Sometimes the premise of a film belies the greatness of what appears on screen. Take a miner who returns to a sleepy town on Valentine’s Day to... no, wait, that one doesn’t work. How about a washed-up wrestler making a comeback? That’s more like it. And here’s another one.

Sure, on the surface, a film about two sisters who start a business cleaning up bio-hazardous material from crime scenes doesn’t sound that appealing; in fact it sounds a million miles away from being any kind of feel-good flick. But that’s exactly what this is, beneath that veneer of blood-soaked carpeting.

Rose Lorkowski (Amy Adams) is a single mum, pursuing an uphill struggle to better both herself and her son’s lives. It doesn’t help that she is having an affair with married cop Mac (Steve Zahn). He does however, plant the curious seed that there is money to be made in cleaning up crime scenes. With her son getting into trouble at school – for licking, amongst other things, his teacher – she soon decides that maybe crime (other peoples’ at least) does pay.

I fancy something with meat, you know what I mean? Really meaty.

Not only does she rope in her sister Norah (Emily Blunt) to join her, she also gets her dad Joe (Alan Arkin) to look after her son when she’s on the job. Rose also builds up a friendship of sorts with Winston (Clifton Collins Jnr) – a one-armed shop owner who sells everything you need to start up your own cleaning outfit.

Director Christine Jeffs proves that even though it’s been a while (her last directorial gig was 2003’s Sylvia) she still knows how to spin out a good cinematic yarn. She manages to get great performances from the entire cast, but in particular from every member of the Lorkowski clan. Brit Emily Blunt is proving to be quite the metamorphic actress, as she appears to adopt varied personas with the ease of a Mr Benn costume change. Alan Arkin pretty much repeats his role from Little Miss Sunshine, but as he did it so well, there’s no complaint in seeing him do it again.

It’s Adams though who won’t be doing her career any harm at all; there’s an earthiness to her character that even though it borders on the unlikeable at times – she certainly takes her friendship with Winston for granted, for example – she’s always highly watchable. It will be interesting to see how she handles starring opposite Meryl Streep in Nora Ephron’s forthcoming Julie & Julia.

And although it does lose its way with a fairly redundant plot point involving Mary Lynn Rajskub (who plays the po-faced Chloe in the series 24), it never detracts from the fact that this is a wholly enjoyable experience. Its mix of oddball-ness, melancholy and humour make for unusual ingredients, but it’s a recipe that works exceedingly well. It’s an indie flick with charm, soul, heart and blood – what more could you possibly ask for?