Michael James Brody Jr.’s legacy is not widely known today, in part because it’s so tough to parse. In 1970, the shaggy-haired 21-year-old heir to the Jelke oleomargarine fortune publicly declared his intention to give away his millions to anyone who asked, inviting a flood of letters and impassioned pleas from around the country. Three years later, he was dead by his own hand.
Brody was a hippie millionaire devoted to saving the world, but he was also a mentally ill drug addict with a Messiah complex. That conflict remains a messy tangle of questions 50 years later, but director Keith Maitland’s enlightening documentary “Dear Mr. Brody” works through the paradox, suggesting that the tragedy of Brody’s fate is matched by the window into the American dream catalyzed by his offer.
Brody’s story has many layers, and Maitland sometimes struggles to unite the disparate pieces. The heir...
Brody was a hippie millionaire devoted to saving the world, but he was also a mentally ill drug addict with a Messiah complex. That conflict remains a messy tangle of questions 50 years later, but director Keith Maitland’s enlightening documentary “Dear Mr. Brody” works through the paradox, suggesting that the tragedy of Brody’s fate is matched by the window into the American dream catalyzed by his offer.
Brody’s story has many layers, and Maitland sometimes struggles to unite the disparate pieces. The heir...
- 9/1/2020
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
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