Starring
Laura Prepon as Karla Homolka
Misha Collins as Paul Bernardo
Laura Prepon as Karla Homolka
Misha Collins as Paul Bernardo
A few weeks back I had the movie Karla in my netflix queue. I had not read a single review of the film and had put it in my list more out of curiosity than anything else. So when it showed up on Netflix Watch Now I took it out of my queue and watched it on the computer instead.
I do know that there were many who were upset about this film being made, especially in Canada where the events took place. I only know about it because it seemed that every cable network from Court-TV to MSNBC that has at least one true crime drama show on the air, has highlighted the Karla Homolka/Paul Bernardo case at sometime or another. For those of you who missed any of these here’s a quick synopsis taken from the Official Karla Movie site:
The most notorious serial killers in the history of Canada begin their psychological dance with death and depravity as an entire country is held captive in fear. In stunningly acclaimed performances, Laura Prepon ("That 70's Show" , "Come Early Morning") and Misha Collins (TV's "24") breathe perverse life into their real life counterparts of Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka, dubbed by an anxious press, the "Ken and Barbie Killers". As the gruesome events unfold, and lovely young girls disappear, the utter lack of remorse from Paul coupled with his quirky charisma paint a delusional world of normalcy for Karla. Police frantically search for and eventually put an end to the couple's horrific killing spree, and their trial captivates the entire nation setting off waves of controversy surrounding the brutal killings. In the end, this gripping, tension-packed film will haunt you forever, to ponder the psyches of two individuals in a tragically demented relationship & because it's true.
Okay well, what did you expect? They are trying to sell you a DVD so they aren’t about to say their film sucks are they?
There are many reasons besides Priority One (Priority One in film making is to make money) to make a film about true life crimes, especially one as recent as this. You can do it to simply exploit the subject matter as much as possible knowing that a certain chunk of society will always flock in to see gore, sex, and violence. Sometimes a film like Karla will be made in order to explore the psychological makeup of the killers so that we might have a better understanding of what drove them to commit the crime (Also known as Abusive Childhood 101). At other times these real life crime dramatizations might have their own perspective which will show us that possibly an innocent person may be doing time for a crime they didn’t commit. Whether there were any such underlying reasons for Writer/Director Joel Bender to make this film we may never know as none of these things seem to apply to the finished product. It’s as if it exists in a void of it’s own and that Bender himself doesn’t really know why he made this film.
While the film has a few tense moments, for the most part they are way too few to say that this
film was made for exploitation purposes. The killings and rapes for the most part take place out of camera range although we do hear what is going on and we do see the aftermath of what occurs. And we always see how it affects Karla as if somehow Karla standing by and watching teenage girls be raped and murdered will make us sympathize with her. Yeah, right.
We already know for sure that Karla along with her boyfriend Paul are guilty, so there is really no new information regarding the crime to be brought to the screen. So you would think that Bender would at least explore the psychological makeup of the killers and why Karla would let her soon to be husband drug her sister, rape her, and then moments later watch as she dies from choking on her own vomit (Note: in the film they do try to revive her, and call an ambulance after she is dead).
For the rest of the film we are led to believe that Paul held the
death of her sister over Karla’s head, thus enabling him to have some kind of complete mind control. And just to be on the safe side, he beats on her occasionally just to make sure she’s an obedient little wife.
An interesting enough scenario I suppose, but it really tells us nothing new. In fact, instead of exploring any and all possibilities, this film ends up as nothing more than a recreation of the events as they happened in the Gospel According to Karla Homolka. And the problem as always with Karla’s story has been is that there is no explanation at all as to why she would help Paul rape her sister in the first place (It’s because I loved him so much doesn’t cut it) and Bender’s film does not even make an attempt to explain it. It’s almost as if Karla had script approval before the first camera rolled.
In the end, Bender’s decision to play so loose with the facts and to make the crimes seem somewhat less horrific than they really were works against the film. We are horrified by the events, but never feel the impact of them as we should. By the time the credits roll, it turns out that you would have been better off spending your time watching one of those true crime story recreations on MSNBC, A & E or even just reading about it on the Court TV web site.
I can’t fault Laura Prepon’s performance as Karla. The character is so thinly written that she’s really not given anything to work with other than crying when she’s beaten, crying when Paul rapes and kills, and simply looking scared the rest of the time. Misha Colli
ns does better in his meatier role as Paul which requires him to act completely deranged and psychotic part of the time, and then act like someone who might probably be deranged and psychotic the rest of the time. Give him either an Ax or steel fingers and he could star in the Freddy vs. Jason and portray both parts.
