Just, Melvin: Just Evil

I think I saw this sometime on TV years ago, but found it again for free on Youtube recently. This is one of the harder watches I've had lately, for many reasons.

Morbid curiosity is usually what draws me to these types of documentaries, but this one has more than enough content to make you regret clicking. Seeing the effects this man had on multiple families, and continues to have on these women as individuals makes me feel sick and so sorry for them. Stories and accounts from his victims are hard to listen to, and really put into context how some people live NOW having been subjected to this kind of abuse. The final, horrible cherry on top of it all is that the perpetrator in question was still alive at the time of filming. (He did die before the completion of the film, though. Silver linings.)

Very tough watch, and the details stick with you.

The "label" on this documentary leads us to believe it is going to be about a very sick man, Melvin Just, a man who killed a woman in cold blood (proven beyond any reasonable doubt), and who not only sexually molested young girls so little it gives you the creeps, but even married women with two year old daughters so he could do this. Yuck.

That is the "label".

But the documentary is more about the family, and the harrowing lives they now lead. You feel so much for them, and understand their pain. The director is part of the family, and was able to get deep into the personalities of the women, now adults.

As adults, you can see they are struggling with simple communication skills. One, in particular, a lady with dark hair, who finds herself compromised by her own brother later, and who rambles incoherently, lost and confused. She touches you the most. If you met her, you would probably find it hard not to fall for her.

The striking thing about these women is how much they seem like women you probably work with, or have seen somewhere.

There is no doubt that Melvin was abusive. He took advantage of those weaker than himself, and probably joked about it with his friends.

The documentary is done while Melvin is on his last legs. Old, fat, in a wheelchair, obviously dying, and helpless. Now, each of his victims is stronger than he is.

When he is not present, the women contemplate retribution. The narrator, whose mother he molested, holds back his anger, but confronts Melvin with the facts. Melvin is in denial. Is he lying? Or his mind totally gone? It doesn't matter. He's now in the "vulnerable" position.

Near the end, the women visit him in the nursing home. They don't kick him or abuse him. They hug him, and show themselves to be mature, civilized people. It appears that at least while making this film, that Whitney himself had too much wasted anger for a wheelchair bound loser. His relatives had a much healthier outlook, which gives insight that is not recognized yet in college Psychology classes I've taken, that victims of abuse actually do get stronger, so to speak.

And it all disappears. All their emotional problems fade away, as they have this victory. And it is a victory. There's nothing left to do to Melvin. Now, they want to be "better people" than he was. Killing him now would just ease his suffering.

This is a documentary for the mature minded. Most of us have been abused by people with more power. Those who live through torments know that you don't have to look for "hate". There are plenty of "Melvins" out there who will look you up, and bring their hate upon you, for no reason. On utube, there are "Melvins" posting hate messages towards the family, claiming they would have done some vile terrible things to Melvin in their place.

That's the kind of hatred the narrator and the women struggle to avoid, and yet they find "Melvins" out there who hate them for not being immature savages like Melvin. "Ironic" is the word that leaps to mind, as you see these people post their hatred, not even realizing they are "Melvins".

Melvin didn't know he was Melvin.

But the family knows. These are brighter people than they appear to be, one with an IQ over 150 that we know of. The abuse upon them is the story. There are those who try to deal with it, and there are those who spitefully abuse. These women showed they could rise above the hatred, though they will still have doubts, and moments where they want retribution. The bottom line is that they rose above it, that they proved they were not "Melvins".

That is victory.

The documentary as a genre, when utilized to it's fullest, is in some ways the most powerful film medium. It has the ability to be unquestionably (and uncomfortably) voyeuristic. You aren't watching a mere creation or representation; you're watching reality. In the case of Just, Melvin, it is a reality magnified through perception, as James Roland Whitney turns the camera on himself and his family, examining the role that the sexually abusive and murderous Grandpa Melvin has had on all of their lives.

In Just, Melvin, you aren't watching a documentary as film anthropology. This isn't an outsider looking in. This is an insider looking in, exposing open and bleeding wounds in a detailed and often grotesque close-up.

In explicit detail, Whitney and his family describe exactly what it is like living with Melvin Just. I use the present tense because even though Melvin may not be physically in the lives of the Just family, they must still confront and deal with the abuse--a suffering that continues to linger in their lives.

Whitney reveals child abuse to be a misnomer. Child abuse is an occurrence with many adult consequences. It is not a fear or remembrance that fades with aging or the coming of daylight, like a childhood nightmare long forgotten. Instead, Melvin appears as a character that must be continually dealt with, something that each of the family members do in their own way, and something Whitney does in a very unsettling on-camera confrontation with the man himself.

