Unbeknownst fact, the serial killer nicknamed the Boston Strangler was identified thanks to the hard work of two journalists, played here by Keira Knightley and Carrie Coon.
The Boston Strangler, a no-screen film produced by Ridley Scott and shown on Disney+, mixes journalistic research and social commentary.
In fact, in the 1960s, journalists Loretta McLaughlin (Keira Knightley) and Jean Cole (Carrie Coon) worked for American Record. But back then, women were relegated to unimportant news. When Loretta McLaughlin begins to realize that the women murdered in Boston are likely to be murdered by the same killer, she asks her editor Jack MacLaine (Chris Cooper) to cover the story, and he also hires his colleague Jean Cole (Carrie Coon).
The story of the Boston Strangler, serial killer responsible for the murder of 15 women in the Massachusetts capital, was the subject of a film back in 1968 starring Henry Fonda as the cop and Tony Curtis as the Albert DeSalvo killer. But what’s new about this Boston Strangler, written and directed by Matt Ruskin, is the fact that the script focuses on the two reporters in charge of the historical stories and the investigation. In fact, without their work and the pressure it put on the authorities at the time, the killer would never have been discovered.
Despite this perspective, similar to works like The Post, Spotlight: Special Edition (2016 Best Picture Oscar winner) and more recently She Said About the Weinstein Affair starring Carey Mulligan and Zoe Kazan, The Boston Strangler rarely goes beyond his subject out. While the woman’s role is explored through the two journalists’ difficulties in conducting their research and her role as wife and mother, the film fails to reflect on the subject more broadly. So we appreciate the informative side – how many women fell out of the dustbin of history with that? – without looking any further.
- Rating: 3 out of 5
- The Boston Strangler will be broadcast on the Disney+ platform from March 17th.