The Central Park Five

Studio: IFC Films / Sundance Selects
Directed by Ken Burns, Sarah Burns, and David McMahon

Nov 23, 2012 By John Oursler Web Exclusive

One of the more anticipated documentaries of this season is The Central Park Five, an investigation on the wrongful conviction of five African-American and Hispanic youths for the rape and assault on a Caucasian jogger in Central Park in 1989. Helmed by Ken Burns, Sarah Burns, and David McMahon, the film utilizes footage from newspaper and television coverage of the time, as well as the original taped “confessions” of the boys, later deemed coerced and wrongfully procured, to draw both an ethnographic study of a NYC at the height of racial tensions and a damning expose on the protectionist tendencies of government institutions.

At the time, the case of the “central park jogger” made headlines around the world. Racially charged coverage of the story deemed the youths “wolves” with a tendency for traveling in “packs,” preying upon innocent white bystanders who represented their economic oppression. Burns et al. begin an intensive search for the facts of the case and relay their findings in a clear and logical way. Footage of the accused as children is interspersed with interviews of them as adult males. Unsurprisingly, not one member of NYPD , or of the city’s litigators on the case, agreed to participate in the documentary. More than ten years after the boys were wrongfully imprisoned the real perpetrator confessed to the crime with such detail that the case was re-opened and all charges eventually dropped from the original five.

The film does a good job at showcasing a staggering flaw in the legal system, as well as those housed therein with a thirst for power. But despite the dynamic subject matter the film remains rather staid, which becomes somewhat of a disservice to its content. The emotional payoff of the men and their families never comes through the way it should, making this an exercise in filmmaking rather than storytelling.

Reviews