Just Melvin, Just Evil, 2000

During my first attempt at this documentary I made it through about forty minutes, finally too uncomfortable with the sleazy sort of free for all of social misfits, most of whom appeared to be semi-literate. Their living conditions were appalling, filthy and unsavory like the family in “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” or “Deliverance.” I knew of course that the documentary was about incest, but I had imagined that it would be a complicated and wrenching story about a family’s long and difficult journey to enlightenment and justice: that it would consider incest as a social problem and offer some kind of coherent reaction to this atrocity. Instead, the documentary presented a family of visibly unwell, both physically and mentally, forty or fifty-something people, accusing not only the bizarre lunatic patriarch of the family of incest, but also each other. Furthermore, the only male in the large group (besides the ludicrous, cud-chewing Melvin) asked two of his half sisters to marry him, and then expounded on why he thought that there was nothing wrong with loving your sisters. The documentary played into every sad stereotype about small towns wherein everyone is related to everyone else, presenting us with a freak show rather than a serious consideration of this very serious issue. This is why I initially refused to continue watching – I felt exploited, I felt like a voyeur.

I could not imagine what to make out of this documentary that first time around. But I eventually returned because I wanted to see how the director finally set the material up as a social critique. Where would the fault lie? With society? I should have known better. The director, who during the documentary pretends that his purpose was to bring Melvin to justice or see him dead and help his family heal, intersperses the odd carnevalesque family scenes with clips of himself taking part in a series of be-sequined tv dancing contests, he and his partner flying through the air in back handsprings. We even saw a video of his wedding, with his bride back flipping her way down the aisle. If people don’t get us, the director notes defensively, that’s okay.

No, it's not really okay if people don't get you. The documentary is supposed to be about incest. We didn't tune in to form an opinion on the director’s wedding – who cares? So, one assumes, the comment applies to the family in general – the film is supposed to be about them, after all. And if the director doesn't care if we get them, why does he want us to watch them?

More fundamental, in addition to being asked to rely upon this wannabe tv entertainer for a serious exposé on incest, we are asked to believe that the charges being flung around by the family members are true, without any evidence whatsoever. As a viewer I have no reason either to believe or disbelieve that these wildly gesticulating very large people were the victims of the grotesque Melvin. Why not? But, on the other hand, why should I believe it? Much later in the film we learn that Melvin was in fact convicted of incest and served eight years (which raises the question of why the director wanted to bring Melvin to justice when society had already exacted its justice – did he think that Melvin should have served longer? If so, he doesn’t tell us that). So it appears that the incest story must have been true. But a murder charge is also flung about, without a shred of evidence. The children claim to have witnessed Melvin pound a nurse on the head with an andiron. But why was the case never brought to trial if a group of about eight witnesses saw the old bugger beating a woman to death in the living room? The film is filled with frustrating innuendo and no conclusions, no guidance as to what we are meant to understand.

Most frustrating of all, we are told that one of the many sisters, fed up with forced sex with Melvin, turned him in to the police. The police showed up, questioned everyone, went to their school, questioned, questioned, and the children all denied the charges. The police, therefore, had no case. Many years later, several of the girls corroborated the story, and this time he was flung in the slammer. But what are we meant to understand? Is this a critique of the police? If so, how? Should they have pressed forward without any witnesses? If so, the director does not tell us this.

Truly disturbing are the accusations of one of the sisters, this one with terribly deformed legs (we are shown many detailed pictures of the problem), accusing the now wheel-chair bound Melvin of recently having paid her a dollar to have sex with him. This is clearly a fantasy, given that Melvin is immobile. Or, if it is true, why did she comply? It isn’t as if he could have forced her. Once again, what are we to understand? Equally stomach turning is the shot of the group of large middle-aged women visiting Melvin in his rest home. They dash down the hall, squealing with excitement to see him. And these are the women upon whom he perpetrating decades of sexual abuse? Why are they visiting him, telling him how good it is to see him?

Bizarre showcase for the handspringing director, this documentary does a disservice to efforts to bring incest to the light of day. Without any context for understanding the visible instability of this family – are they insane because of the incest, or did they cook up the incest because they are insane – we cannot reasonably be expected to separate truth from fantasy.