Serial killer doco everyoneâs talking about Netflixâs new true crime hit looks at New Yorkâs most terrifying year â and one manâs obsession with a deranged killer.
TV by Candace Sutton 12th May 2021 6:16 PM It was the summer of 1976, around 1.10am on July 29, when two young women were sitting in a car in Pelham Bay, a neighbourhood of the Bronx, in the northern part of New York City. Jody Valenti, 19, and Donna Lauria, 18, a nursing and a medical student, were sitting in Ms Valenti s Oldsmobile in front of Ms Lauria s home, discussing the holidays and their futures.
In the Dark and
Atlanta Monster, there’s no shortage of true crime podcasts. The genre is so huge that Netflix whose offerings in this arena include
The Staircase, and many more even created a parody true crime series (
American Vandal). Which raises the question: Why are we so obsessed with true crime? Here’s what the experts have to say.
1. Because being obsessed with true crime is normal (to a point).
First things first: There’s nothing weird about being true crime obsessed. “It says that we re normal and we re healthy,” Dr. Michael Mantell, former chief psychologist of the San Diego Police Department, told NPR in 2009. “I think our interest in crime serves a number of different healthy psychological purposes.” Of course, there are limits: “If all you do is read about crime and . all you do is talk about it and you have posters of it, and you have newspaper article clippings in your desk drawer, I d be concerned,” he said.
‘Framing Britney Spears’ (somewhat ironically) warns against making a spectacle of personal trauma. The announcement that Netflix, too, have a Spears documentary in the works shows how little we’ve learned, writes Jackson Langford.
‘Framing Britney Spears’ (somewhat ironically) warns against making a spectacle of personal trauma. The announcement that Netflix, too, have a Spears documentary in the works shows how little we’ve learned, writes Jackson Langford.
Kristi Zea had recently finished working with Jonathan Demme on
Married to the Mob, so she knew him well enough to speak her mind when he started planning
The Silence of the Lambs. âIt gave me the creeps,â says the production designer. âI said, âReally? Youâre going to make a movie about a guy who skins women and makes outfits out of them? Jonathan, what are you doing? Are you crazy?â â
But the director convinced her of the storyâs feminist merits. Soon, Zea found herself channeling the disturbing paintings of Francis Bacon, and going back and forth with special effects over how skin should drape from a hanger. The resulting taut narrative, uneasy laughs, and bone-chilling depravity made for a master class, and swept all five top Oscar categories in 1992âwinning for best picture, directing, writing (adapted screenplay), actor, and actress. No other film has done it since. Stars Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins went to the head of the