The Jeffrey Dahmer Files (2012)

I keep picking atypical serial killer documentaries. One of these days I'm going to have to watch another unusual one and then write a post comparing and contrasting it with a more conventional take on the same murderer.

Anyway. The Jeffrey Dahmer Files. It's a bit like This Is The Zodiac Speaking in that it breaks the mold, and banks on the audience knowing who the titular character is. In practice it bears a bit more resemblance to The Central Park Five. It's not quite as predominant a theme, but this documentary also focuses on the political and cultural problems of an American city in the late 80s/early 90s. Milwaukee in this case. 

Where The Central Park Five took falsely accused teens as its focal point, this movie has an infamous criminal as its central force. When you talk about serial killers, Jeffrey Dahmer tends to come to mind almost as immediately as Ted Bundy. And like Bundy, Dahmer has gone down in history as a kind of everyman. Someone you wouldn't expect to be keeping human skulls in his apartment. In reality though- and also like Bundy- he was actually a bit of an odd character. For many people there was nothing about him that stood out as especially violent. He was a loner with strange mannerisms, and the vast majority of people with those traits are perfectly safe.

Dahmer was that 0.01%, however.

To illustrate his double life, the documentary takes an approach I've rarely seen. Not in serial killer movies, and not in most documentaries. There are long stretches with an actor impersonating Dahmer in his daily life. Sometimes doing mundane things, sometimes doing things that appear to be mundane but are actually with the intent of hiding evidence. There's an darkly funny moment when a seemingly oblivious Dahmer buys a barrel and carries it home on the bus as patrons look on in confusion.

This approach is an acquired taste, but it serves this documentary's thesis well.

 

The Jeffrey Dahmer files is ultimately about his effect on the people swept up into his orbit. We don't meet with any of the victims' families, but we do hear from a pathologist on the agonizing methods Dahmer used to kill. It's all very technical and non-gratuitous and somehow that made it all the more heartbreaking to hear. There's no need to elaborate or invent lurid details.

The documentary also presents interviews with a detective who interviewed Dahmer, and a woman who was his neighbor.

Interviews with the detective have upset some viewers on Netflix. Mostly because he talks about about how he used this case to distract himself from failures in his personal life. When the case was over, he was deeply depressed because he had nothing comparable to occupy his time. However, I think I prefer this kind of approach to performative disgust or anger. It feels more honest; obviously the Dahmer case is an upsetting one, but most people have brains that will protect you so that you can function, even in the fact of extreme sadness, anger, or disgust. The fact that this documentary brought in such a complex topic makes me respect it more.

The interviews with the neighbor were also moving. She didn't talk about technical details like the pathologist, and she wasn't there for the trial like the detective. What she does, however, is put a face on how a crime like this creates victims beyond those who are murdered. She talks about grieving a friendship that never really existed (given how Dahmer was manipulating everyone around him.) She talks about horror at the idea he might have tricked her into eating human flesh. The neighbor- who is now an advocate for victims of violent crime- talks about how the apartment complex was declared a crime scene and everyone was forced to move. She talked about how everyone from said apartment complex endured suspicion as a possible accomplice.

"[Dahmer] lived the horror story," she says, "and he made us live it."

In some ways, the documentary is trying to do the same thing. But with a completely different motivation. This is not a removed, dispassionate biography of a serial killer. This is a memoir of the people who had to put their lives back together once he was behind bars.

The Central Park Five (2012)

 

After George Zimmerman's recent acquittal, watching a documentary like The Central Park Five several days felt particularly relevant. Not because the cases are exceptional. If anything, the death of Trayvon Martin and the imprisonment of the innocent central park five are endemic to my country's dysfunctional attitudes to its racial minorities. These represent some of the severest possible iterations of racism encoded within American institutions. During the concluding minutes, one of the talking heads says that, just because these men were eventually declared innocent, that doesn't mean that we should wrap a pretty bow around this story. There's absolutely nothing pretty about it; Entire families were traumatized, five teenagers lost out on their childhood, and the man who harmed the victim went free to beat and kill other women. And with the phenomenon of the school to prison pipeline, one can't watch this documentary secure in the knowledge that this is relic of the bad old days. We're still living in the bad old days, and effective documentaries like The Central Park Five bear witness to that fact.

