One of the all-time great true crime documentary filmmakers is back at it with Chaos: The Manson Murders (now on Netflix). Errol Morris’ 1988 classic The Thin Blue Line famously exonerated a man wrongly accused for murder, and now he aims his sharply honed curiosity and journalistic acumen at the Charles Manson saga, an old story made new again thanks to writer Tom O’Neill’s obsessive examination of the topic in his 2019 book CHAOS: Charles Manson, the CIA and the Secret History of the Sixties. For the film, Morris leans heavily on interviews with O’Neill, who scrutinizes the widely held theory that Manson orchestrated the many murders his “family” committed in order to start a race war, a notion popularized by Manson trial prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi’s 1974 bestselling book Helter Skelter. In short: O’Neill thinks the story is more complicated than that, but does he come to a satisfying conclusion? Will the Manson saga ever reach a “satisfying” conclusion? Morris has his doubts.

The Gist: You likely know the story. In the late 1960s, Charles Manson amassed a cult of followers who he psychologically manipulated by isolating them, taking their belongings, giving them mass quantities of psychedelic drugs and preaching crazy ideologies to them. They were colloquially known as the Manson Family, and they seemingly would do his bidding – the phrase that’s been lost to time a bit is “mind control.” In 1969, members of the Family broke into the home of actress Sharon Tate, murdering her and her friends Jay Sebring, Abigail Folger, Wojciech Frykowski and Steven Parent. The following night, they killed grocery store exec Leno LaBianca and his wife Rosemary. Messages were scrawled in blood on the victims’ walls. The motives were hazy at best. Everyone got caught. Everyone was convicted. Everyone went to prison. And Manson became a true American boogeyman whose wild-eyed mugshot lives in infamy.

The commonly held narrative of hows and whys came via Bugliosi’s Helter Skelter, which outlined Manson’s methods and motives – Bugliosi asserts that Manson’s obsession over the Beatles’ White Album and a desire to incite a race war fueled the murder spree. The theory worked to convict the suspects, Helter Skelter sold a ton of copies and became a movie, and for the most part, the saga was laid to rest. O’Neill, however, doesn’t buy it; he spent years poking holes in Bugliosi’s theory, submitting FOIAs and conducting interviews in search of a more complete story. He asserts that Bugliosi suppressed documentation, was selective with the facts he shared publicly and was motivated to become rich selling books and movie rights, all at the expense of the truth.

So what did O’Neill turn up? A possible (probable?) connection between Manson and a former CIA “mind control” expert, and the involvement of Beach Boys drummer Dennis Wilson and record producer Terry Melcher, who rejected wannabe songwriter Manson’s recording project – Melcher used to live in the house where Tate was murdered, so a botched-revenge motive seems plausible. The “CIA and Beach Boys” narrative seems pretty wild and has some far-fetched implications that O’Neill doesn’t fully believe in, and Morris just as wisely greets some of those claims with raised-eyebrow skepticism. The filmmaker fills out the film narrative with commentary by Manson trial prosecutor Stephen Kay and living Manson Family member Bobby Beausoleil (via phone from prison), and archival footage of interviews with Manson and Family members (many via Diane Sawyer and Geraldo Rivera). In the end, no conclusions are definitive – but they’re far more compelling than the tried-and-true account of Manson-related crimes and tragedies. 

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: About 1,000 other true-crime documentaries (most on Netflix) that suck because they lack Morris’ rigor and distinctive style. (Time to rewatch The Thin Blue Line, Gates of Heaven and Fast, Cheap and Out of Control, for sure.) Also Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.

Performance Worth Watching: Kudos to O’Neill for not coming off as a conspiracy wacko, and to Morris for treating him with equal parts respect and skepticism.

Memorable Dialogue: O’Neill drops the thesis statement: “Frankly, I still don’t know what happened. But I know that what we were told isn’t what happened.”

Sex and Skin: None.

Our Take: A touch of background on O’Neill: He’s a smart guy with a background in serious journalism who got sucked into one of the 20th century’s most grimly fascinating rabbit holes. Before publishing his book, he worked with Morris on a documentary that was abandoned and resurrected, and I’d confidently assert that the filmmaker is too smart to indulge the wild theories of a true-crime hobbyist. That gives Chaos: The Manson Murders a significant credibility boost despite its occasional conspiratorial claims. O’Neill’s transparency is wise, and his uncertainty reflects the nature of truth itself, and the failings of modern criminal investigations – his open admission that he’s been unable to tie together a number of threads in the Manson Family saga is precisely why he titled his book CHAOS (and Beausoleil underscores that point with an Occam’s Razor argument that Manson was far too disorganized to accomplish any notable ideological goals).

So of course the doc is a fascinating watch – has Morris ever made one that isn’t rich, detailed and quietly idiosyncratic? (He’s one of the best to ever do it, if not the best.) He’s smart enough to avoid binaries and work in the margins, where the truth so very often dwells, so he aligns ideologically with O’Neill’s inability to piece together a complete narrative of decades-old events, the majority of whose principals are dead. O’Neill’s most compelling conclusion lies in the subtext of Bugliosi’s story, which he labels as “managed and manipulated”: The increasingly dubious “race war” theory underscores a politically conservative message that was an anti-hippie, anti-drugs, anti-protest and essentially anti-antiestablishment message. A message tied to government institutions like the CIA and FBI? Possibly, but who knows for sure? Either way, that sure seems like a form of “mind control” on America’s youth. Chew on that irony.

Our Call: Another fascinating Morris doc. Ignore the bland, generic Netflix-ass title and STREAM IT.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.