Murder in the Heartland

I have only seen the film once. However it had a profound effect on me.Superb acting from Tim Roth and Fairuza Balk and brilliantly directed by Bob Markowitz I could never understand why it never received its due critical acclaim. Maybe Badlands took all the plaudits but I much preferred Murder in the Heartland.Although the haunting music of Carl Orff in Badlands was exceptionally well done.I have always been interested in the Charlie Starkweather and CarilAnn Fugate case and have devoured every book I could get my hands on.As to the expressed innocence of CarilAnn, well I'll guess we'll never know her true involvement. Would anyone know if it has ever been released to the public on Video or DVD Or when it is due to appear on TV again?

This movie does a fair job of re-telling the Charles Starkweather story but falls short of the original picture starring Martin Sheen. The story itself is quite different and I have to believe the latter is a little bit more accurate. Excellent acting by Tim Roth and Fairuza Balk's courtroom scenes were quite good. Overall a fair movie.

I remember watching this when it originally aired and taping it because I'm a big Fairuza Balk fan. I just wish it was available on DVD. Everyone involved does a great job. Especially Tim Roth and Fairuza Balk. It made me want to read more about the real story behind the movie. Look for a young Renee Zellweger as Caril Fugate's older sister. I actually like this better than Badlands. Certainly worth watching! They definitely don't make mini-series like this any more. Very gritty!! I wish Fairuza Balk would do more films! There's another Starkweather movie coming out sometime soon, but I doubt it will be as well done. Someone please get this released on DVD!

Why anybody would want to retell the story of Charles Starkweather so many years after the events that made him notorious is beyond my comprehension.

Perhaps it was just meant to be a character study: Tim Roth dominates the entire show as a passionate, capricious, and utterly fascinating Starkweather.

The film disturbs me because I doubt that the real Starkweather was so interesting. Contemporary accounts suggest he was a sociopath unable to calibrate his responses to all those negative situations of life: envy, frustration, depression. The director has done a great job; the question is, why.

While this film is not well known compared with Pulp Fiction, even Rob Roy, Roth's performance is spellbinding - at least as good as his role in Reservoir Dogs.

It deserves to be seen, as a landmark of late 20th century, one of the really great performances by an actor, rather than a star turn by an overhyped PR product.

It is a real shame this film is not available on home video, as I found it to be extremely well done and memorable. It is based on the notorious Charles Starkweather murder spree of the 1950s, and as a (more or less) true story, it automatically carries a certain level of fascination for afficionados of classic crime cases.

But this one has much more. It gives the viewer a sense of the complexities of the people involved. Starkweather's jailbait girlfriend, Caril Fugate (Fairuza Balk) comes across as oddly pathetic, the product a wretched home life. As such, she is credible and intriguing. She is docile and submissive but stubborn, as well. While not quite likeable, the viewer can feel some empathy toward her.

Starkweather, on the other hand, is a study in absolute amorality. His purposeless life unravels into madness on screen, with Fugate following, sometimes willingly sometimes out of fear or compulsion.

This is an intelligent film. Much is left to the imagination of the audience. It is a long movie, but absorbing. I recommend it highly.