Leave it to director Mary Harron to make a feminist film about Charles Manson and his scruffy desert group of followers and the grisly murders they committed that was the death knell for the 1960s hippie-movement.
Harron unfolds the story in two time frames. One is about a new recruit to the commune at Spahn Ranch– Leslie Van Houten (Hannah Murray) who quickly comes under the spell of their leader, aspiring musician and former jailbird Charles Manson (Matt Smith).
The second is years later with three female cult members in a separate wing of California Institution For Women and a graduate student (wonderful Merritt Wever) who attempts to break the hold that Manson still had over the women by teaching and introducing them to feminist books, trying to return the women to what they were before they met Manson. But she knows this comes at a price- after the fog of the bullshit Charlie preached about “Helter Skelter” wears off, the girls will have to live with the unending guilt of the crimes they committed. The murders themselves are reenacted with discretion but without losing their brutality and horror.
There seems to be quite a few Manson-related films and TV shows this year- from the upcoming Quentin Tarantino film- Once Upon A Time In Hollywood to The Haunting Of Sharon Tate to the second season of the excellent Netflix series Mindhunter which supposedly will include Charlie. But you have to check out this amazing book by Ian Cooper– The Manson Family On Film And Television (McFarland & Company)- it’s an exhaustive compilation of every movie and TV show that referenced the “Family.” He even covers movies I’ve never been able to track down.