With all the police crime procedurals on television these days, a crime movie has to go above and beyond to prove its reason for existence. That’s the struggle that Amy Berg’s first feature directing effort, Every Secret Thing, faces at every turn. The film stars Diane Lane, Elizabeth Banks and Dakota Fanning.

Fanning stars as Ronnie, who was convicted of killing a baby when she was just eight years old. A decade later, another baby disappears and Detective Nancy Porter (Banks), who found the baby all those years ago, thinks Ronnie had something to do with it. But the truth is that Ronnie’s friend Alice (Danielle Macdonald), who was also sent to juvenile hall for the same crime, has more sinister reasons for abducting the baby. Alice’s mom Helen (Lane) also has secrets and a troubling relationship with her daughter.

Berg tries to direct this in a documentary style, which makes perfect sense considering her background. She’s best known for the Oscar-nominated documentary Deliver Us From Evil, as well as 2012's West of Memphis. But this gives the film an incredible reliance on flashbacks, without trusting her talented cast to keep audiences engrossed by letting them tell the stories. Perhaps this is a flaw of the script, written by Nicole Holofcener (Enough Said), or Berg just thought that showing was more important than telling in features. That’s true in some cases, but when you’ve got Diane Lane around, give her the challenge.

It’s also clear that Berg is trying to emulate other recent crime dramas, like Gone Girl or Prisoners. But she doesn’t have Roger Deakins manning the camera. Rob Hardy (who just shot Ex Machina) films the action as if through a dark filter, clouding the edges of the screen throughout the film. It’s dreary, but not artfully so. Every Secret Thing looks closer to CSI than Prisoners.

But Berg lucked out with some fine actors. Lane is fantastic as Alice’s mom and Danielle Macdonald looks to have earned a breakthrough role here, if anyone actually sees this movie. Fanning is also perfect as the introverted Ronnie. However, Banks looks out of her element here as a police officer. She’s good in other dramas (particularly in Love & Mercy), but you can’t quite buy her as a veteran cop.

Every Secret Thing will be released by Starz and Anchor Bay on DVD only on Aug. 4. The only bonus feature is a seven-minute reel of deleted scenes (including one with Girls’ Alex Karpovsky).

Berg made a competent police procedural with Every Secret Thing, but it’s really not much more than that. Despite being rated R, there’s nothing incredibly disturbing about it (at least, nothing on a Prisoners level) and doesn’t accomplish the toughest task crime movies face today: being more shocking than TV crime shows.