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Capturing the FriedmansRating:
Release Date: 27 January, 2004 Retail Price: $29.98 OUR Price: $20.47 You SAVE: $9.51! Cast: Complete Cast (9 total) |
Capturing the Friedmans Reviews
Disturbing, but riveting
Hands down one of the best documentaries ever made. As you can see from the variety of reactions here, it is a film that engages the audience despite its incredibly controversial nature.
I'm amazed at how split the responses are with regards to the guilt of Arnold and Jessie Friedman (specifically the crimes they were accused of together), and even more surprised by the sympathy expressed towards the mother, Elaine. Regardless of whether her husband and son were actually guilty (and for the record, the accusations are HIGHLY implausible and the evidence non-existent), her behavior was selfish and atrocious. I'm sure she was experiencing her own turmoil and thought she was doing the right thing, but it is astounding to see a woman with such a poor sense of familial commitment claim righteousness over the others. Especially considering her choices in starting this family.
In fact, it is this destruction of the family dynamic that makes the piece so compelling. Seeing it disolve firsthand, via the home videos made by the Friedmans, is absolutely fascinating.
Provided you can stomach the graphic and frank discussion about pedophilia, this documentary is fantastic.
Wow...just "wow"
There's not enough good I can say about this film. It is fascinating on so many levels.
Filmmaker Andrew Jarecki's original idea -- to film New York City birthday clowns -- took a new tack when he met #1 clown David Friedman, who had a family secret infinitely more intriguing than his birthday work. It turns out that David's father was an infamous Long Island pedophile whose story had rocked the small town of Great Neck in the late 1980s.
The film is a chronicle of the Friedman's story, from the days before the scandal until the present. Father Arnold Friedman is a beloved high school teacher who teaches piano and computer skills at his home. After police catch him with a few kiddie porn magazines, they start interviewing Friedman's students. Suddenly, Friedman and his teenage son Jesse are being charged with hundreds of incidents of sodomy and assault, and their lives are turned upside down. Luckily (from the point of view of the filmmakers) the family had always loved taking films of themselves and did not stop during the family crisis. Much of the family's film and video footage appears in the movie, either reinforcing or acting as counterpoint to the interviews they accompany.
But "Capturing the Friedmans" is about much more than a pedophilia scandal. It is also about the way that the structure of the justice system -- police, lawyers, judges and legal procedures -- can sometimes generate convictions from nothing. The film is also about memory, specifically the way our memories are reshaped by the passing years. Research is now demonstrating that memories -- rather than being videotapes of the past -- are strongly colored by the way we see ourselves in the present. In the film, the juxtaposition of present day "recollections" with the written and filmed record is staggering.
The filmmakers are not trying to exonerate the Friedmans or to indict those who brought them to justice. The facts are laid out with all their gaps and contradictions; the characters are allowed to tell their own stories with all their factual and self-serving facets. And we are asked to respond. Are the Friedmans victims, merely odd or truly evil? How did a community come to believe what seems to be a bizarre story? How did the legal system reach a verdict without adequate investigation by skeptical police or a trial before the peers of the accused? Was justice served -- or merely the justice system?
The 2-disk DVD includes Jarecki's interview on the Charlie Rose Show as well as interesting material taken during Q&A sessions at the film's premiers. The film's participants react to the way they are depicted -- usually continuing to make the case for decisions made 15 years in the past -- sometimes escalating into confrontations and raw anger.
In short, "Capturing the Friedmans" is a movie that I cannot stop talking about and recommending to everyone I meet.
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