Last week, Netflix’s long-awaited film that centered on infamous serial killer Ted Bundy, from the perspective of his long-time girlfriend Elizabeth Kloepfer, premiered and it was met with mixed reviews.
According to the synopsis: “A courtroom frenzy ensues and sweeps 1970s America when a young single mother reluctantly tips the attention of a widespread manhunt toward her longtime boyfriend, Ted Bundy.”
Zac Efron dazzles in his role of Bundy, creating a magnetic like-ability that made the real-life Bundy so appealing in the media. Efron, from angles, even looked eerily similar to Bundy, making his performance that much more powerful.
However, despite the performances of Efron, and Lily Collins (Kloepfer) this film seems “off”, muddying itself into a controversial arena that almost invokes sympathy for Bundy, one of the most evil and brutal killers in America history.
While it’s fair to argue that portraying Bundy this way accurately tells the story, as that is what made him so fascinating and captivating, the film spends too much time on certain events while brushing past others, creating a very odd and confused dynamic..
Directory Joe Berlinger seems to want to do so much in so little time, and although this was told from a certain perspective, it still deviates from that perspective to tell other details and stories, losing grip and direction of the film’s intent in the process.
While it falls flat in certain areas, and it certainly does, it is still a solid movie. But, I cannot help but feel as though Efron, Collins, and performances from Jim Parsons and John Malkovich were cheated out of something that could have been so much bigger, and so much better.
