Torture Mom

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It's 3:14 am and I've just finished reading the Wikipedia document about the late Gertrude Baniszewski, a.k.a. "the Torture Mother" -- a hugely disturbed Indiana woman who instigated and organized the prolonged torture, mutilation and eventual murder of Sylvia Likens, a teenage girl she had taken into her home, in the early 1960s.

Ellen Page, Catherine Keener in An American Crime

I read this history because of Pat Broeske's 1.14.07 N.Y. Times piece about a movie about Baniszewski's beyond-ghastly deed -- Tommy O'Haver's An American Crime, with Catherine Keener portraying Baniszewski.

O'Haver's film is playing at the Sundance Film Festival (Eccles on Friday, 1.19, at 9:30 pm, and then at the Racquet Club the following morning at 8:30 am, followed by a third screening at the Sundance resort on Sunday), and I'm asking myself -- it's now 3:22 am -- do I really want to see this film? Along with a second filmed drama about the Baniszewski case, Gregory Wilson's The Girl Next Door, which isn't playing Sundance but, according to Broeske, has been submitted to the Tribeca Film Festival?

I'm trying to imagine how watching O'Haver's version won't feel like an endurance trial of some kind -- a film you see at Sundance so you can say to yourself, "I'm not a dilletante...I grimmed up and got through it," and then half-brag about this to others. This is the scenario, in any case, that Broeske's article has put in my head.

A friend who's seen An American Crime says "it is a bit of an endurance test at times, but it really doesn't show anything that graphic... it's more like Hard Candy where the 'thought' of something being done is more intense than actually seeing something. It's worth seeing for the performances by Keener and Page, who are both amazing."

The Wikipedia page says that while Baniszewski "played an active role in Likens' death, the majority of the torture that eventually brought about Likens' demise was carried out by Baniszewski's teenage children and other neighborhood children. Although Baniszewski did instruct the children on several occasions, it was later discovered that they took a large degree of Likens' torture into their own hands, in what would later be called a Lord of the Flies scenario come to life.

"When Baniszewski was convicted of first-degree murder in 1965, the case was called 'the single worst crime perpetrated against an individual in Indiana's history.'"

Years have passed since producer-manager Victoria Wisdom said in a Hollywood Reporter piece that "'Sundance' spelled backwards is depression." But her words come back every so often.

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Posted by Jeffrey Wells on January 14, 2007 at 3:14 AM

comment #1

AH says ...

When they announced this piece, I couldn't believe that they were actually going to make this movie? I don't know anyone who wants to see this, and I've asked around. Important story but having to pay to see it? I don't know.

Posted by AH at January 14, 2007 5:37 AM

comment #2

Ju-osh says ...

AH:
I would never underestimate the public's love of the lurid (see the success of Saw, Saw 2, Saw 3, etc.).

That said, I literally felt sick to my stomach reading the Wikipeda entry -- and I'm not the type of person who's easily disgusted! Damn, even in Wikipedia's bare bones, just-the-facts style description of the whole thing...it's f*cking physically and mentally repulsive.

Has anyone contacted the surviving family for their side of the story/excuses/tales of their conversion to whatever religion will forgive them their sins? I hope the guilt is killing them slowly and painfully.

Posted by Ju-osh at January 14, 2007 10:12 AM

comment #3

christian says ...

i just don't know why anybody would want to see this.

to edify what?

well, john waters will be there.

Posted by christian at January 14, 2007 11:56 AM

comment #4

The Winchester says ...

After Hard Candy, I will see Ellen Page in ANYTHING. I'm a little disappointed nobody threw her name out there as best actress. Surely one of the numerous critics groups out there would have shown her some love.

Posted by The Winchester at January 14, 2007 12:03 PM

comment #5

le corbeau says ...

There is some psychological meat to the story in how the kids came to join in the abuse-- but I think Ju-osh's instinctive mention of Saw is right, this is basically arthouse Saw (Sawndance?). I can't imagine wanting to sit through it.

Posted by le corbeau at January 14, 2007 3:22 PM

comment #6

Wrecktum says ...

You should read the truelife crime article on the Likens killing. Truly horrifying stuff.

http://www.crimelibrary.com/notorious_murders/young/likens/1.html

The Girl Next Door is technically not a movie based on the Likens murder. It's based on a notorious underground novel by Jack Ketchum of the same name. It's supposed to be a gut-churning book loosely based on the Likens' story.

It would be a shame if the filmmakers puss out and don't show what happened to the girl. She deserves for the world to see what these monsters did to her and how they got away with it.

Posted by Wrecktum at January 14, 2007 3:24 PM

comment #7

Ju-osh says ...

Just to clarify -- I think that this story is much more substancial than the Saw movies. I was only bringing them into this discussion to demonstrate modern audiences' love of/fascination with film's portrayal of acts of horrible cruelty.

Posted by Ju-osh at January 14, 2007 3:51 PM

comment #8

le corbeau says ...

It's more substantial, it's an indie art film rather than a teen exploitation film, but it's not wrong to see that the same impulse is being catered to, in different ways for different audiences.

Posted by le corbeau at January 14, 2007 4:53 PM

comment #9

Doug says ...

One thing the most twisted and depraved people can depend on is there will be a film made about them and their unspeakable acts.

Posted by Doug at January 14, 2007 5:47 PM

comment #10

Nick29 says ...

Nothing against Ellen Page as a person, but so far she's been in two of the most intense horror movies I've ever seen (Hard Candy & X-men 3). I fear her.

Posted by Nick29 at January 14, 2007 7:06 PM

comment #11

adorian says ...

If I were at Sundance, I would definitely try to see it. Then, I could jump on the bandwagon about Oscar nominations for it. I would open my article by noting that the race has already begun with Julie Christie (Away from Her) and Catherine Keener sprinting out of the starting box.

Posted by adorian at January 14, 2007 7:15 PM

comment #12

DeweyY says ...

When I saw "American Crime" showing up at Sundance, I just assumed it was a retitling of "Girl Next Door." I see now that this is not the case. We now have dueling Likens stories. I have read Jack Ketchum's novel, and it is one of the more harrowing reads of my life. I could not put it down. I think it is important to look unflinchingly at the horrors of which people are capable, and try to understand just why they happened. Ketchum (one of the more under-rated writers in America) tries to wrestle with these questions. The shame here is that Ketchum wrote the novel back in 1989!! Now, almost 20 years later, they finally adapt his novel to film, and there is another version (this based specifically on the Likens case) is out there. I don't mean to bash Jeffrey on this, but I don't hear him talking about reading novels very often (like I do see with Roger Ebert.) He is sometimes elitist about "intellectually lazy" Americans, but he doesn't seem to read himself. So, you have Ketchum as also-ran because of "American Crime" and Jeff dismissing Richard Matheson's "I Am Legend" as tired, and cliched, when he pretty much wrote the book (literally) on modern horror, and people have been ripping off "Legend" for about 40 years! Let's give a little credit to the writers out there--you know, the ones who don't just write classic crap like "The Departed" (still the laziest, most incoherent crime picture I've seen from a major director--perhaps ever.)

Posted by DeweyY at January 14, 2007 7:38 PM

comment #13