He concluded that, "I think it’s very important for the audience - so that it’s not just another story - to be grounded in the horror, the fact that there were 26 bodies under the crawlspace and three other bodies on the property, and four bodies in the river."Ĭontext is always a prominent element in Berlinger's documentaries. Berlinger even discussed how appropriate it actually was to air the documentary due to its brutal nature. With the availability of over 60 hours of previously unheard tapes of the killer (recorded by a member of his defense team that remained nameless) and never-before-seen footage of the crimes, this documentary dives even deeper into the crawlspace of the killer's closet. If the viewer already knows a lot about these cases, it doesn't really matter, because a different perspective is explored, a more first-person point of view. That is the focus of both seasons of Conversations With A Killer rather than give new information about the cases. Actively listening to their voices as the pictures of the crimes and the victims appear brings the audience closer to what happened. Using tapes recorded during the time the killer was alive gives another layer to the storytelling of these people who have been so studied over the years.Īlongside detectives that work on the case, victims that were able to escape, and families that lost loved ones, Ted Bundy and John Wayne tell their version of the story. There is, however, an extra element that set this miniseries apart from other true crime productions: the killer actively participates in telling the story. Like any good documentary, there are interviews with people today that have something to do with the subject. There is an emotional element present in his documentaries that come from various smart decisions that make you glued to the TV.Ĭonversations With a Killer is a mixture of the past and the present. Using real footage mixed with particular never-before-seen elements, Berlinger is capable of telling previously over-told stories in a new light. Both seasons of Crime Scene ( The Vanishing at The Cecil Hotel and The Times Square Killer) and Conversations With A Killer (both seasons) have been produced with Netflix alone. In the past couple of years, true crime pioneer Joe Berlinger (who made the groundbreaking Paradise Lost films) has produced more documentary miniseries and movies on the topic, such as the one that Efron starred in. Usually, the way the story is structured and becomes enthralling is through the filmmakers' creativity: a linear story, going back and forth, showing the families of the victims telling the story mixed with photos of the crime… The possibilities are almost infinite. It is impossible to say that entertainment is never taken into consideration when producing a documentary. Documentaries have the power of being less biased in romanticizing what happened - they use facts and do not try to manipulate the truth to entertain the audience. Below, these are the best true crime documentaries to watch and listen to (warning: some mention suicide and sexual assault).Because of the increased interest in the area, and the explosion of true-crime podcast series and their adaptations, documentaries about the subject began to emerge at an increasing rate. Production studios are acutely aware of our insatiable appetite for crime, whether it be a gruesome slaying, a spiderweb of deception, or the mass manipulation of others by a narcissistic spiritual leader. Shows like Forensic Files, Cold Case Files, and Unsolved Mysteries have been around forever, but our modern-day obsession with true crime stems from the original Serial podcast and, a year later, Netflix’s Making a Murderer. These shows, podcasts, and films allow us to explore the creepy underbelly of human nature “in a safe way, from a safe distance,” psychologist Dr. Shows, podcasts, and films that fall under the rubric true crime-which, of course, is the name of the genre, not a guarantee that all of the information depicted is true-allow us to play amateur detective, letting us piece together the details and offering an adrenaline rush along the way. It's endlessly compelling to consider the spectrum of human depravity and why some people do the things they do. Why are we so obsessed with true crime, or as my husband and the writers of South Park like to call it, “murder porn”? Psychologists believe it's because we’re fascinated by our own dark sides.
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