Review of Capturing the Friedmans (2003) by Fredrick S — 11 Nov 2011

The eighties was the decade of hysteria: 70% of American adults believed in Satanic ritual abuse, Michelle Remembers, a now-discredited account of a girl's repressed memories of being abused by a Virginia Satanic cult, was released, and a media frenzy surrounded the McMartin school abuse trial; where daycare workers were wrongfully accused of abusing its kids.

These events helped fan the flames of a moral panic. Imagine being accused of pedophilia in this social climate. In Great Neck, Long Island - on Thanksgiving Eve of 1987 - a police arrested Arnold Friedman, a Peter Pan-like patriarch & prize-winning computer sciences teacher, and his 18-year-old son, Jesse, for sexually molesting young boys.

Jailed immediately - bail set at $1.5 million for Arnold and Jesse - the media and Nassau County community went to lunch on them. Capturing the Friedmans is a miracle of pure access; the Friedmans videotaped their lives, even the ugly parts.

We are privy to footage of the back-room proceedings of the legal trial and the slow destruction of this once close-knit family. With Rashomonlike scope, Capturing the Friedmans masterfully combs through different perspectives and testimonies: it is revealed that Arnold may have molested a family friend's son, but that most of the boys were also coerced by the police into implicating the family.

The issue of whether these boys were molested in the Friedman home is clouded. Lost in the frenzy, is young Jesse Friedman. It appears that he may have been innocent - and possibly molested by his own father.

This is heartbreaking work; but the ending is joyous. At the end of the film, you finally realize what the film is trying to say: with the elusiveness of truth and frailty of memories, family love is the most important thing to have in a bad situation; even if that love is misguided, blind, or forever tainted.