The Great Acting Blog: “Mindboggling – Tony Curtis in The Boston Strangler”

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Synopsis

Tony Curtis plays Albert DeSalvo, who is picked up by the cops on a breaking and entering charge, but when the judge rules Albert is not of his right mind, he is institutionalised where psychiatrists diagnose him with a multiple personality disorder. Chief Detective John S Bottomly (played by Henry Fonda) discovers him there, and all the signs are that Albert is infact the perpetrator of the 13 murders Bottomly has so far failed to solve. Bottomly wants to interrogate Albert,  to prove conclusively that he is the murderer, and put him behind bars. Trouble is, Albert’s disorder means that he has literally two totally separate people enclosed within his one body – the vulnerable, simple,honest, blue collar family man, and the cold, serial killer, with each taking it in turns to use the body. Albert the family man has no knowledge or  rememberance of the murders, and further, his survival depends on his absolute certainty of his innocence. If he is interrogated, the doctors say, and Albert the family man is forced to acknowledge Albert the strangler, then this may “just push him over the edge”, and keep him institutionalised for the rest of his life, probably catatonic. Bottomly decides that this would be the next best thing to putting Albert behind bars, and sets up a series of interviews with him, to get to the truth.

Flashbacks

During the interviews, Curtis begins to explain what he was doing on the day of each of the murders, and here the film employs flashback, to show us what Curtis is telling us. Curtis’ false memories are innocent, however, they are gradually invaded by the true memories of the murders; on one occasion he hears a disembodied scream while his memory tells him he’s at work, on another, he thinks he was building a dolls house for his daughter but this is intercut with a strangled corpse. So these flashbacks become a mish-mash of what Curtis thinks he remembers happening, and what actually happened (ie – the murders). Scene by scene, Fonda pushes harder with his questioning, and Curtis digs deeper within himself to arrive at the truth.

Acting Technique

Of course, there are the plastic elements which aid Curtis’ perfromance; the false nose, the brown contact lenses, the distinctive, working-class, Boston accent (more recently employed in Scorsese’s Departed). Then the directorial conceit of using flashback does a lot of the heavy lifting for Curtis – he need only show us intense concentration, and the visuals will do the rest. However, Curtis’ performance really becomes very special in the final scene, when he at last comes face to face with who he really is. The memories of past murder begin to flood Curtis’ mind, dominating  the false, innocent memories. However, the film, at this point, eshcews the use of flashback, and the whole thing is expressed through Curtis’ performance. At the first flash of realisation, Curtis whimpers and leaps out of his chair, moving to the wall and leaning his whole body against it, as if to prevent himself from falling into an abyss. Then, he walks  while still leaning against the wall, and feeling his way across it with his hands, as though blindfolded. There is a moment when Curtis makes one last attempt to deny the truth; he clenches his hands to his head, as though trying to refuse the memories entry to his mind, repressing them. However, all this effort is to no avail, as Curtis is finally consumed by his muderous past, and begins to relive it, re-enacting each murder, the victims are invisible this time of course.

The miracle of Curtis’ performance here, is that by using his body, he reveals the inside of his mind.

 

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