Tuesday, February 13, 2007
Dahmer
I was actually disappointed in *Dahmer*. I guess I was expecting the life and crimes of Dahmer. I remembered, as a teenager, how it was such a big deal when Dahmer was arrested. So, I was looking forward to a gruesome account of how he had came to be. He was charged on 17 counts of murder. However, he was actually convicted on 15 of them, totally some 937 years in prison.
Instead, like one reviewer (in Amazon.com) put it, this was like "pre-Dahmer" and it certainly felt that way. Plus, not everything in this film was accurate as there was a disclaimer saying so. So, if you're not familiar on Dahmer and his crimes, then you won't know which is true and which isn't.
*Dahmer* paints this serial killer as a lonesome gay chocolate factory worker in Milwaukee. However, Dahmer likes his men to be totally submissive. In order for them to be submissive, he'll have them drugged and then killed.
The problem is that we don't really see how or where he murders them, except 2 of them. We see, in flashbacks, how he seduced his (first?) victim. Then, we see how he seduced Khamtay. (In real life, his name was Konerak.) Khamtay was the only person who gave suspense in this entire film. You see, Khamtay escaped from Dahmer's apartment and begged for help. However, when the police arrived so did Dahmer, from work. After some smooth talking, the police gave Khamtay back to Dahmer to his death. Last, we see the drama between Dahmer and Rodney. In real life, Rodney is supposed to be Tracy, who was the second and last victim to escape from Dahmer.
However, we do not see that here. Instead, we see that Rodney is interested in Dahmer. Dahmer is interested but conflicted. Every time that Dahmer wanted to kill Rodney, he stopped. This was interesting because, in real life, Rodney was supposedly not gay.
So, we do not really see the real portrayal of Dahmer in this film. Instead, we see flashbacks of his teen years and young adulthood where Dahmer struggled against the authority of his religious father. I guess that is supposed to explain why Dahmer came to be as this serial killer. We see his run-in's with the police but gets away with it every time. We see how he drugged men at the local gay bar and in his apartment. And that's just about it. You could just imagine how many lives would have been spared if the police had actually done a thorough investigation.
Honestly, it was a waste of time. You're better off watching *The Texas Chainsaw Massacre* just to get an idea of what Dahmer might've been like.
2 stars out of 5.
For more information on Dahmer, click here and here.
Labels: movies
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