The Batlord

Just watched Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer for the first time and it was about what I'd thought it would be. It was a combination of a true crime dramatization and horror movie, except it was really about what true crime dramatizations are about. Nobody watches true crime for information, they watch them to vicariously experience the worst of humanity to justify some unseemly desire to see the worst of our race. True crime dramatizations are exploitation for the masses with the appearance of being informational so that the viewers can pretend that's not what they wanted in the first place, but for the sake of respectability they refuse to look like anything other than a documentary so you never quite get that feeling that they honestly are going for. You're being masturbated without being allowed to ***.

Except this is a real movie with surreal depictions of murder and horribleness and it's upfront about it so you know you're being touched, but the confrontational nature of the exploitation doesn't jerk you off either. It just looks you in the eye while it molests you so you feel dirty and empty just like how a true crime documentary does while doing what they do to the logical conclusion so that you feel like you're watching something you shouldn't be watching, cause tbh you shouldn't be watching any of this. I respect that and feel exactly how I should feel and if I weren't already in a mood to read about serial killers I might try to rationalize it somehow, but why do that when I think I've gotten what I should have gotten and feel like the dregs of society?

So I'm gonna drink more and read more about bad people and feel hollow and think about how this whole experience reflects on me as a person. Good movie.

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