True Confessions is a 1981 crime film directed by Ulu Grosbard, loosely based on the Black Dahlia murder case of 1947. The film stars Robert De Niro and Robert Duvall as the brothers Spellacy, was produced by ChartoffWinkler Productions and is adapted from the novel of the same name by John Gregory Dunne he wrote the screenplay with his wife, Joan Didion.
Des is the pride and joy of aging Cardinal Danaher because of his skill at developing church projects while keeping down costs. He cuts a corner now and then, overlooking the shady side of construction mogul Jack Amsterdam, a lay Catholic who uses his ties to the Monsignor for the congregations benefit but mainly for his own.One day in L.A., a young woman is found brutally murdered, her body cut in two in a vacant lot. Tom Spellacy and his partner, Frank Crotty, are put in charge of the case. The woman, Lois Fazenda, is labeled the Virgin Tramp by the local press for apparently being a Catholic as well as a prostitute, turning it into a sensational case. ........
Source: Wikipedia