Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile

By: Ashlee Dell’Arciprete

It’s 2019 and from “Making A Murderer” to “Mindhunter” for some reason America has become obsessed with serial killers. One of the most notorious serial killers, Ted Bundy, has been a prominent topic of discussion after documentary filmmaker Joe Berlinger’s Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes was released on Netflix. The memoir by Bundy’s former long-time girlfriend, Elizabeth Kendall, inspired a screenplay by Michael Werwie and led to Berlinger signing on to direct and produce Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile, which held its New York premiere at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival after originally premiering at Sundance in January of this year. From the moment the first trailer was released, the film was accused of glorifying Bundy, but how does it hold up?

Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and VIle is a crime thriller biopic that is told from the perspective of Elizabeth “Liz” Kendall (Lily Collins). Liz, a single mother, meets Ted Bundy (Zac Efron) at a bar and they begin dating while Ted helps her care for her young daughter, Molly. After a while into their relationship (around six years later to be precise) reports surface of multiple young women who have disappeared and were found murdered. When Liz realizes the composite sketch looks like Ted she calls in a tip to the police, which isn’t revealed until later. With the bodies located Ted is arrested and charged in multiple states. He is then able to escape from custody as the film goes on. A simple Google search will tell you the outcome of Bundy’s crimes, but the main course of the trial is portrayed. Throughout most of it Liz still believes Ted’s innocence murder after murder and those close to her, Joanna (Angela Sarafyn) and Jerry (Haley Joel Osmet), try to convince her against Bundy’s persistent charm and guiltless behavior. Once she finally catches on they end things and he begins instead seeing an old friend, Carol Anne Boone (Kaya Scodelario), who stays by his side until the end and is even impregnated by Bundy.

The film quickly jumps into the start of the crimes, all while showing zero crimes that Bundy committed or even a shred of violence until the film’s conclusion. This was a crafted decision by Berlinger to avoid glorifying Bundy. What this created; however, was the attempted portrayal of Bundy as a sadistic serial killer, without showing him as one, and almost even making you question if all of those crimes were actually committed by the man in question This is not due to Zac Efron’s portrayal; however, as he does a great job in this role and succeeds in his charm that Bundy was known for. Lily Collins is also amazing in her role. From speaking with Lily at the Tribeca Film Festival premiere, her admiration and care for portraying Liz as a single mother, who really had to grapple with coming to terms with truth about the person you love, shows on-screen and off.

Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes was released 30 years to the day of when Bundy was executed on January 24, 1989 for the 1978 murder of Kimberly Leach. Berlinger even interviewed Bundy on death row in Florida, so one would think that this film would aim to go deeper than Bundy’s Wikipedia page. The Extremely Wicked director is probably the Bundy expert by now and yet there is still an afterthought that begs for the film to have gone deeper – perhaps, why it was that both Liz and Carol Anne Boone stayed with Bundy with such a burning devotion despite his many charges and believing in his innocence for an absurd amount of time. While Berlinger’s direction is solid, some details were in the wrong places or left out altogether which led to tonal shifts that did not lend well to the film.

The film’s title, Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile (while a mouthful) comes from the way in which the judge presiding over the case described the vicious crimes of Bundy while sentencing him to the death penalty. As a narrative feature, it works greater compared to other serial killer narratives recently released, like Charlie Says. At least with this film, the best scenes are when the star is actually in the frame. We would recommend, however, to watch the Ted Bundy tapes before watching the film, as some details to the cases are unbelievably hard to believe whether or not they’re true. While it has good intentions of not attempting to glorify Bundy by omitting any actual murdering, Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile begs to have gone deeper into the why.

Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile held its New York Premiere at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival and is now streaming on Netflix.