Ted Bundy

The story of Ted Bundy is a truly fascinating one. The movie "Ted Bundy" however, failed to portray many of the most interesting periods in his life. That, along with one glaring bit of unrealism and a complete lack of tastefulness kept me from enjoying this movie. Some fine acting performances make the film watchable, but only barely.

Ted Bundy had a troubling childhood where he discovered in his early teens that he was illegitimate and that the man who had acted his father was in fact not. This was a terrible shock to young Ted and he retreated into pulp fiction detective stories that were actually soft-core pornography. Between feeling he had been betrayed by his mother and the sexual arousal he got from these stories, his pathos began to form.

All the while, Ted Bundy got good grades and kept up appearances at school. He graduated high school and college without real difficulty. He became very politically active for the Republican party here in Seattle, and made some contacts that would later be horrified to learn to whom they had given allegiance, most notably a man named Ralph Munro who would become the Attorney General of the state of Washington.

It is at this point where the movie starts, and not with his political prowess, but rather with a relationship he had with a local woman. The film depicts him trying to have genuine human contact and showing real concern to this woman, two things of which this monster was completely incapable. It only briefly shows him in a social situation where he proves highly charismatic, and can get almost anyone to like him within a few moments, a trait necessary to his future endeavors.

These scenes in Seattle offer a technical quibble as they seem to have been shot in Pasadena or some other southern CA location. There are shots with the San Gabriel Mountains in the background and some dreadful scenes at a park where the background is very sparse. Here in Seattle, one would have to drive 100 miles or more to find a park with a hillside barren of trees in the background, but this does not discourage our film makers. The most aggravating part of this is the fact that there are many places in northern CA that could have been used for Seattle without running the cost up too much, but the producers of the film were evidently not concerned.

Most of the rest of the film is devoted to his killings, and even shows a couple with seemingly perverse pleasure. While they do show him as a monster, there is almost a sick humor to them that I found somewhat inappropriate. The film does well to show that one of his jail breaks was facilitated by his befriending a guard.

The film completely disregards one of the most fascinating periods of his life however; his trial. Ted Bundy proved to be a fairly adept attorney and was able to mount a creative defense and the judge even complimented him on his litigation skills when pronouncing the verdict. While in prison awaiting trial, Ted Bundy developed a romance and went so far as to call the woman as a witness in his trial, and make his wedding vows part of his murder trial. This is totally overlooked by the movie.

All in all, this movie seems to be an excuse to show a couple of rape-murders rather than a serious attempt to understand the mental mis-wiring of one of the sickest persons ever to walk the face of the earth.

Be prepared to leave your lights on in order to sleep for at least three days after first viewing this morbidly fascinating account of mass-murdering, intelligent sociopath Ted Bundy and his descent into soul-less depravity. As a study in human nature gone wrong, this is a fascinating body of work. Particularly because this movie is, unfortunately, based on the facts, I am grateful that the viewer is not forced to witness Bundy's every demonic act, though little is actually left to mystery. Chilling, thought-provoking, disturbing, tragic, and well-made, this movie is an often shocking account of one cold-blooded monster's reign of terror.

The best part for this viewer is that the movie allows us to see Bundy sentenced to death.

A. Freimann

I rented this because I expected it to be intense, having seen Matthew Bright's work in "Freeway". It's definitely that. It's hard not to compare it to "The Deliberate Stranger": each focuses on a different aspect of Bundy's story. "Stranger" focused more on the investigation and the actual facts, and Mark Harmon's performance captured the smoothness and charm which enabled Bundy to gain his victims' trust. This movie is all about the animal beneath. In reality, Bundy's ability to keep that beast hidden was part of what enabled him to carry on as long as he did. This film lays bare that monster, and shows it in all its ugliness. I'm seeing a lot of criticism of this movie for being good at what it set out to do: to make you share in the revulsion of what Ted Bundy was. Complaining that it's in bad taste? What does 'taste' have to do with a sadistic animal who snuffed out dozens of young womens' lives, just to fulfill his need to feel powerful? In this respect, this movie is superior to "Stranger": that one is much too tame and sanitized. What kind of hypocrite watches a movie about a serial killer, and complains that it's too lurid? While "Stranger" is more successful as a factual and interesting telling of Bundy's story, this is a much more impactful movie that makes you feel as though you're actually in the room with that demon. Only 15 minutes into the movie, I felt filthy just from watching his odious behavior. Bright's purpose here was not so much to make a biography as it was to use Bundy's story to point out something fundamental about human nature: the desire for control, and how it drives us to harm each other. While not as good as Bright's earlier "Freeway", it's still a good, disturbing movie, much in the brutal vein of "Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer". It's actually much more violent - especially sexually - than the latter, though not as gruesome.