Just, Melvin is a hard film to watch. Exposing family problems--especially from the inside--is something often looked upon by our tabloid culture as taboo, if not out-right manipulation. Indeed, many may be tempted to make talk show comparisons given the nature of the film, it's I-have-a-horrible-secret revelations, and the living conditions of many of those involved. Such comparisons, however, make the incidents spoken of in the film--quite freely and with no apparent prodding on the part of Whitney--no less real.

While the camera ventures into the dark closet of the Just family, it does not remain entirely in the shadow of evil. The horrible happenings are fused with the humor and life of the family, at times giving the film an air of the surreal. True--it's hard to laugh, but sometimes it's hard not to.

Ultimately, Just, Melvin is not only an involving human story; it's an exploration of documentary and it's many facets. It's film, it's reality, it's confession, it's catharsis. There's a lot of pain and, oddly enough, humour. It's documentary fully utilized, a process made to watch, a means of telling to achieve not only healing, but awareness and, finally, justice.

I have a lot to say about this film, much is personal.

But I just wanted to voice one thing here mostly.

To start, the movie is incredibly well put together, its editing, pacing and structure of told events builds a heavy image. The usage of old photos, the chosen locations, the entire tone, its like a step back into certain parts of childhood, some I miss, some best forgotten, and what this film does BEST is convey the aesthetics of rural/trailer life around being a victim of sexual violence. Everyone opens up and tells the heaviest of details, some gruesome, some actually heart warming (most will not find it that way, I know this) and the result of the feeling of an open soar, 60's and 70's households that are unchanged in the 90's, filled with secrets and fading family photos of groups of people who hate each other now, bitter nostalgia and loss, it runs the course.

All this to say...I wish the director focused on someone other than himself.

Certain moments you can read between the lines enough to know its a personal project that is using the lives of those around to flesh out the director's goals. OK, that may be harsh, but he gets selfish with it anyway.

There are several people, like the two gay sisters, or the aunts, or the intersex kid, or frankly ANY of the children really, who would be better focused on, hell why not all of them??

The director talks about his time in dance competitions, talks about how smart he is, plays piano while the camera zooms into his face really close and wiggles around so you know he is a troubled person who has things to get off him back, the way that you can see his sisters at times losing patience with him, the part where he rounds up his family and makes them visit Melvin (which was obviously him hoping that everyone would flip on Melvin and yell at him, which I was at least hoping for too, but anyone who been there knows, no matter how much you hate someone who did that to you, sometimes its hard to get to a place where you can express it in front of them) hell, he even at one point starts to force his Mom into confessing her sins of not being more proactive in stopping Melvin, despite the fact that she was a victim too, and was essentially powerless overall.

All this to say, I feel like I was told about something heavy that I really wanted to know more about, and I was told the story I didn't connect to.

I feel the pain coming out of this film and I am not here for the sake of shaming a victim of childhood sexual assault, but as real as this film makes the past feel sometimes, I still wish it went into the lives of all the girls, and I wish I could have heard more about how the kids related to each other, hearing things like their meetings with each other to plan how to kill Melvin, and the friction that came between everyone as they grew was so important I feel but was flooded over in exchange for accumulating as much on screen evidence against Melvin. Now I don't think anyone else in the family would have been able to make this, mostly due to the limitations of access they have both due to their class status and due to the things the abuse did to them (I hate the mother for acting like those sisters being rowdy and drunk and gay was them being 'broken') and the director tries to be distant in the weirdest times, vs the ones he gets personal during.

Its important people like Melvin die. Not a fan of prison. Since most people in prisons are actually not evil, child rapists tend to get killed fast, but because of this, prisons tend to give special protection to anyone tried, plus in his advanced age, he'd probably be treated with care, since he'd be legally allowed medical help. Basically It'd be no skin off his horrific back since unless he is taken out, he doesn't seem to get out much anyway, maybe the concept of being in prison would upset him but he needed to suffer. Eye for an eye, cheek turning is for petty arguments.

I need to say I loved the family, I wish I could have seen a much longer cut, I loved hearing about the children and how they felt about life, what they loved, hated. I was crying when they were defiling Melvin's grave, both from sadness of how they were denied the justice they deserved, and from the sad joy of seeing them take what power back that they could. I also enjoyed seeing Melvin get freaked out and make the most laughably empty threats as he is told a list of his sins.

I enjoyed the movie overall (despite my major gripes about its chosen focus and how personal the director made it when it should have been shared a bit more) it hits me in many places very close to my heart, and I would recommend this film to anyone who is wondering if they should watch it. Its nothing I'd Introduce to someone, unless I had to.

Documentaries don't get anymore gritty and raw than Just Melvin, Just Evil. This is a text book example of the ripple effect that abuse, molestation and incest have on multiple generations in one family. Difficult to watch and at the same time I could not stop watching. These family members are courageous and strong and I commend them for their brutal, gut- wrenching honesty. Excellent documentary!