Subject: Murder: By Reason of Insanity
This is yet another film that I probably like better than I ought to, but at least I know I can defend myself this time. I merely mention that as a pre-emptive strike in case somebody else wants to get grouchy about it later.
It's a tv-movie portraying a true story and was made in 1985. Jürgen Prochnow and Candice Bergen are Adam and Ewa Berwid, a Polish couple with two children who have immigrated to the U.S. Adam is nuts. He seems to be a serious control freak anyway, but after his business fails and Ewa has to go to work to support the family he becomes fully unglued and begins abusing her more and more.
Ewa gets some lawyers, files for divorce, and Adam ends up in a psycho ward for observation - then goes to a secure mental hospital for 6 months - then goes to a not-so-secure mental hospital. There, his idiot doctor lets him out unsupervised, against the objections of other members of the staff, and despite the fact that Adam's whole gig is that he wants to kill Ewa and has said as much to everybody he's ever spoken to. So he goes and kills her.
It is not pretty.
At the end, you get the usual epilogue explaining how mental patient release procedures were changed in several states as a result of this incident.
At the risk of sounding flippant, I must say that this sort of tv-true-victim-of-the-week movie has really gone downhill in the almost 15 years since Murder: By Reason of Insanity was made. Once I got the lay of the land, I hunkered down for a couple hours' worth of watching poor, brave Candice Bergen trying to stay away from her wacko ex-husband and build a new life with the threat of his reappearance hanging over her head, culminating in the Big Scare, Chase, and Fight Scene at the end. Did that happen? Yes... but what I liked was that it's not nearly as heavy-handed as what I'm used to watching in this genre. (I admit to not watching them a lot because they're morbid... and heavy-handed... but I've seen a few.)
Despite the fact that the story is predictable on the whole (can't be helped), it engenders the proper response from the audience simply by showing what happened. There's no attempt to WRING sympathy out of you, and I appreciate that. Ewa is a regular person. She's neither a mousy little thing nor an Amazon - and she doesn't start off as one and change into the other, thank you very much. Sure, she probably waited too long to take action, but not way too long. She never defended her husband's behavior ("But I love him") - but you get the sense that she did care about him, up to a point. She just had her priorities straight.
And, in a terrific move by the scriptwriter, Ewa does not spend 40 minutes whining about herself. In fact, she doesn't whine at all. The script and Candice Bergen let you know what the character is going through without boring you or insulting your intelligence.
The movie also does not give you an hour's worth of wife-battering. One fairly brief scene that's very violent and a few less harrowing ones tell you all you need to know about the situation, and then they move on and concentrate on the characters. A very different approach to The Burning Bed. Another difference (and a refreshing one, so it's nice to think that THIS can happen in real life) is that nobody was stupid or apathetic in this movie except that one doctor. The people Ewa went to for help took her seriously and helped her. The judges were savvy. The cops showed up fast when they were summoned. It's not Ewa against the system. The system worked fine for a long time, and for the right person. It was all brought down by one weak link, which might make the strong ones seem insignificant, but I don't think they were. I think there's a lot of value in showing, once in a while, that there are a lot of competent and caring people who know how to do their part properly in a situation like that. I don't think there are enough of them, but we're not a completely hopeless society.
The cast was quite good; there are a lot of familiar faces among the supporting players. Jürgen (I may as well say here, a very young-looking and severely handsome Jürgen) was, as usual, way too good in his role as a killer. A psycho killer, no less. He was scary as hell. Although there are several scenes where he loses it and starts ranting and raving, there was no scenery-chewing going on here; you can believe everything he does; and you do not want to have this guy around. Jürgen never plays for sympathy in this role, which I thought was interesting because he could have. (Well, it would have been politically incorrect, of course, but it would have been cool to see him at least skirt the edge, just because Jürgen can do stuff like that and get away with it.)
But the movie opens with Jürgen sneaking around Ewa's house at night, looking for a way to get inside, and the Creep Factor you get from that alone sticks with you for the whole film.
Good stuff.
Not light entertainment.
And now I'm ready for that Jürgen-and-Tim Conway kiddie film...
I agree with this take, one hundred percent. The only illumination I can add is from personal experience of a male (former friend) going psycho in just this same way. It's like Jurgen studied the offical Play-by-Play Domineering Psycho Male Handbook, and so did he.
Funny how far TV movies have fallen in scope and possible greatness. Remember the Powers Booth "Jim Jones" flick (fine, fine, affecting job all around) and Tommy Lee Jones in the EXECUTIONER'S SONG (with the ubiquitous Eli Wallach!) I can't think of the last REALLY worthwhile job anyone's done in a TV film...not this decade.