Swoon

Right from the beginning it is clear that this film is very different.  As characters pan across the screen, the viewer is unsure what to make of the film's opening.  Who are these people?  What is their relationship to one another?  The slave ideology we have seen so many times is then addressed.  Here parallels can be drawn to other films, and more obviously, to the news articles.  The actors then walk away and a movie set becomes visible.  This moment plays with the idea that life, gender, and sexuality are performances.  I am still unsure what to make of this scene.  Once again, broken glass plays a role in the film.  Leopold and Loeb become carefree as they wander about causing destruction.  The most important element at work is their relationship.  While other mediums skirted around the issue of their sexuality, this film directly confronts it.  They are as close as two people can be when they put rings on each others fingers.  What do we make of this representation?  Are we happy to see a different portrayal, or is it better to keep their true relationship covert?

The two boys continuously bicker like a married couple as the film continues.  An interesting element is the emergence of images central to the Leopold and Loeb story.  We watch them type out the ransom note.  What is the effect of this?  How do we interpret seeing the story in such a literal sense?  This is the first time the viewer sees what actually happened acted out.  Other films were less tied to the story, but this one is directly reliant on exactly what happened.  The two boy's names are used and their lives are detailed quite accurately.  Another scene I struggled with is the one where people were playing cards.  It is notable that they two boys are dressed in street clothes as opposed to women's clothing, but I am unsure how to understand this moment.  Likewise, the studying of German is hard to place and contemplate.

The idea of slave and master is also confronted directly.  Imagery accompanies this, making it that much more powerful. The most chilling scene is the one where the crime is actually committed.  It is one thing to read about it, and entirely another to see it happen.  What emerges here is just how random it was and the fact that Loeb appears to be in the power position.  When the boys pour acid on the body we do not actually see it.  What is the effect of this?  Why is the body not shown in this moment?  The destruction of the typewriter is also important to consider.  We can see that the boys probably did not think they would ever get caught, but at some level, they felt deeply suspicious.  I was also intrigued by the scene in the court room.  It is so different than what we see in Compulsion.  Here there is less dialogue and emotion, and the scene is more reliant on music.  Seeing the boys be handcuffed and fingerprinted was powerful.  They are truly painted as criminals and seeing it is once again more powerful than merely hearing about it.

Once in prison, the film takes a tonal shift.  It becomes much more chilling and melancholy.  The scene that describes the boys based on their physical features is almost creepy.  They become a set of criminals in a world of crime, undecipherable from all of the other killers out there.  The murder scene is terrifying.  While we do not see any of the actual violence, the portrayal is quite powerful.  Seeing Loeb's body on the floor elicits a surprising emotional response.  Instead of feeling he got what he deserved, I felt sad for him.  He emerges not as a criminal, but as a human being whose life was cut short.  This scene allows us to make claims about the boy's character.  Leopold is heard screaming out in his cell because he is in so much emotional pain.  We can tell here how much they loved and adored each other.  Lastly, what are we to make of the ending?  We see Leopold embrace Judaism even though he once renounced it.  He seems to be an entirely different person.  The end of the film is a straight telling of his life after jail.  It starkly contrasts that which came before.  Leopold crying eventually shifts into him lacking emotion as he speaks on TV.  What do we make of the ending?  Do we feel something is missing?