TIME October 23, 2017
Time OffReviews
that’s just strategy, albeit an edgy one. But when he confronts
his colleagues about their reading of Manson as a figure from
a morality play—“That’s a little bit Old Testament, don’t you
think? Good, evil, black, white.. .”—they revolt.
This tension, even more so than its subject matter, is what
makesMindhunter feel perfectly timed. Crime drama can, at
its worst, revel in the grossest sort of spectatorship. Shows
like CBS’sCriminal Minds, or ones that trade on the names of
real-life murderers, can all too easily slip into gratuitousness
for its own sake. (That program’s star, Mandy Patinkin, quit
after two seasons over its content.) But at its best, the genre
tries to understand the roots of crime by investigating some of
humanity’s most vexing paradoxes.Mindhunter, curious and
thoughtful, is an example of the latter.
Based on the fascinating memoir of FBI profiler John
Douglas,Mindhunter carries you through one naïf ’s journey into
darkness. Ford, like any ambitious young thing, is bolder than he
is wise. That mix of traits serves him well as he travels across the
U.S. researching criminal minds. Groff, who played a lovelorn
game designer lost in the sprawling San Francisco gay scene on
HBO’sLooking, brings to this show the same questing spirit.
He’s aided by the direction of David Fincher, whose ornately
nasty visual style gave the early seasons ofHouse of Cards their
poisoned-truffle savor.
House of Cards is defined, though, by its haute allure—its
characters stride the corridors of power and do so in made-to-
measure suits.Mindhunter is baggier and more appealing. Ford
and his partner Bill Tench (Holt McCallany) exist in a state of
disempowerment. One wittily shot sequence cuts between all
the bits of sustenance and transport they rely on as they traverse
the country seeking killers to interview, from diner coffee to
Alka-Seltzer to Trans World Airlines flights.
Like any institution, the FBI has its own inertia: “Psychology
is for backroom boys,” Ford is told by a higher-up. “It’s frowned
upon.” His fighting back against this diktat hel k the
character more than just a passive interrogator e
can root for, both to override his superiors and n
through. No one would call Kemper, the man F s
about his crimes early on, a sympathetic figure g d
female hitchhikers. But Ford listens to him wit -
ment. When Kemper suggests he be lobotomiz s
not such a bad thing—Ford reacts with horror. a
hugely valuable resource.
If all TV cops were this curious about the wo d
them, there’d be no such thing as a crime proce.
After all, what makesLaw & Order so repeatable
is the fact that the procedure doesn’t change.
Cops and criminals all have a part to play.
Mindhunter is engaged with the process of
law enforcement, but a procedural it isn’t.
Instead, it examines how crime is fought
to ask what it is we really want cops to do
for us. This is no bleeding-heart show—
it’s on the side of law enforcement and
incarceration. ButMindhunter’s underlying
belief, that the enemy ought to be respected
and known, feels almost radical.
MINDHUNTER is streaming on Netflix now
David Fincher, 55, has made a career of
delving into abnormal minds, withSeven,
Fight Club, Zodiac, The Girl With the
Dragon Tattooand Gone Girl. But he says
his newest project,Mindhunter, on Netflix,
is something else. He discussed the show’s
genesis and the true-crime boom with TIME.TIME: Why this show?
Fincher: I was fascinated by the notion
that at some point, [J. Edgar] Hoover’s
creation—this monolithic, bureaucratic
organization—had to say, “There are
things going on that we just can’t properly
articulate and don’t understand. How do
we protect the innocent until we look at
how it all works?” And even if it started in
the basement, even if it started in a way as
the kind of voodoo department, they did it.
I also thought it was intriguing that, in
order to truly understand one’s enemy, one
had to develop even for short periods of
time—even if they were faking it—empathy
for people who heretofore would have been
beneath our contempt. They had to figure
out how to have human conversations with
those who are subhuman.Th h ts up a shift from explainable
vated by jealousy or greed
t y senseless violence. Do
hat shift actually took place,
BI just start paying more
the senseless crimes?
murder and psychosexual
s d existed for forever. In Eastern
mythology of the vampire or
f is probably a by-product
f nd of behavior. A mutilated
y found in the forest had to
b attributed to something.
We’ve allowed it to become the
mythology of horror, but that
activity probably had more to
do with sadism than it does
with lycanthropy.How closely does the show
a here to real life?
A ot of the interviews with
s al killers were taken verbatim.
T Kemper interviews, theQ&A
The true purpose
of true crime
By Eliana DocktermanTREND-
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TheK▽ FINCHER: MARIUS BUGGE; MINDHUNTER: MERRICK MORTON—NETFLIX; SEVEN: PETER SOREL—NEW LINE/KOBAL/
REX/SHUTTERSTOCK; ZODIAC: MERRICK MORTON—PARAMOUNT/WARNER BROS./KOBAL/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK