Netflix has released a new Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile trailer. The new movie from Joe Berlinger (Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes) looks at the crimes of Ted Bundy (Zac Efron) from the perspective of his longtime girlfriend Liz (Lily Collins).
I caught the film at Sundance and felt that Berlinger had fallen into a bit of a trap in trying to capture Bundy. In looking at his subject, he missed all his victims and saw the same seductive sociopath the rest of the world saw, so there’s not a lot of new insight even though Efron gives a riveting performance. The movie is at its strongest when it looks at the story from Liz’s POV and how the guilt weighed on her for not knowing that the man she loved was a murderer. Unfortunately, the film gets bogged down on Bundy’s courtroom and jailhouse antics while refusing to directly look at his atrocities.
Check out the Extremly Wicked, Shocking Evil and Vile trailer below. Click here for Steve Weintraub’s interview with Berlinger and the cast, and click here for Adam Chitwood’s review. The film hits Netflix and select theaters on May 3rd, and also stars Kaya Scodelario, Jeffrey Donovan, Angela Sarafyan, Dylan Baker, Brian Geraghty, Terry Kinney, Haley Joel Osment, James Hetfield Grace, Victoria Cox, Jim Parsons, and John Malkovich.
Here’s the official synopsis for Extremely Wicked, Shocking Evil and Vile:
A chronicle of the crimes of Ted Bundy from the perspective of Liz, his longtime girlfriend, who refused to believe the truth about him for years. Directed by Academy Award®-nominated filmmaker Joe Berlinger and starring Zac Efron, Lily Collins, Kaya Scodelario, Jeffrey Donovan, Angela Sarafyan, Dylan Baker, Brian Geraghty, Terry Kinney, Haley Joel Osment, James Hetfield, Grace Victoria Cox with Jim Parsons and John Malkovich. Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile launches on Netflix May 3, 2019.