Director Report Card: Mary Harron (2019)

6. Charlie Says

Following his 2017 death and the fiftieth anniversary of his most infamous crime, there has been a renewed interest in Charles Manson and his notorious Family. 2019 has seen several films inspired by the topic, ranging from the high-profile “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” to the regrettable lows of “The Haunting of Sharon Tate.” In-between these two poles resides “Charlie Says.” The new film from the “American Psycho” team of Mary Harron and Guinevere Turner, it is Harron's first theatrically released film since 2011's “The Moth Diaries.” You'd think this combination of director, writer, and topic would generate more conversation but “Charlie Says” has been greeted with, at best, lukewarm buzz.

Beginning in 1972, the film follow Leslie “Lulu” Van Hounton, Patricia “Katie” Krenwinkel, and Susan “Sadie” Atkins – otherwise known as the Manson Girls – as they sit in prison cells on what was formerly California's death row. Despite his and their interactions, the girls remain faithful to Charlie and his apocalyptic visions. Psychologist Karlene Faith interviews the girls, attempting to reach them. As Lulu and the others recall their days at Charlie's ranch, the turth about their time there – and the gravity of their crimes – begin to dawn on them.

It would seem Harron's primary goal with “Charlie Says” is to depict, in an almost clinical way, how a man like Charles Manson successfully manipulated so many people. He knowingly preyed on the psychologically vulnerable. Some of the girls came from abusive backgrounds, the Family providing comfort and acceptance. Some where just adrift, in search of a philosophy to guide them. Manson isolated them from their support nets, forcing them to cut off all contact with their family. He broke down their own sense of personal identity, giving them new names and roles. In their place, he forged new identities, dependent on him as a figurehead. Anybody who wasn't already vulnerable to Manson's tactics, who didn't buy into his bullshit, was dismissed. As depicted in a scene where a potential new Family member is brought to the ranch, immediately questions Charlie's authority, and is swiftly sent away. This is why otherwise reasonable people fell under Manson's control. He took away all their other options for emotional support, made them rely solely on him, until they were literally willing to kill for him.

Anybody familiar with how cults, or even abusive relationships, works will recognize these tactics. In fact, I think that might have been a reason why Harron chose now to tell this story. Manson's Philosophies are blatantly racist. Part of why he's such a effective manipulator is how he places himself and his followers as special, against an enemy he dehumanizes – by calling them "piggies" – until they seem utterly alien. This is not too dissimilar to how radical factions, ranging from ISIS to the Alt-Right, draw in followers. Manson largely targeted vulnerable young women, instead of disenfranchised young men, but the principals are the same. It would seem, when it comes to charismatic psychos talking people into committing horribly violent acts, not much has changed. And there's value in recognizing that.

Unlike other films, which have depicted Manson as a wide-eyed lunatic, “Charlie Says” acknowledges that he was charismatic. He's a galvanizing speaker and is even sweet and comforting at times. This provides context for why Leslie and the others stayed. Yet the film never backs away from Manson's ugliness. His rants grow increasingly egotistical and nonsensical. He's a hypocrite, one of the attributes he tells the girls to hate about the world outside their commune. During a musical rehearsal, he berates the girls into disrobing. After the audition goes poorly, Charlie vents his anger by beating one of the girls. This is all behavior they accepted because Manson taught them it was okay. Harron acknowledges that the girls were sometimes disturbed by his behavior. Leslie is shown as scared or confused by Manson at times. She even clearly considers leaving at one point. But fear – more-so of the outside world than the Family – kept where she was.

So “Charlie Says” is a thoughtful and well-researched depiction of what happened. So why isn't it a better film? Some of this is strictly a pacing issue. The flashback structure was clearly chosen to foreground the women's recovery, sot eh audience would understand them as more than just murderers. This has almost the opposite effect. We meet the Manson Girls as fawning, obsessive followers. As opposed tot eh flashbacks, where they seem like still reasonable, easy-to-relate-to people. It's just the nature of the narrative that the flashbacks are what we are most interested in. We want to see the lurid stuff. Focusing on the women's recovery is an admirable choice but the prison scenes are slow, often interrupting the flow of the more fascinating flashbacks.