Back in 1989, a comatose female jogger was found raped, beaten, and left for dead in Central Park, in New York City. At the time, several young, black teenagers were in jail for being in the company of other teenagers committing crimes in the park. As news of the jogger's condition spread, police were under pressure to find the culprit(s) responsible. The central park five speak about being interrogated for hours; young teens deprived of contact with their families, food, and sleep.  Eventually, far too tired to function, they confessed to the crime. At some point the police had locked onto these children in their custody and never quite let up on their intent to pin the crime on them. Even though they had to coach them to say the right things. Even though all their false confessions to the crime differed from one another (all of them pinned the rape on someone else.) Even though one young man visibly flinches at the sigh of the beaten up jogger. Even though their DNA was never found at the scene of the crime.

In the end, the shocking thing isn't that they were found guilty. It's far more surprising that this case even went to trial at all.

This documentary is quite skilled at sketching in the intimate stories of these men, as well as the overal socio-political forces at work in New York City at the time. During the 80s, the city was in the middle of a rising wave of crime. People kept to their enclaves- divided based on race and class, of course- and people were angry. The victim in this case was white, but she was also an upper class banker; a fact which is repeated ad naseuam in the footage of news reports at the time. Meanwhile other rapes and murders did not get nearly the kind of attention at the time. A number of factors- spoken and unspoken- combined to create a perfect storm of controversy. 

 Therefore, this was not just a trial. It was a message, a showpiece, a warning. This was a war enacted on the psyches and lives of five vulnerable young men. One of the most heartbreaking moments is when one of the central park five says he was just coming into his own and figuring out who he was before he went to jail. Another says he was told to go to the police station for questioning, but he'd be back home. He then says "and I came back seven years later."

While their names were eventually cleared, their exoneration did not inspire the same media storm as their trials and convictions. And that's why documentaries like this are so important. Every time the innocent are convicted, there's an important story there. Aberrations of justice speak to flaws in the system, and inequalities in the institutions allegedly designed to protect us. 

The reason these young men lost out on their childhood is because of the choices individuals made. From the police who locked onto them, to the prosecutors who used this case to jump-start their careers. And, of course, there was a jury. One of them speaks on camera, about being one of the few jury members to doubt the guilt of the defendents. He eventually caved to voting them guilty.

His reason? It had been days of deliberation and he was tired.

This is the Zodiac Speaking (2007)

In the intro post to this blog, I alluded to the fact that I watch more than my fair share of serial killer documentaries. This propensity makes This is the Zodiac Speaking- a documentary on the infamous case of an unsolved Californian serial killer-  more in tune with my usual viewing preferences.

Except, oh yes, even serial killer documentaries have their tropes. Often they will start out with something like an account of their crime being uncovered, or news clips from their execution day. These films will then flash back to the killer's childhood, and proceed in chronological, impartial order until the narrative loops back to what was covered in the beginning. Talking heads will fill in the gaps.

This is the Zodiac Speaking takes a different approach, with mixed results.

In some ways you have to approach this case differently than an account of the Bundy or BTK murders. The Zodiac got away with it, for one, and this case hasn't quite receded into the misty realm of legend. It's not quite a Jack the Ripper type enigma, yet! Although maybe someday it might be.

For one thing, a number of associated police officers, 911 operators, and victims (those who survived) are still alive. And it's from these witnesses that the director, David Prior, pieces together a narrative of what happened during those years. Or, at least, what people recall after time and distance. There's no dispassionate narrator to be found here. Each speaker is set up against a plain white background and, for the most part, their words must carry the description of events. This is not a movie for newcomers to the case. This is clearly meant for people who are familiar with the Zodiac Killer's known crimes, and have a desire for something close to primary source material relating to it.

There is some compelling and terrifying discourse here, and it's all the more valuable because it's firsthand. Survivor Bryan Hartnell might be the most electrifying speaker in this, with his vivid memories, and ability to elucidate on what was clearly a traumatic experience. Michael Mageau, the other survivor, is equally compelling; although he survived a Zodiac attack his companion on that day, Darlene Ferrin did not, and he wants to defend her memory.

Other witnesses run the gamut from straightforward to cagey and uncertain. Here and there tidbits of information leak out; a possible first name, a possible appearance, a possible address. But nothing concrete materializes. All these bits and pieces create a baffling tableaux, and the sense that this case probably could be solved, but a missing puzzle piece is just out of reach.

