Henry - Portrait of a Serial Killer is probably one of the best, and most unsettling, horror films I've yet seen. Not a horror in the traditional sense, it takes a very matter-of-fact, unflinching look into the disturbed world of serial killer Henry Lee Lucas and his sidekick Otis Toole.
Filmed excellently by John McNaughton in a film-verite style, we are offered little in the way of history or explaination. It sometimes feels like the Belgian classic Man Bites Dog, in the respect that we follow the protagonists from one bloody, motiveless killing to the next. Often the viewer is made to feel like a voyeur or at worst participant in the crimes being committed, through clever techniques such as when the pair video the rape and murder of a young woman in her home, we are shown Henry and Otis viewing the resulting video. We are watching them watching themselves.
Very bloody, but never particularly gratuitous (the uncut version has a rather nasty opening pan through a motel washroom, in which a hooker is slumped, a broken bottle stuck in her face) this is a tremendously powerful film. Very strongly recommended for those of you with a strong stomach. Buy it at amazon
| Scab on 26 January 2002, 1.07 pm | I think a particularly noteworthy detail is the
Henry's relationship with his mother. When we
first hear of him killing his mother, it just
seems obvious, but when later, he i s unable to
remember how he killed her, we see an important
part of his personality. Exactly what this
suggests of his having murdered his mother, I'm
not sure, but it would seem that the incident
might not be as self-explanatpry as you would
first think. It somehow adds another dimension to
the whole "seril killer who's killed his
mother" thing, and helps lift the movie to the
next level.
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