"Ted Bundy" is definitely one of the most unpleasant viewing experiences I struggled myself through this year, but - then again - that is only logical since the actual Ted Bundy also was one of the most unpleasant persons to ever walk the planet's surface. And then still, I certainly don't have to complain about feeling unpleasant, because the (too) many people that crossed paths with Bundy, notably the victims and their families, truly must have gone through hell.

Between 2000 and 2009, there was a gigantic wave of true crime movies about US serial killers. Since horror cinema was going through a long non-fertile and uninspired period, this was a God's gift for many directors (*) because portraits of real serial killers don't much of a plot. All the notorious figures received one or even several biopics: Ed Gein, Aileen Wuornos, Zodiac Killer, John Wayne Gacy, BTK-killer, Jeffrey Dahmer, Richard Ramirez, the Lonely Heart Killers. Ted Bundy could not be left out of this list, of course, but just as Bundy himself was an unusual killer who could not be classified within the known profiles, his biopic also can't be compared to all the routine and inferior films about other serial killers.

Why is "Ted Bundy" worth your time if you have the stomach for it? For starters because there was a multi-talented and promising (at the time, at least) director involved. Matthew Bright demonstrated, with the excellent "Freeway" and "Confessions of a Trick Baby", that he doesn't avoid sensitive taboo subjects like teen prostitution, drug addiction and child abuse. He was the ideal man to narrate the shocking but story of Bundy as raw, nihilistic, and disturbing as it really was.

Secondly, Matthew Bright was enormously "helped" by how absurd and unfathomable the facts in the case of Ted Bundy were. His story is one of those that simply must be factual because, if it had been written as fiction, people would claim it's totally implausible and unrealistic. How is it possible that Bundy made so many victims and remained under the radar for so long, even though his modus operandi and means of transportation were so conspicuous? How can a woman remain so loyal to a man who abuses and humiliates her, like Bundy did to Lee? How can it be that someone like Bundy escapes from jail twice or receives declarations of love from hundreds of women after his conviction? The explicit violence and cruelty in this film is often hard to look at, notably the scene in the cabin and the "submission fantasy", especially when realizing this freak and monster could do whatever he pleased for several years.

If you are really into serial killers, I strongly recommend this. In some ways it's quite unique, and the lead performance is very menacing. The film almost seems like a farce at times, but in a way that perhaps captures the surreal aspect of serial killing in a way rarely, if ever caught well on camera before(Although American Psycho touches this area as well.). It's far from a perfect film, but it is a worthy watch for many fans of the subject. While the tone of the film may offend some deeply, for others who can stomach the crudeness, they actually may find this film to be very funny at times. I know I did. Now don't get me wrong, the things Ted Bundy did are obviously not funny at all. Nonetheless this film takes a bit of a different look at things from the perspective of Bundy, and at times it can be quite entertaining here. In this way it ends up being a strange but somewhat thought provoking film. As I said, if you are interested in the genre, I strongly recommend taking a look at this film. It's not the best Bundy film, but it is well worth a watch for many. Some of the funniest moments in the film have to do more with Bundy's apparent kleptomaniac tendencies. Some could say that this film is fairly disrespectful to his victims and overall is in bad taste. I can understand this definitely. Though I felt the film sort of evens itself out in the end by showing what a coward Bundy really was. Nor did I feel that the film glorified Bundy in any way. What you see is a monster of a man for sure, which is what he was. A monster when in control, but more like a crybaby when he wasn't. As with all serial killer films, watch at your own risk. 7/10.