And then the movie tapers off. It simply ends. This is because the Zodiac's crimes ended in an equally abrupt fashion. It doesn't discuss the "non-canonical" attacks, such as the abduction of Kathleen Johns. It doesn't get into conjecture on the killer's identity. This just isn't that kind of film. The effect is such that, when watching This is the Zodiac Speaking, the film feels almost incomplete. It's definitely a frustrating watch. But then again, maybe that's the point.

He was never caught, after all.

Deep Water (2006)

 As I've discussed before, the act of summarizing and reviewing documentaries makes me compare and contrast between them. Louise Osmand and Jerry Rothwell's Deep Water is a riveting experience that, at first, made me think of, yep, The Island President. You see, the ocean is cast as the antagonist yet again, but in this case its not the encroaching dread it becomes to the Maldives. Here, the film focuses on intrepid sailors who rushed out to meet it back in the 60s. The camera films it as a roiling, beautiful, gray-blue-green terror. As the story unfurled, however, I soon realized this was more in tune with The Flat. While less sparse than that documentary, Deep Water deals with similar themes; family members taking secrets to their grave, and how their survivors cope with a tattered view of their history.

The event in question is the Sunday Times Golden Globes Race. During the cold war, the U.K. regained a fascination with sea voyage not seen since Elizabethan days. In 1968, inspired by Francis Chichester's feat of sailing around the world, sailing enthusiasts and newspapers alike decided to promote the next biggest feat; circumlocution without ever stopping on land.

It was a tall order even for the most accomplished of sailors. And Donald Crowhurst, who signed up to take part, was decidedly an amateur. However the cash prize was a strong incentive to a man with a failing business, so he opted to sign up. From the start the media took a great interest in this unknown, dark horse contestant, trying to paint him as a symbol of British fortitude and ingenuity. Things were a bit less rosy in actuality. Crowhurst's yacht was shoddily made and his financier put severe qualifications on his funding; if Crowhurst crashed or gave up early he would have to pay for the cost of the boat. Losing would leave him in even worse financial straits. As someone who had lived in poverty during childhood, he did not want to put his family through that.

 

The filmmakers have a talent for taking archival, cheery footage and teasing out meaningful micro-expressions. Crowhurst looking terrified here, Crowhurst's wife looking concerned there, their children looking oblivious there. They also sketch in the personalities of the other sailors. Bernard Moitessier felt so in tune with the sea, for example, that the film goes a way to showing that he was escaping the constraints of life on land. Robin Knox-Johnston, the ultimate winner, even appears in talking head segments, in order to fill the viewer in on the conditions sailing in the Australia to South America leg of the journey. (Hint: it's not pretty.)

In the late 60s, with the space race going at full tilt, it was easy to feel excited about travel and adventure. However, the ocean is a vast, overwhelming place, and we've explored less than 5% of it. And, as Deep Water constantly asserts, technology was limited. During this seafaring contest, it was easy to go weeks upon weeks without human contact at all. If you bring worries and concerns with you into your sequestered existence, the demanding conditions often amplifies them to the point of it being unbearable.

Therefore, without spoiling too much, I will say that this film is ultimately a dissection of Crowhurst's failure. Deep Water demonstrates how numerous disastrous choices and coincidences lined up to create a near insurmountable situation. Even as many talking heads beat themselves up for their failure to step in, the film gently suggests that Crowhurst was running face first into economic realities, cultural expectations, and his own inner demons. There was very little that any one person could do once the ball began rolling.

That this was supposed to be a reflection on parables- both personal and nationalistic- becomes underlined in the last segment of the film. Crowhurst's son recounts his feelings upon receiving dreadful news, and how, as a child, he thought that "this is the wrong story. This is not what it's supposed to be happening."

At this point I realized that the whole documentary had been about this; people and the stories they tell (or don't tell.) 

It's about people and the stories they choose to believe in, until they can't believe in them anymore. 

The Flat (2011)

 

The Flat was one of those documentaries I stumbled upon via netflix. Its description on that site makes it sounds like a film centered around a mystery. In a way that's exactly what it's about. But if you go in looking for mind-blowing surprises and unsolved crimes, then you might be disappointed. If The Flat focuses on a mystery, then it's a meditation on the contradictions of the human mind, and the complexities of inter-generational relationships. 

