H. H. Holmes: Original Evil

You can basically follow the entire "documentary" while reading from Wikipedia. Seriously, it almost goes along with it word for word. Total cop out. Obviously no new information. Save some time, just read the website.

To call this amateur filmmaking would grossly insult the world's amateur filmmakers. Writer-Director Phillip Gardner's script is convoluted, unattributed and completely incoherent in spots. Misspellings riddle the subtitles. This 70-minute monstrosity is packed with B-roll that has nothing to do with the storyline; public domain silent footage of vaudeville comedy performers, for instance, supposedly posing as the story's principals. Video allegedly representing actual locations is faked - a long cable car sequence in San Francisco which has no relevance to the H. H. Holmes saga whatsoever, just to mention one. This is smoke, mirrors and a bloody melange of tacky reenactment half-dissolves posing as a documentary with poorly-recorded narration. If Holmes was a con artist who exaggerated his murderous exploits, this laughable excuse for insight goes him one better.

Just... save yourself the hour plus and go read Devil in White City or watch a number of other documentaries on HH Holmes.

It's hard to believe that this documentary is made in 2018. It could easily have fooled me as having been made 30 years ago. I actually would not have been suprised if this was made at home with a personal computer and a budget of 0£. It is hard to concentrate because of the horrible soundtrack, which is a 2 minute cheap sequence of misplaced music played on a loop. It is actually as annoying as the dreadfully unprofessional, dull and irritating narrating that constantly left me wanting to hit the fast forward button. Pictures and scenes are also re-used throughout the 70 minutes long nightmare to such an extent that before i had reached 1/4 into it, i started thinking that this documentary should have lasted for 20 minutes due to lack of material and dragged out scenes. This could have been a really interesting story, that is in the hands of people who actually belong in the business of making documentaries. For the love of god, stear away from this, and spare yourself from thinking about how you can get the last 70 minutes of your life back.

With clearly public domain footage of stage shows and street scenes combined with mid-90s computer graphics and college kids acting like they are being murdered and tortured, this is comically awful.

Worth watching to teach incongruity. I can't believe someone got paid for this.