The Sunrise Theater's mid-July movie is award-winning Canadian independent film "Small Town Murder Songs," a modern Gothic tale of crime and redemption about an aging police officer from a small Ontario Mennonite town who hides a violent past until a local murder upsets the calm of his newly reformed life.

This independent crime/thriller will be shown July 14, 15, 17 and 18 (no screenings on July 16 due to Blues Crawl). Shows are weekdays at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2:30 and 7:30 p.m.

This drama is rated R, runs for 75 minutes, and stars Martha Plimpton, Peter Stormare, Aaron Poole, Stephen Eric McIntyre and Jill Hennessy. The film is directed by Ed Gass-Donnelly, who won the Phoenix film festival's Best Director Award for his work on this film. Martha Plimpton also won the Best Actress Award at the Whistler International Film Festival.

The following plot summary is from the Metacritic website: "When a young, unidentified woman is found dead by the lake - the victim of a brutal and violent crime - Walter, an aging small town police officer, is called to the scene of the town's first murder investigation in decades. Haunted by his past, and hampered by the mistrust of the community and a state police officer overseeing the investigation, he sets out to solve the murder, complicated by his ex-lover and his suspicion of her current boyfriend. As he delves deeper into the crime, his newly reformed life begins to unravel and intertwining itself within the investigation and possibly the murder itself."

Stephen Holden of The New York Times writes that the film is "...compellingly acted from top to bottom. As the raw passions of its hard-bitten characters seep into you, the songs hammer them even more deeply into your consciousness. The film's only flaw - a big one - is its brevity."

The historical Sunrise Theater is located at 250 NW Broad St. in Southern Pines. Tickets for all shows are $7 for adults. Refreshments, including beer and wine, are available. All Sunrise Theater movies are commercial-free.

For more information, contact the theater at (910) 692-3611 or www.sunrisetheater.com.