Poorly made and dishonest

Rating: 4/10 (3 May 2005)

Having taken a slight interest in the story of Aileen Wuornos, I was appalled by "Monster" because it does no justice to her story. To be fair, Charlize Theron gives a good performance as Wuornos, but after seeing Nick Broomfield's "The Selling of a Serial Killer" (1992) I realized just how biased and dishonest the film adaptation "Monster" is.
Patty Jenkins does have a clear agenda to push which is this: Aileen wasn't a bad person, it was men that made her that way because she was abused by them. It's true, yes, but that doesn't negate what she did -- she still murdered innocent people and "Monster" really tries to gloss over some of this.
Second of all, my big problem with the film is that it spends so much unnecessary time on the relationship between Aileen and her lover, played by Christina Ricci. It's true, they were involved together, but the movie stops midway to focus on the trials and tribulations -- trying to add depth to the characters -- and fails (or at least it did for me) because I soon lost interest in the "love story." In fact this is yet another case of the film glossing over events -- most of the stuff involving the two in this movie is completely made up.
I would have preferred a less biased viewpoint on the matter. Although Broomfield's documentary is also very biased (on Channel 4 he even provided a post-chapter where he explains Aileen was just troubled and not aware of what she was doing) it is far more truthful to Aileen's story.
Her story is a true American tragedy and to see it glossed over by Hollywood like this, added on top of lies and a biased agenda, is really a shame.
A lot of people are going to disagree with me on this but I can't hide my dislike for "Monster" and the disappointment I suffered after seeing it.