TV) (USA)". I went into it deliberately knowing nothing about the story, eager to see Gregory Hines and Jim Belushi. I was not disappointed. Hines, who died last year, did no dancing or singing here, yet proves again that he was one of our fine, mostly overlooked actors. Set in the mid-1980s, he is the boss, Belushi works for him at a national magazine. They go to Atlanta upon the urging by a black lady politician who believes there is more story than the investigation, closed 5 years earlier, of the murder of 25 to 50 black children in the 5 counties that makes up Atlanta. It is both a well-made movie, and an important piece of American history.SPOILERS, SPOILERS follow, read no further if you don't want any surprise spoiled. A young black man was convicted and sent to prison, authorities attached blame to him for all the children murdered, but an investigation into a possible Klan role was kept secret and all records destroyed just a short time after the investigation was 'closed', in violation of Atlanta records policy. One cop, however, had made copies of key documents first, and buried them for safety, eventually turning them over to the two reporters. There was some vague implication that Atlanta's first black mayor was involved in the suppression of information, to not tarnish his administration. There is a clear implication that a member of the Klan investigation team was in fact a Klan member, and his was the main role in suppressing the investigation, along with destroying records. There seemed to be strong evidence that the Klan was indeed on a mission to kill black children as a method of 'cleansing' their community. The movie ends with no firm conclusion, and that may upset many viewers. However, for me it was still a worthwhile viewing, to understand a bit better some of the impact of racism, which we all hope is fading into history. We're not there yet!

Released on video as "Echo of Murder", this film is a scrapbook docudrama which retells the history of the infamous early 80's Atlanta "Child Murders" through the investigative reporting of two journalists, Heins and Belushi. The film gathers momentum quickly and keeps up the pace though the story is more a regurgitation of history than an embellished drama. Worth a look for those unfamiliar with this dark time in Atlanta's history.