Menendez + Menudo: Boys Betrayed

While overwrought and repetitive at times, this is still a very good documentary of how some boys in the Menudo singing group, including Roy Roselló, were sexually abused by their producer Edgardo Díaz and others. One of the others was Jose Menendez, who was the head of RCA records when Menudo was signed to the label.

The documentary centers on Mr. Roselló and his pursuit of justice. He wants to see Edgardo Díaz thrown in prison for his crimes against boys. He was a particular favorite of the producer, and couldn't see a way out of the situation as a teenager, since he was paying all the bills to support his mother and siblings.

Not only was Roy Roselló repeatedly raped by Díaz for years, he tells of going to the Menendez house one night, where Jose Menendez told him to drink a glass of white wine, which made him terribly woozy. He then remembers being led to an upstairs bedroom, where Menendez raped him, causing injuries that didn't heal for days.

This is how Roy Roselló's story ties in with the Menendez brothers. They were convicted of killing their parents by a jury in a second trial, because the jury in the first trial could not reach an unanimous verdict. In the first trial, ample evidence was allowed that showed the brothers were sexually abused by their father. Thus, they could then be convicted of manslaughter and not murder, if that was true.

In the second trial, such evidence was severely limited, which led to the belief the brothers were making up the sexual abuse, and a good and decent father was being slandered. There are telephone conversations in this film between journalist Robert Rand and Lyle and Erik Menendez, who are serving life sentences in prison. Their cousin and maternal aunt, who believe they should be freed, are also interviewed.

The main focus of this documentary, however, is on Roy Roselló, Menudo, Edgardo Díaz and others who knew about the sexual abuse of Menudo boys. It was quite obvious to many individuals, including journalist Bolivar Arellano, who tried to bring the matter to light back in the 1990s. He is interviewed in this film, along with others.

Will this documentary give the Menendez brothers a chance of being freed after serving over 30 years in prison? Will Edgardo Díaz ever be charged with sexual abuse? Will Roy Roselló finally find the peace and justice he has sought for so long? All that remains to be seen, and this documentary does an excellent job of bringing this mostly buried issue to the surface once and for all.

This information is all worthy of a documentary, but the wrong people made it. So much of this is staged and it really undercuts the power of the truth. Having real people obviously reenact conversations was not the way to go. Too many scenes seem to have been directed for maximum effect which was completely unnecessary. There's also the constant teasing of information which is kind of an odd decision for a documentary about pedophilia. Of course it's not necessary, but the teasing of it felt distasteful. But like I said, this is an important exploration of what happened. I just wish it was done by more experienced documentary filmmakers.

Like I said it is too scripted and self serving for the Executive Producers IE Nery. Too many repetitive scenes. I understand and sympathize but have doubts about the motives of the Main Players. I would have liked more focus on what the point actually is: Charge someone, or this is just a attempt to capitalize on someone's pain. Really makes Los Angeles Police Station an embarrassment in episode 3. Really needed this to be a completed DocuStory to have impact. Who will get the rights to a book if the Melendez Brothers are released. Again sad the Roy had to endure what he allegedly went through as a member of Menudo.

The documentary is excellent and my heart truly goes out to the boys whose childhoods were stolen by these monsters. Unfortunately, (as of the 1st and 2nd episodes anyway) almost all of it is captioned due to the primary narrator speaking Spanish or by telephone. That is problematic enough but someone made the poor decision to utilize a white font against a lot of light colored backgrounds. The resultant eyestrain is terrible and some important content is completely lost due to being unreadable against a white background. I can't believe this made it out of post-production like this. Very disappointing.

The first two episodes of this documentary series focus heavily on members of Menudo. As a result a LOT of the dialogue is in Spanish. It really got exhausting having to read so much. I would have preferred translators speaking the dialogue if only to save me all that reading. Sometimes I couldn't keep up because they spoke very fast. I felt like I ended up missing so much of what was being said as a result.

It's so sad what happened to these boys and I truly hope this Edguardo guy gets what he deserves. Hopefully the Menendez brothers can also get some justice for what they went through. What they did was horrible, of course, but you have ti wonder what choice they had, or if they even felt they had any other choices.

Such a sad, tragic story.