Helter Skelter (1976)

Helter Skelter (1976)

Based on the book by Vincent Bugliosi and Curt Gentry

Teleplay by J.P. Miller

Directed by Tom Gries

            What started out as a 1970’s exploitation flick soon became something much more sinister and dark.  This flick started out incredibly weak, but ended up backhanding me in the face.  Read on, young reader, read on.

            I just finished reading this book, so I figured that watching this made-for-1970’s-TV movie would be a good way to cap off my experience with Charles Manson and his Family. Boy was I wrong.  This movie starts out bad.  And not bad in a good way, it’s actually kind of painful to watch sub-par actors struggle with the corny dialogue and stilted deliveries.  What surprised me is that 90% of the dialogue was taken directly from the court transcripts and the book.  The sets are incredibly limited, although, from what I understand, they shot on location in most instances.  This means, they really shot at Spahn Ranch, the LaBianca residence, and the streets of Los Angeles.  Despite the attention to detail, I was still unmoved by the production value here.  Another thing worth noting is that this flick followed the book (and by proxy-real life) to the T.  Sure, they left out a few details and changed a few names, but this is pretty much as in depth as you can get.  Of course, the 690 page book has much more info and it covers a lot more, but if you don’t want to spend 3 weeks of your life reading one book, this movie would probably be the best way to go.

            Where the movie really kicks in is the second act.  Once they get Susan Atkins and subsequently, Linda Kasabian (she was played by Marilyn Burns, from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre fame) on the stand, that’s where the movie (and really, the case itself) kicks off.  It doesn’t seem like it would be very exciting, two girls sitting on the witness stand, talking, but it was.  For Linda’s statement, they used a weird 70’s film technique where they lay one image over another, so we got Linda in the background, with a recreation of the Tate/Labianca murders over it.  It came out really well, and it was effective in scaring the piss out of me.  The other good thing about this flick was Steve Railsback’s performance as Charlie.  This dude was a freaking wrecking ball of intensity.  He did play it a little over the top at times, but when he was being creepy, it was fucking on.  He kept making that face that Charlie made for the cover of TIME magazine and it was fucking creepy as hell.

            As a movie, this was just average.  But as a history and film buff, I can recommend this flick over the 2002 remake with Jeremy Davies any day.  If you want to learn more about the Manson trial/phenomenon, then check this one out, because it’s pretty decent.  Until next time, loyal readers.