Errol Morris’s 1999 documentary, coming before his Oscar winning The Fog of War, is an absorbing and visually stunning character study of a man once renowned for making capital punishment more humane but who subsequently lost everything after supporting a holocaust denier. Using his patented Interrotron camera (a device used to allow the interview subject to speak directly into the camera), a compelling score and wonderful cinematography by Robert Richardson (JFK, Nixon, Kill Bill), Errol Morris weaves Fred Leuchter’s story into such an engaging narrative that it’s hard to think of Mr. Death as a documentary and not the work of fiction. The documentary starts out as a character study of Fred Leuchter’s, an impish and awkward looking man who hits on the notion of designing better electric chairs and lethal injection machines in an attempt at easing prisoner suffering during execution, and bringing a level of “dignity” when the end does arrive. Because of his success in execution design, Fred is commission by famous revisionist historian Ernst Zundel to be a witness at his criminal case in a Toronto court. Fred accepts the job and is dispatched to Auschwitz to test the gas chambers for traces of cyanide. Morris captures the trip to Poland using home video recordings made by Fred and his wife (sent there a week after being married, it’s no wonder she later divorced him), and although he isn’t qualified to be conducting geological experiments he nevertheless submits a report stating there was a lack of sufficient evidence claiming the Nazis used gas chambers in Auschwitz for the exterminating of Jews. In the end, Fred is cast out by his peers and he loses his government job contracts, forcing him into isolation from everything he knew. You can’t help but feel sorry for him; even though he denies that the gas chambers existed, he is not an anti-Semite but a sad and pathetic man who found acceptance in a holocaust denier. Errol Morris re-creates certain events (much like he did in The Thin Blue Line) using slow motion, high key lighting, and a gorgeous soundtrack to accent key moments, elevating Mr. Death from the standard made-for-television documentary into a highly accessible experience that is entertaining, thought provoking and ultimately a visually stunning account reminiscent of a classic Greek tragedy play.
Richard Saad
© Cinephile Magazine, 2006