Synopsis
An experimental documentary film that uses archival footage, interviews, and fictionalised scenarios to tell the story of the people around Jeffrey Dahmer during the summer of his arrest in 1991.
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Cast
- Andrew SwantJeffrey Dahmer
- Pamela BassSelf - Jeffrey Dahmer's Neighbour
- Jeffrey JentzenSelf - Medical Examiner
- Pat KennedySelf - Detective
- 83
Entertainment Weekly
The Jeffrey Dahmer Files is for hardcore Dahmer obsessives only. - 80
Los Angeles Times
Far from closing the case, The Jeffrey Dahmer Files opens up a whole new perspective, acknowledging the banal and the baffling. - 75
Slant Magazine
Teasing out a subversive portrait of a complex and rather subdued monster, The Jeffrey Dahmer Files unfolds with the same meticulousness exemplified by the eponymous serial killer. - 75
San Francisco Chronicle
In the end, the filmmakers don't reveal a lot of new insights into Dahmer's character, or answer questions about how all these murders went unnoticed before Dahmer was apprehended. In some ways, we are left to fill in the blanks - and that can be a queasy experience. - 70
The New York Times
If the film’s spare re-enactments are a little awkward, they also smartly repurpose Dahmer’s studied reserve into a meditation on perversion as hypnotic as it is repulsive. - 60
Village Voice
Thompson assembles his footage with an expert's touch, but what his film lacks is its own perspective on these atrocities. - 60
New Orleans Times-Picayune
One gets the feeling that Thompson left a lot on the table with The Jeffrey Dahmer Files, that it could have been something more, something bigger, something elaborate. And that may be true. But the film that Thompson did choose to make - one that is both simple but effective -- is fascinating in its own right. - 58
The Playlist
Quite frankly, The Jeffrey Dahmer Files would have been better if it had a little more meat on its bones.