Kemper (2008)

I grew up in Santa Cruz when Kemper was doing his terrible work, and so I have some familiarity with the gory details of this story. I mean, I never researched it but one picks things up from local news and talk around town. And without giving anything away, you can be sure that NOTHING in this movie is based on anything that happened in real life. In fact, I'm almost certain that they took an existing serial killer screen play and did a search and replace, swapping out "Mike Killington" with "Ed Kemper."The locations don't look like Santa Cruz. The characters don't talk like humans. The cars are incorrect cars. The cel phones are... wait THERE WERE NO CEL PHONES IN THE EARLY SEVENTIES. Seriously, if there was any detail that could have been authentic, they found a way to make the exact opposite choice. It's kind of a marvel to see a movie with literally no correct decisions behind it. How does a thing like that happen? Even if you never heard of Kemper you can appreciate this as a bad movie on its own terms. The acting is wooden and one-dimensional, the music is mostly synths, everyone is too pretty, the plot twists are like straight road through the midwest on a high-visibility day. I guess what I'm saying is, if you have the attention span for stuff like this, it's the best time you'll ever have.

Kemper is set in Santa Cruz in California where two female murder victims are found within the space of a few hours, detective Tom Harris (Christopher Stapleton) is on the case & because of the different kill pattern he feels that two separate killers are on the loose. Harris seeks the help of his gifted friend Ed Kemper (Robert Sisko) who has helped catch serial killers in the past by creating a profile, sure enough Kemper's clues lead Harris to one of the killers but in a ironic twist it turns out that Kemper the man helping to catch serial killers is actually one himself & after he murders his abusive mother (Patricia Place) detective Harris has to hunt down & bring his one time friend to justice. Kemper regularly phones Harris & plays a cat & mouse game with him as he tries to make Harris understand why he became a serial killer...Also known as Kemper: The Co-Ed Killer this was directed by Rick Bitzelberger & according to the opening credits is supposedly 'Based on True Events' although while there was indeed a serial killer called Ed Kemper (Edmund Kemper in reality & not Edward Kemper as he is called here) who killed several hitchhiking teenage girls in the late 60's & early 70's almost everything about this film & it's script is fabricated & a work of pure fiction. To be frank Kemper isn't even a reworking of the facts, there is nothing here in Kemper that relates to reality other than a guy whose last name is Kemper & kills a few people. The script invents this relationship between Kemper & a detective named Harris, while the twist that the man helping Harris to catch serial killers is in fact a serial killer himself we know that from the outset, we know Kemper is a killer so when the twist is revealed about a third of the way in it comes as absolutely no surprise whatsoever. While the cat & mouse relationship between Harris the hunter & Kemper the hunted as he teases & taunts Harris is a slightly different take on the usual serial killer thriller it only carries the film so far, eventually it just becomes a little boring as nothing else really happens. The pace is alright, at just under 90 minutes Kemper is watchable & alright for what it is but it's nothing to write home about & ultimately forgettable.While the real Kemper was active in the late 60's & early 70's the makers probably couldn't afford a period piece & as such features mobile phones, new cars & is contemporary. The retro diner was probably a little reference to the actual period Kemper killed during but otherwise even the backdrop isn't right. There's a bit of gore, there are a couple of gory slit throats with a cop having his throat sliced open with some wire, a couple of decapitated heads including one in an oven (at least Kemper had the decency not to turn the oven on...) & a few dead bloody bodies. Reasonably well made Kemper looks decent enough, it looks like a polished television film rather than a full blown theatrical release though.The production values are alright, it's quite well made without being anything special. The acting is alright, but again without being anything special.Kemper is a decent enough time waster, a serial killer thriller based on true events that don't resemble those events in the slightest. Not the worse serial killer thriller out there but far from the best either.

Only for the most desperate true-crime buff, this TV movie-quality dramatization is about serial killer Ed Kemper and one certain cop's bond with him and his pursuit of him. Lame acting, worse dialogue (written by a former soft-core porn screenwriter), plot holes aplenty, and lackadaisical direction and editing. Many scenes are wide angle master-shots with no real framing, as the actors just meander on screen and recite their lines of dialogue. The plot is not very fact based considering it claims to be inspired by true events, it deviates from the facts of the case almost from square one. It seems like the screenwriters were not even familiar with the case when they wrote the screenplay. An interesting movie could have been made out of the story, but they did just about everything wrong here. And I did not know that people had laptop computers and cell phones with text messaging and photos in the 1970s?

Maybe it was my mood, maybe I was drawn in by the "based on a true story" lure, but I found this film peculiarly entertaining. I don't know how accurate it is as to the facts, but we do know there was this strange killer. The problem with the facts has to do with the description of Ed Kemper being a serial killer of the sixties and seventies, yet we're seeing newer cars and cell phones. Maybe I'm just obtuse, but when TV shows like the new "Life On Mars" are more accurately portraying a time period I have to wonder. Still, I was sucked in by the presentation and the story enough to watch it until the end. It's not that gory and it does rely heavily on character, it might be too mild for those seeking a real creep-out.