Brother's Keeper (1992)

User Rating:

7.7/10   

Directors:

Joe Berlinger
Bruce Sinofsky

Release Date:

9 September 1992 (USA)

Genre:

Documentary

Plot:

This documentary by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky details the murder trial of Delbert Ward. Delbert...

Plot Keywords:

Murder | Brother | Rural | Trial | Tractor

Awards:

5 wins & 1 nomination

Cast

Connie Chung	...	Herself
John Teeple
Delbert Ward	...	Himself
Lyman Ward	...	Himself
Roscoe Ward	...	Himself

Runtime:

104 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Australia:M | USA:Not Rated

Filming Locations:

Munnsville, New York, USA

Company:

American Playhouse

Movie Connections:

References "Matlock" (1986)

Munnsville Horror

This incursion into the private lives of rural people that turn public by exposition in the media had an eerie effect on me. It was a subjective reaction to a real story that has nothing sinister about it, but I was deeply distressed and somehow frightened by the realization of how some people still live isolated from the world, and in unhealthy conditions, while at the same time being in touch with a community that finds them eccentric but is ignorant of their dysfunctionality. The disturbing story of the four Ward brothers, farmers who lived like hermits in a shack until old age, is material for a Gothic novel or a psychological thriller. When one brother dies in 1990, and his younger brother Delbert is arrested for murder, the "Munnsville horror" begins, manipulated by the media while the community defends the accused. For their opera prima, directors Berlinger and Sinofsky spent more than a year with the case. The result was highly rewarding.