Killer Legends

Picked randomly on Netflix i found the content directly relating to each incident quit fascinating. Problem is the film comes off amateurish due to the fact that the documentarian(s) find it necessary to insert themselves with filmed commentary, including the two of them bumbling around on location attempting to identify murder sites and rather pretentiously speculating on the case circumstances and the killers motives. Most superfluous and unnecessary are the occasional, random personal reaction shots during interviews or in hotels rooms while conducting research. Wish i could give more positive feedback. The filmmaker's just seem to be stretching this a bit, most likely due limited resources on the chosen subjects.

Delving into our collective nightmares, this horror-documentary investigates the origins of our most terrifying urban legends and the true stories that may have inspired them.

A few years ago, Joshua Zeman made "Cropsey", a punch in the gut documentary that started as an examination of an urban legend and turned into a full-scale exposure of something far worse. What many would rather have us forget, Zeman brought to life: a mental facility that was not doing its patients any good, to say the least.

This time he is back, examining not one but four urban legends and finding what may just be the truth behind them (or, if nothing else, real events that pushed the legends further into public consciousness). The hook man, the candy poisoner, the babysitter and the killer clown. Each is looked at in some detail (although limited by the film's running time).

With the hook, we travel to Texarkana, find a little-known serial killer who was never caught, and explain how fact and fiction were blurred through the film "The Town That Dreaded Sundown". The fact the city annually shows a film about the killer, who could have been alive and attended a performance, is a bit disturbing. And how these "Texarkana Moonlight Murders" are relatively obscure, even for serial killer buffs, is a mystery in itself.

In the candy poisoner segment, we learn of the legend of candy tampering, which is just that: a legend. Although circulating for one hundred years, instances are so rare as to be virtually non-existent. And then we have Ronald Clark O'Bryan, the man who took these legends and used them to cover up his real crime... and legend becomes reality.

The babysitter story, with a killer being inside the house, is best remembered as the plot for "When a Stranger Calls". Interestingly, we find that babysitters are not likely targets -- perhaps even less likely than the average person. But then the story takes a juicy turn, when we learn of a serial rapist and murderer who preyed on babysitters, and how a town's racial prejudice probably sent the wrong man to prison. This story deserves its own documentary.

Lastly, the killer clown. Apparently there is an urban legend (not as well known) of clowns that drive white vans and abduct children. And while they circulate around Chicago, the story cannot be traced to the obvious source of John Wayne Gacy (though he certainly intensified it). Here we never quite get to the root, but along the way learn a great deal about Chicago's history with clowns, which is interesting in itself.

This film is every bit as good as "Cropsey", though it does suffer from the format. From the short segments, we are left with one of two impressions (or both): that these needed to be longer but could not be because of running time, and that this was likely supposed to be an ongoing series for Chiller that never came to be. One can easily imagine Zeman traveling to a new town each week and getting to the bottom of an unsolved mystery and an old legend, being the gruesome counterpart to Jan Harold Brunvand.

And we hope he does make more.

The two presenters here are certainly no Louis Theroux. Do you remember the really annoying guy that would try scare others with creepy campfire stories on school camps? Well he is back and this is his documentary. For such interesting subject matter, it's testament to the incompetence of the filmmakers that they somehow manage to balls it up so badly.

It comes across highly exploitative and cheap in nature, with the presenters far too often the center of the film, instead of the subject matter itself. It features 4 'very American' urban legends. It would have been better off split into mini episodes as part of a Netflix series hosted by someone like David Farrier - because it doesn't quite work as a documentary.

Just ends up being two amateurs pointing at trees in the dark. It tries too hard to be scary, with not only on-site nighttime footage, but cut-shots of horror movies loosely based on the urban legends. The documentary didn't even come to much of a conclusion on the subject of urban legends.

Don't watch if you have a fear of clowns - though that segment was by far the most interesting part.

I loved Joshua Zeman's first documentary Cropsey even though it was frustratingly short on details and hard facts. Killer Legends was uneven and hard to follow, especially the first segment about the hookman killing a couple in a lover's lane in Texas. It got better and more focused later, especially the candyman segment but it just wasn't as good as Cropsey. Watch that instead of this one.

Just like the directors other documentary, Cropsey, I found myself interested in the concept, but it really just let me down. It has a few little interesting moments, such as the clown segment, but overall it doesn't give a whole lot of information that you couldn't find online yourself with a little bit of research.

The film explores the concept of how certain urban legends come from real crimes that actually happened. In theory this sounds good, but it ends up kind of covering what we could already assume. It also covers some stories that have already been covered before, such as the case of the poison pixie stick a kid ate on Halloween. It would have been more interesting to hear about urban legends that came from surprising real events. I think Cropsey did the same thing. It was a documentary that had a good concept but just kinda goes into territory that is less relevant and becomes boring. It also seems ridiculous how the filmmakers try to "solve" these crimes themselves, as if they are going to find something that the tons of people who investigated it before them, including police and other interested people. I just knew that they wouldn't discover anything new or shocking.

I do wish this had more to offer, but it ends up being a forgettable documentary. I mean, if you really are interested in it, check it out, but if you know a little bit about urban legends, you might not get anything new from this.