He Describes A 1950s Life Of Crime & Why He Did It.

This is a very unusual 16mm film from the 1950s that attempts to be a documentary. In some ways I believe it is. From what I can tell, the man speaking behind the mask is not an actor. This is a clip from a a police training video made in the state of Michigan to help police officers deal with lifelong criminals and understand them more deeply.

Reading the credits at the end of the film, the criminal is not credited. The film is part of my archive which has thousands of films from the 1950s that I collected over the course of my life.

Although somewhat 1950 styles formal in the way the criminal is interviewed, I find this man and the story he tells and the way he tells it, fascinating. There is something hauntingly real about how he describes his family, his upbringing, his attitude towards the crimes that he committed, what the film describes as "the criminal mind." The interviewer who was a well-known police officer from that time is just asking frank questions spoken with no emotion–we call it flat. The subject is also responding with no emotion. But those of you watching this who weren't around at that time should know that this piece of film was considered outrageously real for its time.

I do not believe that I have seen a recently produced documentary that explains, as bluntly as this one, a life of crime and what might have caused someone to become a criminal, breaking the law as consistently and as coolly as this gentleman did.

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Thank you
David Hoffman filmmaker