More than even that, “Charlie Says” never truly brings its subjects to convincing life. The depiction of the Manson family is respectful, showing the machinations that led Leslie and the others down that path. It's also somewhat impersonal. It seems we never truly get inside the heads of Leslie, Sadie, and Katie. They exist as either victims of Manson's manipulation or his brainwashed followers. Rarely, do we get an idea of what they are thinking or feeling. The film pulls back when it should get closer. It goes scientific when a more emotional, personal approach was needed. We understand why this happens but we don't feel it.

I want to say Turner and Harron were making an intentional choice there, perhaps to further emphasize the women's victimhood over their statuses as killers. Yet even the acting has that oddly withdrawn quality. Hannah Murray plays Leslie Van Hounton, our PO.V. into this world. Murray projects a wide-eyed naivety throughout the film. She hints at the panic and confusion Leslie felt without exploring it deeper. Sosie Bacon as Katie has a similar approach while Marianne Rendon, as Sadie, goes more unhinged. Merritt Wever as Faith, the psychologist, is fine, especially considering she is given some of the movie's most difficult dialogue.

By keeping Leslie and the others as blanks, something perhaps uncomfortable happens. Charles Manson becomes the most interesting character in the film. Matt Smith plays him as a frustrated wannabe with a talent for manipulation. When his music career fails to take off, he becomes more obsessed with his messiah fantasies and his violent tendencies. He uses and abuses the women arund him to build up his fragile, masculine ego. This sees Harron returning to ideas she last explored in “American Psycho.” (And like Patrick Bateman, Manson is virulently racist and homophobic.) Smith invokes all these sides of Manson, making him a complex and disturbing presence.

Of course, Patrick Bateman was a fictional character and the bloody mayhem he wrought was stylized, exaggerated. Charles Manson was real and the murders he orchestrated were tragedies. Harron approaches the murders tastefully while still making them unnerving to watch. She keeps the violence largely off-screen. She devotes screen time to the victims' lives before they are violently ended, giving us an idea of what was lost. We see the grisly aftermaths, often presented starkly and straight-ahead. When we do see the violence happen, Harron remains focused on the characters' faces, on what they are feeling in that moment. The effect is visceral without turning the real life deaths in a trashy horror movie.

There's a certain documentary-like edge to these scenes. That is something she attempts to extend to the rest of the movie, less successfully. Most of “Charlie Says” looks just fine. The night time scenes around the Family fire place have a suitably warm glow to them, with just an undercurrent of danger. The day time scenes have a fitting sense of desert heat. The prison cells are appropriately cold and gray. Yet occasionally the camera adopts a shaky, hand-held quality that's a bit distracting. Especially during a moment when Sadie tears all the posters off her cell wall, when the camera seems to collide with an actress' shoulder. I don't what was up with that.

Whatever disappointment I felt with “Charlie Says” crystallized as it reached its end. Throughout the film, Faith makes various attempts to connect with the girls. (A darkly humorous moment occurs when a black man explains the racism of Manson's ideas to the clueless girls.) Finally, after recounting the murders, Leslie finally realizes the gravity of her crimes. And that's pretty much the end of the movie. It's an abrupt conclusion and also one that feels like a cheat. Leslie having a slow realization of guilt would've been more compelling. As would have an epilogue detailing how she grappled with the enormity of what she did. Instead, “Charlie Says” ends just when it's getting most interesting.

Clearly, Harron and Turner's goal with “Charlie Says” was to depict Lulu, Katie, and Sadie more as victims of Charles Manson and not-so-much co-conspirators. (They're not alone in this cause. In his book, “Role Models,” John Waters argues for a similar case.) While the film convincingly lays out the evidence, I wish it was more exciting. The director and writer of “American Psycho” making a movie about Charles Manson promises a lot. While some elements of the film – namely Smith's performance and Harron's handling of the murders – work, “Charlie Says” is a disappointingly cold and withdrawn film. The muted response was totally justified. [Grade: C+]