An American Crime

The acting is exceptional, the casting great, and the atmosphere is haunting. This has all the elements you would look for in a crime thriller. However, my problem with the film is not the film technical and artistic merits, but the morality issue of the directors choice to victimize the character of the mother.            

                The film is based on an actual crime of the 50s that is too horrific to even believe is real. Silvia, a  teenage girl is kept in a basement, tortured, burnt, beaten and malnourished  at the hands of the other children in the neighbourhood guided by the mother of the house.  The movie shows the mother struggling with the male dominated world around her, being that she can barely make ends meet to feed her children, getting abused by the men in her life and is almost paralyzed with depression. In one incident, when something doesn't work to her favour, she heads to the basement and starts to burn scars reading "I'm a whore" on the belly of Silvia the teenage victim, begins to cry and then commands the children around watching to finish the job. I don't care how horrible the mother thought she had it, many women throughout history have had it worse and the accounts of mothers keeping a teenage girl in the basement to be tortured by the fellow kids happens… well never. It never happens. This is the one time. This is a sick, disgusting individual and to have her shown with remorse, pity and humanity is… completely wrong.  Do they actually expect the audience to forgive her or feel some remorse for her? "Sure you kept a child tied up in your basement and taught other children how to exploit her helplessness, but you had a lousy date with a jerk, so therefore you didn't really mean to abuse and teach abuse to children because you had a lousy date."

                This is exploitation but not in a fun entertaining fashion. There is no real reason for a re-enactment besides the production company taking another stab at exploiting Silvia's torturing to not only making money off her horrible death but to show some remorse for the sadistic mother who initiated all and then through her other kids under the bus in order to save herself.     

                This is the exact same story as "The Girl Next Door" which is an unrelenting horror film, that offers no  safety net for the people watching it. Although "An American Crime" feels more competent of a film, "The Girl Next Door" is a far superior flick. The writer of "Girl next Door" at least had the decency to change the names of the characters, not trying to use the reality of the situation as a gimmick to  sell more tickets. However, I wouldn't recommend either. This is a story that needs to be documented in criminal records, but does not need to be retold on screen for our viewing.  Disgusting.

Avoid It.