An average movie

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this movie but, since it did sound like an interesting story and since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out. Wel, making a movie about Ted Kaczynski AKA the Unabomber did sound like a great idea so the damned thing definitely really had some potential, it’s just too bad that the end-result didn’t end up to be so great after all. The first mistake they made was that the running time (barely 100 mins) was just too short to satisfyingly cover this story. I mean, the time period going from his time in Harvard at the end of the 50’s to his arrest in the mid-90’s was quite extensive so something more epic like ‘Zodiac’ which lasted 1 hour longer would have been probably more appropriate. Another mistake they made was to put so much focus on Henry Murray’s psychological experiment on Kaczynski. Indeed, they basically argued that it might have had a decisive impact on the young man but it was never convincing. Eventually, it seemed to be more like an excuse to show Kaczynski was a precocious young man in Harvard who didn’t fit in but the connection with his future terrorist activities was just too fine after all. The only interesting thing happening between Murray and Kaczynski was Murray diagnosing him of schizophrenia which seemed to be fairly accurate following what was displayed in this movie. However, in real life, even though it made sense following his actions, this diagnosis would be disputed by some after all. The reality was that Kaczynski was actually a brilliant man, even more intelligent than your average super-smart serial killer but, somehow, at some point, his intelligence (and his alleged mental issues) made him turned against humanity or, at the very least, our capitalist way of life which was something super interesting but so poorly developed in this movie. Concerning the FBI investigation taking place in the 90’s, well, I’m afraid it was also rather half-baked. Indeed, I always had a weak spot for Shailene Woodley but she wasn’t given much to do here and, to be honest, she wasn’t really impressive. Obviously, the way she chased on her own Kaczynski never happened and it was pretty obvious that he had been reported by his brother at some point. In this case, it would been more interesting to focus to what had been done by the FBI during the previous 20 years following the first bombing. At least, Jacob Tremblay gave here a really strong performance but he was probably the only thing that really worked in this movie after all. Anyway, because the topic was so fascinating, I still think it was worth a look though. 

6/10