Cheap Criminals (DVD) (Criminals, Joseph Strick) Price

This unusual documentary consists mostly of criminals talking openly and apparently honestly about their crimes. The film begins by showing hapless smalltime miscreants, such as a dimwitted woman who talks about how she had enough experience "prostituting" not to have gotten picked up in a police sting operation. Most of the interview subjects are unapologetic, and things become disturbing as muggers talk about their violent rampages and how the feelings of their victims simply never entered their minds. The point is made that crime permeates society, and in a brief break from interviews, surveillance tapes are shown of church elders stealing thousands of dollars while counting money taken in collection plates, and airport baggage handlers rifling through luggage. As the interview material continues, the crimes being confessed become increasingly more serious, and the proceedings take on a much darker tone. A videotaped jailhouse interrogation with an obscenely defiant rapist is a startling and sickening look at someone who can only be described as pathological. In a later segment, the lack of emotion shown by a murderer is equally disturbing. As a relatively unfiltered look at how criminals see themselves, their victims, and their crimes, this is a fascinating, though often troubling piece of work. --Robert J. McNamara

ACTORS:	Criminals, Joseph Strick
CATEGORY:	DVD
THEATRICAL RELEASE DATE:	01 January, 1995
MANUFACTURER:	Image Entertainment
MPAA RATING:	NR (Not Rated)
FEATURES:	Color
TYPE:	Documentary
MEDIA:	DVD
# OF MEDIA:	1
UPC:	014381951721