Criminal Adaptations

Alejandro Monteverde’s Sound of Freedom (2023) is an action-thriller featuring Jim Caviezel as Tim Ballard, a former government agent who embarks on a dangerous mission in Columbia to rescue children from sex trafficking. The film sparked significant controversy, some of which involved QAnon conspiracies and questions about if Ballard is who he claims to be. Is the film 75-80% accurate as the director has claimed? Listen now to find out.

Primary Sources:
Vice 1
Vice 2
Vice 3
Vice 4
Vice 5
Foreign Policy
The Nation
Salt Lake Tribune
The Atlantic
Slate

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Michael Ritchie’s The Positively True Adventures of the Alleged Texas Cheerleader-Murdering Mom (1993) takes a satirical look at one of the wildest true crime stories you’ve never heard of. Wanda Holloway (played by Holly Hunter) would do anything to help her 13-year-old daughter make the cheerleading squad, even if meant putting a hit on the competition. Listen  now to hear how one of the FIRST original HBO movies depicted  this stranger than fiction case.

Primary Sources:
McDonald Maier, Anne. Mother Love, Deadly Love. Carol Publishing Group, 1992.
Texas Monthly
The Crime Wire

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Sid Vicious, best known as the bassist for the Sex Pistols, was arrested and charged with the murder of his girlfriend, Nancy Spungen, on October 12, 1978. The couple’s toxic relationship and drug addiction was the source of Alex Cox’s 1986 film, Sid and Nancy. Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb received high praise for their portrayal of the punk rock couple. Does the film deserve its recognition as one of the best rock biopics of all time? Listen now to find out.

Primary Source:
Parker, Alan. Sid Vicious: No One is Innocent. Orion Books, 2007.

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To outside observers, the Baekeland family seemed to have it all. Brooks and Barbara were an attractive, social, and incredibly wealthy couple who  traveled the world with their intelligent son, Antony “Tony” Baekeland. After the couple separated in 1968, the relationship between Barbara and Tony grew volatile, dependent, and even incestuous…culminating in Tony committing matricide 1972. In 2007, Tom Kalin tapped Julianne Moore and up-and-coming Eddie Redmayne to portray the Baekeland’s in the indie film Savage Grace. Listen now to learn how accurately these two Academy Award winning actors portrayed the dysfunctional relationship that inspired the film.

Primary Sources:
Robins, Natalie & Aronson, Steven. Savage Grace: The True Story of Obsession and Murder Among America’s Very, Very Rich. Dell Publishing Company, 1985.
Bustle

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In October 1997, small-town North Carolina resident, David Ghantt, executed one of the largest heists in American history by stealing $17 million from his employer Loomis Fargo, an armored-car company. He passed the money to his co-conspirators and fled the country, eagerly awaiting his third of the cash and love interest, Kelly Campbell, to join him. The series of missteps resulting in their capture was the source of Jared Hess’s Masterminds (2016), featuring an all-star cast of Zach Galifianakis, Owen Wilson, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon, Leslie Jones, and Jason Sudeikis. What was fictionalized for this wild ride of a comedy? Listen now to find out.

Primary Sources:
Diamant, Jeff. Heist: The Oddball Crew Behind the $17 Million Loomis Fargo Theft. Sourcebooks, 2002.
Carolina Coast Online

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The Reign of Terror spanned 1921 to 1925, during which William Hale and his nephew, Ernest Burkhart, orchestrated the deaths of more than two dozen Osage, including the family of Burkhart’s wife, Mollie Kyle. Martin Scorsese, with the help of Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, Lily Gladstone, and Jesse Plemons, depicted these murders in the Academy Award nominated film, Killers of the Flower Moon (2023). Did Scorsese deviate from the actual events and David Grann’s nonfiction novel of the same name? Was there a larger plot against Osage Nation than what the FBI led us to believe? Listen now to find out.

Primary Source:
Grann, David. Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI. Doubleday, 2017.

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Walter Keane was one of the most in-demand artists in the 1960s. His portraits of children with saucer-sized eyes could be found in galleries across the world, on advertisements nailed to telephone poles, and on lithographs in department store bargain bins. While Walter was partying with the rich and famous, Margaret Keane, his wife and true creator of Big Eye paintings, was restricted to their basement studio creating new art for Walter to take credit for. Tim Burton, with the help of Amy Adams and Christoph Waltz, connected with Margaret’s story and brought it to the big screen in Big Eyes (2014).

Primary Sources:
Parfrey, Adam & Nelson, Cletus. Citizen Keane: The Big Lies Behind Big Eyes. Feral House, 2014.
Keane Eyes Gallery

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 New Episodes of Criminal Adaptations season 3 are coming June 17th !

Join our hosts Remi, who spent over a decade working in the film and television industry in Los Angeles, California, and  Ashley,  a clinical psychologist and forensic evaluator in Oregon as they continue discussing some of your favorite movies, and the true crimes stories that inspired them. 

 Coming soon!

Music: John Bartmann https://johnbartmann.com

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In the conclusion of our two-part season finale, Al Capone is sent to prison after being convicted of tax evasion. After he’s released from Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary, his brain and body fail him due to neurosyphilis. Listen now to find out how accurately Josh Trank, with the help of Tom Hardy, depicted the final year before the gangster’s death in the 2020 film, Capone.

Primary Source:
Kobler, John. Capone: The Life and World of Al Capone. Hachette Books, 1992.

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Notorious gangland kingpin Al Capone was at the height of his career supplying illegal liquor and beer during Prohibition. Thanks to his ruthless tactics and deep pockets, he essentially controlled Chicago through payoffs given to the city’s highest rank politicians and police force. Fed up with widespread crime, federal agent Eliot Ness put together a small group tasked with finally bringing “Scarface” to justice and putting an end to his reign of terror. Brian De Palma’s The Untouchables (1987) is based on the team who achieved their goal in less than three years, and features a star-studded cast which includes Kevin Costner, Robert De Niro, and Sean Connery. In addition to discussing the true story that inspired De Palma’s film, we will talk about how Capone rode to power, earning his reputation as the most infamous gangster in America.

Primary Sources:

Kobler, John. Capone: The Life and World of Al Capone. Hachette Books, 1992.
Ness, Eliot and Fraley, Oscar. The Untouchables. Award Books, 1957.
Vanity Fair
Medium

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