Don’t get me wrong. The film wasn’t entirely a waste of time. It was interesting to watch on about the same level as watching Forensic Files on Court TV. Well maybe not that interesting. And if you can’t be any more interesting than that I have no choice but to give you my grade which for Karla would be a very unmerciful C-.
The most notorious serial killers in the history of Canada begin their psychological dance with death and depravity as an entire country is held captive in fear. In stunningly acclaimed performances, Laura Prepon ("That 70's Show" , "Come Early Morning") and Misha Collins (TV's "24") breathe perverse life into their real life counterparts of Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka, dubbed by an anxious press, the "Ken and Barbie Killers". As the gruesome events unfold, and lovely young girls disappear, the utter lack of remorse from Paul coupled with his quirky charisma paint a delusional world of normalcy for Karla. Police frantically search for and eventually put an end to the couple's horrific killing spree, and their trial captivates the entire nation setting off waves of controversy surrounding the brutal killings. In the end, this gripping, tension-packed film will haunt you forever, to ponder the psyches of two individuals in a tragically demented relationship & because it's true.
Okay well, what did you expect? They are trying to sell you a DVD so they aren’t about to say their film sucks are they?
There are many reasons besides Priority One (Priority One in film making is to make money) to make a film about true life crimes, especially one as recent as this. You can do it to simply exploit the subject matter as much as possible knowing that a certain chunk of society will always flock in to see gore, sex, and violence. Sometimes a film like Karla will be made in order to explore the psychological makeup of the killers so that we might have a better understanding of what drove them to commit the crime (Also known as Abusive Childhood 101). At other times these real life crime dramatizations might have their own perspective which will show us that possibly an innocent person may be doing time for a crime they didn’t commit. Whether there were any such underlying reasons for Writer/Director Joel Bender to make this film we may never know as none of these things seem to apply to the finished product. It’s as if it exists in a void of it’s own and that Bender himself doesn’t really know why he made this film.While the film has a few tense moments, for the most part they are way too few to say that this
film was made for exploitation purposes. The killings and rapes for the most part take place out of camera range although we do hear what is going on and we do see the aftermath of what occurs. And we always see how it affects Karla as if somehow Karla standing by and watching teenage girls be raped and murdered will make us sympathize with her. Yeah, right.We already know for sure that Karla along with her boyfriend Paul are guilty, so there is really no new information regarding the crime to be brought to the screen. So you would think that Bender would at least explore the psychological makeup of the killers and why Karla would let her soon to be husband drug her sister, rape her, and then moments later watch as she dies from choking on her own vomit (Note: in the film they do try to revive her, and call an ambulance after she is dead).
For the rest of the film we are led to believe that Paul held the
death of her sister over Karla’s head, thus enabling him to have some kind of complete mind control. And just to be on the safe side, he beats on her occasionally just to make sure she’s an obedient little wife.An interesting enough scenario I suppose, but it really tells us nothing new. In fact, instead of exploring any and all possibilities, this film ends up as nothing more than a recreation of the events as they happened in the Gospel According to Karla Homolka. And the problem as always with Karla’s story has been is that there is no explanation at all as to why she would help Paul rape her sister in the first place (It’s because I loved him so much doesn’t cut it) and Bender’s film does not even make an attempt to explain it. It’s almost as if Karla had script approval before the first camera rolled.
In the end, Bender’s decision to play so loose with the facts and to make the crimes seem somewhat less horrific than they really were works against the film. We are horrified by the events, but never feel the impact of them as we should. By the time the credits roll, it turns out that you would have been better off spending your time watching one of those true crime story recreations on MSNBC, A & E or even just reading about it on the Court TV web site.
I can’t fault Laura Prepon’s performance as Karla. The character is so thinly written that she’s really not given anything to work with other than crying when she’s beaten, crying when Paul rapes and kills, and simply looking scared the rest of the time. Misha Colli
ns does better in his meatier role as Paul which requires him to act completely deranged and psychotic part of the time, and then act like someone who might probably be deranged and psychotic the rest of the time. Give him either an Ax or steel fingers and he could star in the Freddy vs. Jason and portray both parts.Don’t get me wrong. The film wasn’t entirely a waste of time. It was interesting to watch on about the same level as watching Forensic Files on Court TV. Well maybe not that interesting. And if you can’t be any more interesting than that I have no choice but to give you my grade which for Karla would be a very unmerciful C-.
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