An American Crime

Don’t look in the basement: Ellen Page and Catherine Keener in An American Crime, currently airing on pay cable’s Showtime.

Guardian Gertie gladly accepts the $20
weekly fee from the Likens as they continue on the carny circuit, but
troubles loom when the checks start coming late and she’s too
cash-strapped to make ends meet—which means Gertie applies a leather
strap to the Likens girls as punishment. Domestic matters get worse
when oldest teen daughter Paula Baniszewski (Ari Graynor) gets knocked
up by a married man, with back-and-forth gossiping incorrectly blaming
Sylvia as the source. Alas, the scenes involving basement whippings and
Coke-bottle violations are just a prelude to the cavalcade of horrors
that await the imprisoned Sylvia, with much of the inhumane treatment
actually dished out by Sylvia’s peers.

Director Tommy O’Haver, previously known for lighter fare such as Ella Enchanted and Get Over It, always resists the temptation to go into Mommie Dearest
territory. His script, co-written with Irene Turner, shows the roots of
child abuse and the psychological effects of covering up these crimes,
which of course made the revelations of the Sylvia Likens story so much
more shocking back in 1965. There is something of a fantasy sequence
toward the end involving getaways and family reunions that might fake
out some viewers, although those who recall what really happened in
that Indianapolis household will surely treat Sylvia’s occasional
voice-over narration as a beyond-the-grave flourish similar to William
Holden’s dead gigolo relating the flashbacks for Sunset Boulevard.

Keener holds her end of this movie’s
Faustian bargain with her intense characterization: Her Gertie has a
slovenly sense of desperation during scenes with her much-younger
ex-lover Andy (Spider-Man’s James Franco), yet she manages to
elicit a queasy empathy even when her unbalanced Gertie goes to violent
extremes. In contrast, Page shares the grueling effects of Sylvia’s
psychological and physical destruction with the viewer, in a
tough-to-witness performance that was reportedly shot in sequence. 

O’Haver also coaxes natural turns from the film’s many youthful players, with two standouts: Evan Peters (Phil of the Future)
as a bespectacled neighbor kid with a crush on Sylvia, although that
doesn’t stop him from collaborating in the abuses, and Tristan Jarred’s
chilling work as the 13-year-old Johnny Baniszewski, a budding sadist
who encouraged schoolyard accomplices to use Sylvia’s body as an ash
tray. (“It’s OK,” says Johnny’s sisters. “Mama said you can.”) A
postscript reveals that Johnny Baniszewski became the youngest inmate
at the Indiana State Reformatory.

Pay cable’s Showtime, which has dibs on broadcasts of An American Crime
(the network oddly premiered the film over the Mother’s Day weekend),
continues its showings on Thursday, May 15, 11 p.m., and Tuesday, May
20, 8:15 p.m. The Showtime Too channel airs it on Friday, May 16, and
Wednesday, May 21, 8:15 p.m., while Showtime Showcase has a run on
Sunday, May 18, 8 p.m., and Showtime’s On Demand option offers anytime
service. (Full disclosure: Showtime’s advance screener was only
available in a full-screen version, with O’Haver’s widescreen
compositions receiving the ping-pong, pan-and-scan treatment. First
Look will issue a letterboxed DVD on Aug. 19.)