Lionsgate used to release mostly small films, and then got
into horror (the “Saw” franchise), became a public company, acquired other
distributors (such as smiliar competitor Summit Entertainment), and became a
producer and distributor of “B movie” comedies and action films for the
mainstream market. It also developed one
of the best musical trademark logos in the business, despite using it against
its bizarre “saw” machinery (which opens up onto a scene of the “true” Lions
Gate in Greece).
Lionsgate uses its stirring musical opening for the
disturbia, “Raising Jeffrey Dahmer”, directed by Rich Ambler, from 2006, rather
than its grind for horror films (against the same machinery). That’s appropriate, because Ambler’s drama
focuses almost entirely on Jeffrey’s father Lionel (Scott Cordes): his being
informed (starting with a “phone home” sequence and reaching police) of his son’s
crimes, and his having to fend of popular and media rumors about his having
abused his son – all of them false.
The film opens in court, where Jeffrey (Rusty Sneary)
recounts his first homicide, when home alone in Ohio, at age 18. This one incident is dramatized quickly, and
the young male victim, played by Frankie Krainz, is depicted as unusually
attractive.
The film uses fuzzy focus and sometimes black and white for
the flashbacks into Jeffrey’s boyhood, showing his gratuitous behavior, killing
animals. As a young adult, Jeffrey (who always speaks in a monotone) is constantly fending off his father's concern out of "privacy" and at one point says he wants to have a lab, just as his father (who is shown as a laboratory scientist) does for work. There seems to be no real
explanation for Jeffrey's path other than genetics. There
are some childhood development experts who do claim that upbringing means less
than a lot of people think, and that inheritance and organic factors mean a lot
more. Certainly, the justice system is
having to deal with these questions given the occasional violent outbreaks
leading to tragedy, especially two recently during the summer of 2012.
In the end, the film doesn’t tell us a lot about why this
happened. It does show us how a father
has to deal with his own level of responsibility, and decide just what he can
do for himself and the others who remain in his life.
The film (available from Netflix) can be watched on YouTube
free legally, but requires login and age verification.
There is an review of the earlier film “Dahmer” here on July
8, 2012.
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