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Capturing the Friedmans

Country: USA, Language: English, 107 mins

  • Director: Andrew Jarecki
  • Producer: Peter Bove; Richard Hankin

CGiii Comment

It's difficult not to think that this is where Solondz's Happiness comes from - this is far more disturbing, simply because...this is real - a real family imploding.

What makes this so special is that it reveals the ambiguity and uncertainty within litigation - especially when there is NO physical evidence.

Home movies reveal the major characters at rest & play - which gives an incredible insight.

But...Arnold Friedman was a self-confessed paedophile and a collector of child pornography.

ILLEGAL - no matter how many protestations that his sons make - rather angrily - YOUR FATHER NEEDED MEDICAL INTERVENTION - not acceptance and/or justification.

This is a deeply flawed legal system - with excessive over-charging and coercive plea bargaining

Should a bargain be offered for a guilty confession? That's how the system works...bizarre.

Will it make a difference? Sadly, no.

What a gruesome world we live in. Sad, very sad.

A fascinating film.


Trailer...

The(ir) Blurb...

In the late 1980's, the Friedmans - father and respected computer and music teacher Arnold Friedman, mother and housewife Elaine Friedman, and their three grown sons, David Friedman, Seth Friedman and Jesse Friedman - of Great Neck, Long Island, are seemingly your typical middle class American family. They all admit that the marriage was by no means close to being harmonious - Arnold and Elaine eventually got divorced - but the sons talk of their father, while also not being always there for them, as being a good man. This façade of respectability masks the fact that Arnold was buying and distributing child pornography. Following a sting operation to confirm this fact, the authorities began to investigate Arnold for sexual abuse of the minor-aged male students of his computer classes, which he held in the basement of the family home.

Cast & Characters

Arnold Friedman as Himself;
Elaine Friedman as Herself;
David Friedman as Himself;
Seth Friedman as Himself;
Jesse Friedman as Himself;
John McDermott as Himself;
Frances Galasso as Herself;
Anthony Sgeugloi as Himself;
Chuck Scarborough as Himself;
Joseph Onorato as Himself;
Judd Maltin as Himself;
Howard Friedman as Himself;
Abbey Boklan as Herself;
Ron Georgalis as Himself;
Scott Banks as Himself