Deborah Lipp

Capturing the Friedmans (2003) 9/10
In 1984, Arnold Friedman is arrested for child pornography. While searching his home, the police discover that Friedman is a teacher, and has computer classes at home. Soon he is under suspicion of molesting a large number of students, and suspicion falls upon his youngest son Jesse as well. (Documentary)

Capturing the Friedmans challenges our ideas of what we know, and of what conclusions we can draw. 1984 was the height of the McMartin daycare case, and there was a lot of hysteria about the evils of child care and the dread thing that could happen to children.

But Arnold Friedman was not the innocent victim of a bizarre accusation. He was a pedophile with child pornography hidden in his home. The suspicions cast on him seem to have been based in fact. But were they?

The Friedmans were a family fascinated by videography. The documentarians were blessed with access to a large number of homemade family videos taken before and during the case. We watch as a family disintegrates before our eyes. One brother, Seth, declines to appear in the film. David, the eldest, believes his father is utterly innocent, even of pedophilia, regardless of any evidence. David is furious; with his mother, with the media, with everyone. The youngest, Jesse, is simply resigned and sad.

The film finds a very few of Friedman’s accusers who are willing to talk. Some stand by their stories and some do not. One young adult tells of the enormous pressure put on him as a child to confirm that Arnold molested him, and finally caving in. An investigator speaks, in all seriousness, of how important it is to pressure children and put words in their mouths. He seems sincerely to believe that this is best for the children.

Yet there is something wrong here. There is no way of reading this as tragic victims versus outrageous accusations. The uncomfortable perch is between somewhat guilty parties (at least in Arnold’s case) versus accusations with a grain or more of truth. The accusations are fueled by, but not an invention of, hysteria. They are blown up, expanded upon, and nurtured, until their scope is beyond belief.

While this happens to the community, what happens to the Friedmans? Each deals alone with anger, shock, and terror. They don’t come together as a family; they shatter, and to a great extent, they remain shattered twenty years later.

This isn’t a comfortable film, nor is it a lurid one. It asks us to look at what we see and simply, calmly, think. It is remarkable how difficult that is. For some people in the film (and indeed, for some people who have reviewed it), it remains out of reach.

Two For the Money (2005) 7/10
Brandon Lang (Matthew McConaughey) was a college football star until he trashed his knee. Now he predicts football outcomes for a 900-line. There he’s discovered by Walter Abrams (Al Pacino), who owns the biggest sports tout operation around. Lang becomes Abrams’s protege, caught up in a whirlwind of high-end gambling, and in Abrams’s marriage to Toni (Rene Russo).

This is the kind of movie that never quite makes the radar of the casual movie-goer. It has a small but strong cast, an interesting premise that’s hard to describe (as the preceding paragraph illustrates) and lacks the kind of hook that fills theater seats. I would probably never have seen it if I wasn’t in a hotel room with nothing to do but browse HBO’s offerings.

For all the whir and buzz of high-stakes gambling and hard-sell phone banks, Two for the Money is fundamentally a character study. Brandon is lost without football, and allows Walter to make him into a new person; “John Anthony, the Million Dollar Man.” Walter is a gambling addict who likens himself to an alcoholic bartender; he serves but doesn’t drink. Yet with Brandon/John, he seems to be gambling again—on his protege’s career.

Most interesting is Renee Russo as Toni, doing devoted wife as if you’ve never seen one on-screen before. She is luminous in the role; solid in her commitment to her husband, honest about his many faults, frightened of the direction he’s taking. I can’t say the movie would be worth watching without her. She’s really something.

Pacino is terrific here. He’s over the top in that patented Pacino way, but he’s playing a character; he’s definitely Pacino playing Abrams and not Pacino playing Pacino which, let’s face it, gets old. McConaughey is more of a cipher, but he’s playing a character who doesn’t really know himself.

Two for the Money meanders, and isn’t quite sure of itself. It oversells certain points, and then backs away from other points that should have been solidly nailed. Unfinished business with Brandon’s father is alluded to, but just when you think we’re moving into some satisfying family drama, the script backs away, and leaves us with Brandon’s surrogate father (Abrams) instead. That felt like a gaping hole to me. This was one example of a dot not being connected; I felt writer Dan Gilroy didn’t know the difference between hanging back for subtlety, and avoiding the issue because you don’t know how to write it. Maybe the “based on a true story” aspect inhibited him.

Despite these dissatisfactions, Two for the Money delivers strong performances, intimate, complex relationships, and interesting characters.