MR. DEATH: THE RISE AND FALL OF FRED A. LEUCHTER JR. — **** — Documentary on execution expert Fred A. Leuchter Jr.; featuring interviews with Leuchter, Robert Jan van Pelt, Ernst Zundel and others; in color and black and white; rated PG-13 (vulgarity, animal cruelty); exclusively at the Tower Theatre.
As long as there are people like Fred Leuchter in the world, documentary filmmakers like Errol Morris will never run short of inspiration.
Not that such a thing is likely to happen anyway — and no one else is making documentaries quite as well as Morris these days.
After all, this is the same man who has made extremely entertaining films about a pet cemetery ("Gates of Heaven") and disabled genius Stephen Hawking ("A Brief History of Time") and managed to tie together four very different sets of interviews in one terrific package ("Fast, Cheap and Out of Control").
But his latest, "Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter Jr." may be his most accomplished work to date. It's certainly his most difficult one, at least in terms of the material. And it may be the most controversial that he's ever attempted.
As hard as parts of it are to watch, though, the film is also riveting and thought-provoking — in a way that recalls "The Thin Blue Line," the 1988 film that is generally regarded as Morris' best.
"Mr. Death" profiles Leuchter, a so-called "death engineer" from Massachusetts who has designed a number of "humane" execution devices for penitentiaries throughout the United States.
(In one of the movie's more telling and ironic moments, Leuchter, a proponent of capital punishment, says he doesn't support "capital torture," trying to justify his peculiar choice of careers.)
However, Leuchter also became notorious for his "expert" testimony during the 1988 trial of Toronto Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel, in which he claimed that his investigations proved that gassings did not occur in the Auschwitz death camp.
Though Morris does spend some time debunking Leuchter's claims (by using Leuchter's own investigators, no less), the film still manages to be a balanced portrait of this most peculiar subject.
For instance, Morris shows Leuchter in some of his most human moments — even taking time to touch on his odd childhood, as well as his unsuccessful marriage to a waitress (which was clearly doomed when Leuchter took his new bride on a honeymoon — to Poland for an Auschwitz excavation!).
Morris also makes good use of Caleb Simpson's alternately creepy and goofy score, as well as his trademark re-creation scenes (the presence of which explains why his films continue to be disqualified for Academy Award consideration).
"Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter Jr." is rated PG-13 for graphic descriptions of execution, including some vulgar talk, as well as a scene of animal cruelty (footage from a short film by Thomas Edison). Running time: 91 minutes.
You can reach Jeff Vice by e-mail at jeff@desnews.com