Documentary Review

For this assignment, I watched the Netflix special The Ted Bundy Tapes. I chose this because I heard some other students talking about it earlier in the week. I have always been somewhat fascinated with true crime stories. The formatting was interesting, as the story was partially being told through taped conversations with Bundy himself. The documentary flowed very well, with the use of a film strip rewinding and fast forwarding to show the jumps in time as the story was being told. It handled the subject matter carefully, but did not shy away from the more difficult aspects of Bundy’s trial and crimes. They used b-roll footage from interviews and images from back in the 70s from the time that he was active and during his trial. Clips of the interviewees faces were kept short, with b-roll being inserted over the audio for most of the stories and explanations. It chronicled Bundy’s crimes and eventual demise, while concurrently telling the story of a young reporter who cracked the killer to get him to speak on his crimes for the first time. The repeated visual of shots of the victims and a map pinned with where he committed crimes were very moving, albeit uncomfortable, especially when watching while home alone at night like I happened to be. Every interview had a distinct, interesting background, each an interesting shot that was generally framed following the rule of thirds. Every interviewee was well lit, the use of key lights apparent. The use of Bundy’s tapes as frequent audio descriptions of the events that unfolded was haunting and effective. I would highly recommend this 4 part docu-series.