Sons of Sam - A Man and a City's Descent into Madness
In just the last twelve months alone, Netflix has been churning out one true crime documentary after another. Documentaries like Night Stalker, American Murder, Murder to Mercy, Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel, Murder Among the Mormons, and The Three Deaths of Marisela Escobedo have given lovers of the macabre-but-true hours of factoids and interviews to drool over. On May 5th, Netflix added Sons of Sam: A Descent Into Darkness.
Sons of Sam: A Descent Into Darkness follows the 38 year long obsession by journalist Maury Terry with the famous Son of Sam case. In 1976 and 1977, New York City was terrorized by a series of eight shooting attacks which left six dead and seven others severely wounded. Taunting letters were left for the police and sent to the newspapers taking credit for these crimes signed by “The Son of Sam”. In August of 1977, the police arrested 24 year old David Berkowitz for these murders. He openly confessed to committing these attacks at his arrest, during subsequent interrogations, while being psychologically evaluated, and at his arraignment. He said he was told to commit the murders by a demon speaking through the barking of his neighbor’s dog. Both the demon and the owner of the dog were named “Sam”. Having confessed, Berkowitz was sentenced to six consecutive life sentences which - now at the age of 67 - he is still serving.
The documentary Sons of Sam is broken into four parts. The first part focuses on the crimes, the manhunt to find the Son of Sam, and the effect these murders had on the city. The documentary expertly utilizes televised news clips of the era to help modern audiences grasp how New York was paralyzed by a single gunman. I was born in New York in the 1970’s. I was a toddler at the time of the killings, but years later I remember adults speaking about the time when the Son of Sam was thought to be lurking about the city looking for his next victim. It was easy to hear the sense of panic, outrage, and bewilderment which gripped them. Watching the first episode, I found myself transported back to those conversations.
The first episode closes with the arrest of Berkowitz and introduces Maury Terry who becomes the primary protagonist of the documentary. Episodes two and three largely revolve around Terry’s investigation into the Son of Sam case. His obsession started with the fact that he lived and grew up in the same town as Berkowitz. What really hooked him, however, was certain inconsistencies he noticed in the story presented by the police, eye witnesses, and Berkowitz himself. This caused Terry to start investigating, reaching out and communicating with nearly everyone Berkowitz ever spoke to, and even interviewing Berkowitz himself on several occasions.
Terry initially developed a theory of the case which involved multiple shooters. This theory is not as odd as it might seem. While an extreme minority view, it has been voiced over the years by several police officers, investigators, attorneys, and even several victims and witnesses. As the decades roll on, Terry explores more and more leads, and his theory of the case eventually evolves into a sprawling hypothesis about a nation wide Satanic cult orchestrating the killings as a form of human sacrifice. Terry eventually writes a best selling book about his theory which is released just in time for the mid-1980’s “satanic panic” to set in and dominate the media. Terry becomes swept up in this, hoping to use the wave of interest to gain more information and put forward his case to find “the real killers”. Ironically, it’s this association with the “satanic panic” that provides him with the notoriety to get a small group of volunteers to help him follow down new leads, but also damages his credibility.
By the end of the fourth episode, it is clear that the entire focus of the documentary has shifted at some point. Somewhere along the line, it stops being a film about the Son of Sam killings and one particular theory of “what really happened”. Instead, it becomes a story about Maury Terry. He is the one who experiences the “descent into darkness” which is in the film’s subtitle. He never finds the final proof he needs for his theory to become undeniable. In the end, he ruins his marriage, loses countless friends, and ultimately drinks and chain-smokes himself to death in the quest to prove his theory is true.
This shift in focus has the effect of making the documentary lopsided. It forces viewers to question the source of the theories we’ve just dedicated the last four hours of our life to, rather than evaluate his evidence on its own merits. Or, at the very least, it makes me wonder if it could have been an episode or two shorter if we had only been given the facts of his theory, instead of wondering out loud if Terry might have actually been the conspiracy nut so many accused him of being.
This is especially awkward because many of Terry’s initial suspicions are genuinely fascinating, insightful, and quite possibly true. He uncovers several insightful flaws in the official account of the murders. This is especially true of his early work on the idea that there were multiple shooters. He brilliantly exposes time frame discrepancies and undeniable incongruities in eyewitness descriptions. Even as he slowly develops his Satanic conspiracy theory, there is no question that he uncovers far more about Berkowitz and his associations than the police ever did. Terry may have been obsessed, but he was also clearly very talented.
After all his cards are laid on the table, it's clear Terry’s theory has the fatal flaw of many conspiracy theories. He has great difficulty clearly separating “verifiable”, “probable”, “likely”, and merely “possible”. The documentary’s presentation also plays fast and loose with these categories as well, trying to make the best case possible for Terry’s sprawling Satanic cult theory. Once again, this would have been more effective if the movie did not then go on a tangent regarding Terry’s personal life and arguably neurotic obsession.
On the whole, Sons of Sam is worth watching. Netflix has definitely put out stronger true crime documentaries over the past year. Yet, even though the wrap-up is awkward, the journey there is fascinating. The Son of Sam killings are almost as interesting as the Zodiac. Berkowitz is one of the most compelling mass murderers of the era. Also, Terry’s Satanic conspiracy grows to encompass everything from child porn, to Charles Manson, to the ‘60s counter culture. And who doesn’t like a good conspiracy theory?! Episode 4 is called “Rabbit Hole” and that is exactly what you go down in this series. If that’s your bag, you will still have a great time.
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