True Crime Movies

[sdreid]

Good deal Magpie. I'm sure it will be replayed numerous times also.

[Magpie]

Good news/bad news on the Manson show. History Television is showing it in Canada tomorrow night, but unfortunately I'm working.

Luckily my wife is going to record it for me so I can watch it when I get home

[sdreid]

True Crime Related Film Levels:

1-Fictional connection-Film with a made up tie to an actual case Time After Time (Jack the Ripper)

2-Inspired by-A movie where the idea came from a real crime but with few actualities maintained Psycho (Ed Gein)

3-Based on-The faithful recreation of a case but with names and/or locations changed Naked Massacre (Richard Speck)

4-Docudrama-Generally true rendition of the crimes portrayed by actors Helter Skelter (Charles Manson)

5-Docudramentary-A documentary with dramatized reenactments interspersed The Other Side of Bonnie and Clyde (Parker/Barrow Gang)

6-Documentary-Pure primer on the case Villisca: Living with a Mystery (Villisca axe murders)

[sdreid]

Perhaps for purposes of clarity, I should lay out what I think are the tiers of "true crime related" films. In a subsequent post, I'll list them, least to most, by Category-Description Film Example (Case)

[sdreid]

Hi Magpie,

I saw it and agree with you.

[Magpie]

History Channel's first showing of Manson is Monday evening at 9-8c. IMDb lists the players but doesn't give much other information about the production.

I wish I could see that. Hopefully they'll get around to showing it on the Canadian version of the History Channel.



Speaking of Manson, did anyone see the remake of Helter Skelter? I know it got almost universally crappy reviews, but I thought it was pretty good.

[sdreid]

History Channel's first showing of Manson is Monday evening at 9-8c. IMDb lists the players but doesn't give much other information about the production.

[kensei]

Ah, my mistake. Thanks for correcting me.

[sdreid]

Hi Kensei,

It was actually Murder in Greenwich that was about Moxley. The movie Murder in the Hamptons was about a different crime. There is another excellent film based on Moxley called A Season in Purgatory although the names are changed.

[kensei]

Was just searching my memory banks for more true crime movies and came up with these:

"Dahmer" starring Jeremy Renner as Jeffrey Dahmer. I remember thinking "That's it?" when it ended, because it stopped far short of telling the entire story.

"To Catch a Killer" starring Brian Dennehy as John Wayne Gacey. Nicely done.

"Murder in the Hamptons," about Michael Skakel's killing of Martha Moxley. Also nicely done.

And "Perfect Murder, Perfect Town" about the Jonbenet Ramsey case, which featured Kris Kristofferson as a detective. The scene that is burned into my memory from this movie is the one in which Jonbenet's body is found in the basement and in that house already full of cops her father carries her upstairs in a panic, and what the actor was holding had to have been a very realistic prop as opposed to the actual child but looked exactly like her body in rigor mortis with the stiff arms extended up over her head. It still gives me shivers. The movie seemed to lean in the direction of Patsy Ramsey being guilty, which I feel has been pretty much discredited now, but Kristofferson's character was supporting the theory of an unidentified intruder.

[sdreid]

The new TV movie Manson first plays on September 7. I don't know the time but I believe it's on History channel. For what it is worth, the previews don't look too bad.

[sdreid]

I watched Bundy: A Legacy of Evil last night. My expectations were low but it was not bad. There is the expected violence interspersed with scenes that make you think your watching a remake of The Graduate but it isn't really sympathetic toward Bundy, I'm glad to say.

[sdreid]

Yes, I meant Public Enemies not Night of the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian.

[sdreid]

Thanks Magpie! I'll see it some time at the theater or, more likely, in a few months on DVD.

[Magpie]

I saw Public Enemies last week.

The first half or so is really, really slow. The second half is much better.
Johnny Depp is great, as always, but Christian Bale is pretty wooden throughout.