The film opens with filmmaker Arnon Goldfinger organizing the titular flat in question.  Turns out it was the home of his recently deceased grandmother. His maternal grandparents were German Jews who moved to Israel in the wake of World War II. They never learned to speak Hebrew, and much of their apartment comes across as tribute to the land of their birth. Case in point; a bookshelf full of literature that's written auf Deutsch. In the middle of emptying out his grandmother's home, Goldfinger uncovers items that complicate his understanding of his grandparents lives in Germany and how they spent their years after the war. 

Filled with questions, Arnon Goldfinger proceeds to tape a number of interviews, and go on several trips to piece together the story of his grandparents. I mentioned in my previous review that modern reviews take on some stock tropes in order to engage viewer interest. The Flat largely eschews some of the traits of trendier films. In fact it's all very bare bones; sedate instrumental music, voiceovers, and extended interviews. Just the (known) facts, ma'am. It can make for a plodding, slow experience, but it fits the nature of the story being told. 

For me, the emotional anchor of The Flat was the relationship between the filmmaker and his mother. If Arnon Goldfinger is full of incredulity and curiosity, his mother is reserved and seemingly pragmatic about her parents' reticence. Goldfinger has an interest into figuring out the psychological truths of his grandparents' lives, while his mother hints at what it must be like to be raised by two refugees from Germany. How she didn't want to kick the proverbial hornets nest by asking questions and causing her parents further pain. In his travels, Arnon Goldfinger runs across many people of his mother's generation who have a shared demeanor. A couple times she looks to the side and says she wishes now that sometimes she had asked more. Together the two journey together and try to cope with their differing relationships to tragedy and veracity.

The Flat, then, is not just a story about how his grandparents coped with the horrific betrayal of their homeland. It's also about how World War II - and the Holocaust in particular - has rippled out and effected each subsequent generation. For Arnon Goldfinger, he seems to have settled on politely but persistently probing at secrets and asking questions designed to make people think. Near the end of the movie he uncovers information that might upset a previous interview subject. He gets on a train and, as his voiceover says, "my dilemma is what to do with what i know."

He ultimately opts to speak to the woman about his discoveries. However, this film demonstrates problems faced by historians or filmmakers of his generation. The movie ends with Goldfinger and his mother fruitlessly searching in Germany for the grave of a relative and the last shot is off the empty flat back in Israel. These are twin images that speak to one of the major themes of this documentary. Namely, the Holocaust didn't just kill millions upon millions of people. It also disrupted some of the usual transmissions of history, and people Goldfinger- descendents of survivors- now have to piece together their relatives lives in bits and pieces. And the answers to certain questions are simply lost forever.

Obsessed & Scientific (2009), Timeline: The Legend of Zelda (2012)

Over the last few days, I've watched two comparatively short documentaries showcasing fringe obsessions.

 

First up was Jay Cheel's feature on the subject of time travel. From enthusiasts to naysayers, this 20 minute tries to cover all aspects of the debate. I was struck by how Obsessed & Scientific hit on many of the usual features of recent documentaries; the talking heads speaking over the credits, live action sequences interspersed with images of charts and documents. Footage sped up and slowed down. A soundtrack with well-known artists. In this case Sufjan Stevens' music makes an appearance. (As compared to Radiohead in The Island President.) None of these things are bad. In fact it makes for a pleasant viewing experience in general! However, the more I watch documentaries, the more aware I become of tropes common to the medium.

I have to admit I did not come into this movie with the best frame of mind. I went searching for documentaries on John Titor, and I thought this movie would focus on that subject entirely. I was about ten minutes in when I realized this focused on time travel in general. One man talks about replicating a time machine seen in one of his favorite movies. He has no illusions about actually being able to travel in time, but one senses that that's not the point. The purpose of the exercise is to create a tangible object related to his favorite subject. Online forums have put the enthusiast in contact with people who share a similar fascination with time travel. Indeed, the internet is a constant presence in this film, from chats about building model time machines, to lively debates about the truth behind John Titor.

