(2003)**1/2
So I've always been very curious about what happened with Charles Manson and his little cult. Now I know. Very graphically too. Maybe I should have just read the biography...
So it starts of with lots of overlapping scenes of "footage", "interviews" and "real life". I thought it was a real documentary. But it wasn't :( Yet again, I am so gullible. Finally we sort of understand that theres this TV presenter and documentary maker in the 90's and he is editing footage. At the same time overlapping with that we get the whole story of "The Family". At first its just a couple of girls obsessing over "Charlie" and then the family gets bigger and bigger. They sort of take over this ranch belonging to this blind guy. The family basically romps around naked doing drugs and acting like children. The details are limited as to why the blind guy has let them all stay. Free sex is the most probably answer.
A lot of nudity. More sex than any people-loving-person needs. So much nudity that I nearly fast forward because it is becoming repetitive. Drugs. More drugs. More Sex.etc..
Charlie is an aspiring musician... as well as being the second coming of Christ. He doesn't want his music to become commercialised though and when his producer doesn't want to keep him in his studio, he flips out a little, okaaaay a looot, you got me there. (In my opinion, this is why all the killings started). Tex, his not so smart buddy steals money from the blacks (as its ok to steal from a race you hate). The Black Panthers get upset, and threaten to kill Tex. Charlie smooth talks them... by killing them. The War on race is on!! Aaand for some reason that means the Manson family has to live in the desert. But as they are good for nothing jobless hippies, they need money and fast.
Keeel the evil producer. Gory bloody scene that lasts too long. A guy called Bobby goes to jail.
Scene with lots of nakedness and drinking dog blood and campfires and orgies and devils and stuff. ewwy.
Then come the real senseless killings, as they all have to try to get emprisoned to join their brother Bobby. They start randomly going into peoples houses and stabbing them (quite badly, I have to admit, because they have to stab them atleast 60 times before they are dead...then again, they stab them another 50 times after death, so i guess that wasn't really a concern for them). This part is EXTREMELY BLOODY. They do horrible things to the bodies after they are dead, so horrible that I don't want to repeat them in this review. Lots of people go to jail after loosing all their morality to Charlie and drugs.
God was I happy when that was over. It was too realistic for me. It was stories you hear about cults and the 60's, but put into a very very realistic faux-documentary. Watch this if you stomach is empty, and you're ready for a lot of blood and a lot of graphic group sex. Oh who am I kidding, you're all going to watch it now.
The only scene in the movie without sex or gore.
9 comments:
All that nudity and you couldn't post one picture example?
Good review =)
Wan't there a movie called Helter Skelter that got into this stuff?
I also find the Manson story fascinating. The "Beatles" connections (specifically Manson's wild interpretation of the "white album") are really disturbing.
jpx, isn't it interesting how a particular form of psychosis leads directly to messianic thinking? I guess there's a certain element in a healthy mind that, when exaggerated unreasonably by a warped developmental process or a diseased mind of some other sort, convinces the person that he/she IS God on earth, which must mean Christ. David Korresh thought he was Jesus Christ. It's not a coincidence: it's a distortion of naturally occuring elements in the psyche, like before a baby has his/her object specificity or whatever(knowing the difference between yourself and the surrounding world).
Delusional thinking is really scary. A patient of mine recently committed suicide because she was convinced that all of her doctors (including myself) had been conducting experiments on her for years. So, for example, when her boyfriend treated her badly she assumed that we put him up to it in order to see how she would react.
Hmmm, you make an interesting point, Jordan. When you say, "it's a distortion of naturally occuring elements in the psyche" I hear, narcissism + naturally occuring distortion creates this kind of presentation. Basically these guys that you cite were probably complete narcissistic assholes growing up before the "vulnerability" kicked in. Care to weigh in, AC?
I'm not getting involved in this conversation. JPX I am always amused when you shift from such things as wanting to see naked girls to talking clinical.
Great review Anas. I think this may be a bit too graphic for me. Movies based on actual events tend to freak me out a bit more.
Whirlygirl, don't blame him in this case. I made the abrupt shift to clinical talk.
knowing nothing about Manson whatsoever, I'd agree with the extreme narcissism and maybe think about paranoid schizophrenia. i have a couple of patients now who have psychotic disorders in addition to whatever i'm treating them for and it is tough indeed. i agree delusional thinking CAN be scary (and fascinating), but to be fair, there are many different types of delusions and most are perfectly harmless.
I just think it's interesting that they believe they are Christ AND love machine guns...I'm no theological expert or anything, but you'd think if Jesus had been into destroying all who opposed him, doing so BEFORE the crucifixion would have made more sense...
Sorry to hear this one grossed you out ADP, and I hope it doesn't put you off the genre.
I watched The Fearless Vampire Hunters a few years ago, which Roman Polanksi directed and starred in. It's also where he met Sharon Tate, his future wife and probably the Mansons' most famous victim. Watching her struck a chord of sadness in me that was a totally different flavor from the obvious gore-mongering inherent in Horrorthon. It's good to keep that distinction handy.
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