Honourable Mention: The Gray Man

The Gray Man was a 2007 film that was directed by Scott L. Flynn and was based on real life serial killer Albert Fish (birth name Hamilton Howard Fish). The reason it is a suitable subject for TMtV is that Fish was known as the Brooklyn Vampire – another case where the moniker vampire was given to a real-life killer, though another name he was given was the Werewolf of Wysteria. Along with the Gray Man, vampire was one of several nicknames he was given but he did claim, as well as being a cannibal, that he specifically drank the blood of victim Billy Gaffney. It has to be noted that he claimed this with his attorney but Gaffney’s mother was not convinced that Fish was actually the killer. This crime does not feature within the film, in the most it concentrates (crime wise) on the abduction and murder of Grace Budd – the crime for which he was convicted and executed.

Patrick Bauchau as Fish

So the film starts in an orphanage and boys being beaten around the backside with a paddle, one being the junior Fish. It cuts to him as an older man (Patrick Bauchau, Kindred: the Embraced, Blood Ties & Vampires; The Turning) flagellating himself with a whip – he can see his younger self in the room with him. He begins to narrate – speaking of a memory of boys torturing a horse by setting its tail alight and likening himself to the horse, burning with passion.

Silas Weir Mitchell as Albert Jr

Albert Fish Jr (Silas Weir Mitchell, Grimm) turns up at a building and asks landlady Mrs Karlson (Heather Surdukan) about his father. She lets him into the room he rents. He is looking through mail as his father gets home and it is clear there is little love lost (later it seems he is fond of all his children except Albert Jr, and this is likely because he went to live with his mother when she left Fish). In the sequence we see him give Jr raw meat to eat (he eats his portion raw also). We can only guess that it was human flesh. Fish has a hankering to take Karlson’s son to the pictures but she is wary of him. This leads to him being evicted after writing her an abusive letter.

Jack Conley as King

With a noir style voice-over, we meet Dt. Will King (Jack Conley, also Kindred; The Embraced, Angel & Buffy the Vampire Slayer). He has had a chequered past as a policeman (details aren’t really forthcoming) but has been put back on the force in the Missing Persons bureau. He is a proponent of new techniques such as finger-printing and, we discover, tenacious to the point of making himself ill. He eventually gets the Budd case.

Grace's final moments

Of course, we see the abduction prior to that, Fish using grifting techniques to ingratiate himself quickly into the Budd family. What we don’t actually see is anything too graphic. The film shies away from anything that might be described as horror, and actually fails to build the tension that perhaps the story needed to cement it as a (true) crime thriller. It’s a shame as the performances are solid – especially Bauchau. It is interesting that his performance brought to my mind Anthony Hopkin’s performance as Hannibal Lector – that most famous of fictional cannibals. It was perhaps in the cadence he used and the delivery he offered. Fish’s tendency to send obscene letters is explored but he was also purported to be a rapist, which is not explored, with a string of sexual fetishes that are not deeply touched on.

I need to touch on the DVD edition I watched. This was the Dutch release and the transfer, it has to be said, is poor. The resolution is low and thus the film pixilates a lot – this of course detracts from the experience.

The imdb page is here.

On DVD @ Amazon US

On DVD @ Amazon UK