I would like to see Jay Cheel do a documentary focused solely on John Titor, because, given what I've seen here, he has has a nice grasp on informative, appealing documentaries. It's a lesser known mystery, but one with many potential areas of debate, and more than its fair share of devotees. There's a great deal to mine here.

As it stands, my favorite segment in this had to be when one of his interview subjects- a theoretical physicist- talked about how there's probably no reason for us to be visited by people from the future. They would be far too advanced to care about the people of the past! As he spoke, the filmmaker inserted images of tourists visiting museums. People pay big money to see relics of the past safely ensconced behind glass. Would there be people willing to go back in time to see something more vivid; history unfolding? 

Obsessed & Scientific suggests that the answer is yes. 

 

Timeline: The Legend of Zelda is GameTrailer's handsomely made documentary on... yep, the timeline of the Legend of Zelda series. 

As video games go, it's hard to get much more iconic. It might also have one of the most obsessive fanbases out there. All credit to nintendo here; it's quite a feat sustaining interest in a series for nearly thirty years.

Some of this devotion might have to do with timeline theorizing. You see, in the Legend of Zelda games there are clues- some small, some blatant- that these games follow in some kind of chronological order. This isn't like Final Fantasy where there's a new world and story for nearly every single game. Most stories feature new characters, even if they have the same names, and are set in the same world. Some games are announced as sequels, some as prequels, and some get no such label at all. However, there is clearly an overarching mega plot. With the internet's tendency to bring like minded people together, there's long since been a dedicated group of followers who pore over hints in the game and try to construct the order of the games.

It's not an easy task; As of Ocarina of Time, the series has introduced the element of time travel. End result? It was widely accepted that the chronology branched into two different timelines after that game.

As you might be able to guess, I have had my forays into forum discussions on this very topic! I had to kill time during the wait for Twilight Princess somehow.

I haven't picked up this topic in years, but a friend alerted me to this documentary a few days ago. When I sat down to watch it, I was delighted from the moment I hit play. I found that some of the theories of my teenage years were correct, while I was way off based in other aspects. As a short film, it expertly conveys a convoluted subject, rather than drifting off into esoteric minutiae. Timeline: The Legend of Zelda probably has a small target audience, but if you're into the series and you're curious about worldbuilding, then I heartily recommend giving this a shot. 

Obsession is a common theme in many documentaries I've seen. Particularly ones from the past decade. Both of these films are part of a thriving milieu non-fiction films focusing on  collective fascination with a niche subject. This might be the first time I review I review movies of this nature, but it won't be the last.

The Pluto Files: Nova (2010)

I think, if you check my facebook, I'm still a member of a group entitled "When I Was Your Age Pluto Was Still A Planet." Somehow that irreverent, nostalgic name feels complementary to the tone of this documentary.

The Pluto Files is not an incisive look into Pluto's status (or lack thereof) as a planet. It's a fluffy piece on the history and debate surrounding this celestial object. In a prologue of sorts, Dr. Neil Degrasse-Tyson discusses being inundated with stern letters over his planetarium's decision to not depict Pluto with the solar system's eight planets. The rest of of the documentary is framed as his journey to hear many different points of view on the subject. It takes him all across the country. No two scientists share exactly the same opinion.

Nothing really gets below surface level, even if this makes for a pleasant viewing. The most thought-provoking segment is when Tyson meets with the family of Clyde W. Tombaugh, the discoverer of Pluto. Tyson gets to take a look at Tombaugh's telescopes dating back to the 30s.  They weren't the most sophisticated telescopes around, even back in the day, but evidently they got the job done. There's something sort of fantastic about the idea of a hardworking 23-year-old researcher uncovering a whole new planet.

As I write this review I'm hampered by what to call Pluto, by the way. "Planet" is apparently incorrect, but "dwarf planet" takes getting used to and feels a bit ungainly. Or perhaps I'm like Steven Colbert who, in a clip from his show, starts grumbling about how the planets seem like they should be one of the few constants out there.

Pluto is vindicated in one way. During the beginning of this documentary, Tyson chats with some scientists about the oddities of Pluto. Way too small, weird orbit, etc. Research is beginning to show, however, that there are many dwarf planets out in the far reaches of the solar system, and they all share similar characteristics. Pluto may have been demoted, but in the process it has gained a ton of new buddies.

And it will always have its fans on earth.