Dahmer (film)

Dahmer

Poster
Directed by David Jacobson
Produced by Larry Ratner
Written by David Jacobson
Starring Jeremy Renner
Bruce Davison
Artel Kayàru
Matt Newton
Music by Christina Agamanolis
Mariana Bernoski
Willow Williamson
Cinematography Chris Manley
Edited by Bipasha Shom
Production
company
Blockbuster Films
DEJ Productions
Two Left Shoes Films
Distributed by Peninsula Films
Release date
  • June 21, 2002 (2002-06-21)
Running time
 102 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Budget $250,000[1]
Box office $144,008[1]

Dahmer is a 2002 American biographical horror film directed by David Jacobson and starring Jeremy Renner and Bruce Davison. Renner plays American serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, a mentally-unstable recluse in Wisconsin who kidnaps, rapes, and murders multiple men.

There are two timelines in the film: The "present" of the film runs in ordinary chronological order covering the period of one-to-two days; the flashbacks go in reverse order, so that Dahmer is seen as successively younger until the film arrives at his first murder and its aftermath.

Plot

Jeffrey Dahmer (Jeremy Renner) is a shy and socially awkward factory worker in metropolitan Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Troubled by a turbulent childhood and his religious father's denial of his homosexuality, Dahmer begins luring attractive young men to his home, where he conducts experiments on his victims before he murders them, trying to create a living zombie.

Flashback scenes from Dahmer's earlier life reveal that he killed one man this way in Bath, Ohio when he was a teenager. They also reveal his troubled relationship with his father, and Jeffrey's alcoholism. In the present, he rationalizes his crimes in Milwaukie over the divorce of his parents and his emotionally isolated childhood; nevertheless, he can't stop inviting more and more young men from bars and clubs to his home, where he successively kills them.

Jeffrey meets a young man named Rodney and invites him to his house with plans of murdering him, but as the night goes on and the conversations get more personal Jeffrey is faced with an emotional crisis. Rodney confesses his romantic feelings for Jeffrey, but finds him evasive. During the course of their evening together, Jeffrey strangles him with a belt until he loses consciousness; however, Rodney survives, and escapes the apartment. The film ends with a flashback to Jeffrey as a teenager, riding in a car with his father on the way to a therapy session, cross-cut with a scene in which he dissects one of his victims on his bed.

Cast

The real-life counterpart to the fictional victim is in parentheses

Production

Although the script recreates actual events, the names are changed out of respect for Dahmer's victims. In reality, the escapee who led to Dahmer's capture was Tracy Edwards, portrayed by Artel Kayàru as Rodney, and Dahmer's first victim was a man named Stephen Hicks, portrayed in the film by Matt Newton as Lance Bell. Production took place in Los Angeles and one scene in Milwaukee. The mask special effects were created by Christien Tinsley and Kelley Mitchell, who were involved two years later in the makeup of Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ.

Reception

Dahmer has received mostly mixed to positive reviews. It currently holds a 68% "Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes.[2]

Stephen Holden of The New York Times gave the film a mixed review, praising Renner's performance and the supporting performances, but said the film "falls headlong into the trap of imagining that it can somehow rationalize the monstrous."[3] Carla Meyer of the San Francisco Chronicle gave the film a middling review, writing: "Filmmaker David Jacobson doesn't seem to know where to go with his version. He approaches crass exploitation by juxtaposing scenes of carnage with shots of chocolate spilling into a vat (Dahmer worked in a candy factory). Other moments carry real suspense and emotional weight."[4] Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly praised Renner's performance writing that he "imbues Jeffrey Dahmer with a very solemn desolation that looks just enough like ”normal” pain to let you in on the way that this repressed, lonely freak could pass himself off as just another sad-eyed outcast."[5]

Shawn Levy of The Oregonian gave the film a positive review, noting: "Writer-director David Jacobson and his star, Jeremy Renner, have made a remarkable film that explores the monster's psychology not in order to excuse him but rather to demonstrate that his pathology evolved from human impulses that grew hideously twisted."[6]

Legacy

Kathryn Bigelow said that she cast Renner in The Hurt Locker because of his performance in Dahmer.[7]

Awards

References

  1. 1 2 "Dahmer (2002) - Box Office Mojo". 2002-08-11. Retrieved 2011-07-03.
  2. ↑ Dahmer at Rotten Tomatoes
  3. ↑ Holden, Stephen (June 21, 2002). "FILM REVIEW; Trying to Make Sense of the Irrational". The New York Times. Retrieved December 28, 2016.
  4. ↑ "Lukewarm attempt to explain serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer". San Francisco Chronicle. July 12, 2002. Retrieved December 28, 2016.
  5. ↑ Gleiberman, Owen (July 10, 2002). "Dahmer". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved December 28, 2016.
  6. ↑ Levy, Shawn (September 6, 2002). "Review: "Dahmer"". The Oregonian. p. 21.
  7. ↑ "Jeremy Renner, Breakout Star Of 'The Hurt Locker'". NPR. February 24, 2010. Retrieved March 23, 2016.
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