Figuring the Puzzle of Two Killers Blue Caprice’ Explores the Relationship of the Men Behind the Beltway Sniper attacks by Focusing on the Pieces: Steve Dollar see note please
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323392204579071631070452274.html?mod=WSJ_LifeStyle_Lifestyle_5
Father figure? More like Imam and new convert. John Muhammad converted to Islam in 1987. Malvo wrote rants about Jihad and Allah while in prison. Several exhibits produced in the trial disclosed pictures of Bin Laden, a White House in cross hairs, Quotes from the Koran and the words Jihad….I wonder if this movie will mention those uncomfortable truths…..rsk
The Beltway sniper attacks in 2002 claimed 10 lives in the Washington, D.C., area, but “Blue Caprice,” a movie based on those events that opened Friday, avoids a blood-spattered retelling.
Instead, director Alexandre Moors chose to explore an elemental aspect of the case: the quasi-paternal relationship between John A. Muhammad, who was executed for the shootings, and the younger Lee Boyd Malvo, now serving a life sentence.
“I was attracted to the father-son dynamic at its core,” said Mr. Moors, who is 41 years old and lives in Fort Greene. “Once you knew that, it was obvious to focus on this.”
The movie, which stars Isaiah Washington as Muhammad and Tequan Richmond as Malvo, treats its subject matter in bleak fashion, shaped by a visual style that the first-time filmmaker honed while producing videos for Kanye West and Jennifer Lopez.
In “Blue Caprice” (the title riffs on the car used in the attacks), Mr. Washington, consumed with rage and paranoia, teaches the boy how to be a killer, manipulating his need for a father figure. As Malvo, Mr. Richmond masters his sharpshooting skills under a regime of physical and emotional abuse mixed with parental approval.
“They are quite a unique pair of criminals,” said Mr. Moors. “I felt this would be a great metaphor to talk about the culture of violence in this country.”
With his screenwriter, Ronnie Porto, Mr. Moors visited the crime scenes and pored over trial documents and medical records to construct an idea of who the men were and what they did.
“Yet there were a lot of gaps in what people knew and what really happened,” Mr. Moors said. “It was interesting to work with these ellipses and those missing clues. From the beginning, we envisioned the script as a puzzle with missing parts. I like that the structure of the film mimics that.”
Mr. Washington, whose career suffered after he was dropped from ABC’s “Grey’s Anatomy” in 2007, has been praised for his performance as Muhammad. Mr. Moors pursued him for the role for months. A fan of his work on Mr. West’s video “Runaway,” Mr. Washington said he accepted the offer based on Mr. Moors’s reputation, as well as his persistence.
“He never wavered in that I was the one and only guy for the movie,” Mr. Washington said. He recalled Mr. Moors handing him a copy of Dostoyevsky’s “Notes From Underground,” a key to the movie’s brooding mind-set. The director also asked him one question, Mr. Washington said: “What does a coward look like?”
“That was the mustard seed,” said the actor, who described the production as “a fast, intense and painful journey. I had to surrender to him and deal with the spontaneity of the script.”
Mr. Moors was impressed by his lead’s work in movies like Spike Lee’s “Clockers” and Clint Eastwood’s “True Crime.”
“In both, he played someone accused of crime and managed for the entire film to navigate this gray line, this ambiguity. You never know if the guy is innocent or guilty. There were all these shades and subtleties,” Mr. Moors said, expressing a desire for audiences to see Muhammad as a fatally flawed human, not a clichéd serial killer. “I thought Isaiah would be able to go into this territory and deliver this performance. He’s a monster. I mean that in the good way.”
The director, who shot much of the film in Staten Island, preferred to leave some parts of the story similarly mysterious. Mr. Moors never made an effort to contact Malvo, now 28.
“I didn’t want the film to be a biography of a criminal,” he said. “It was important to keep a certain distance, not only from the criminals but also from the victims. It’s not a documentary. It’s my interpretation of the facts.”
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