The much anticipated ‘Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile’ (otherwise known as the Ted Bundy Zac Efron movie) premiered on Netflix on May 3. The movie runs just under two hours, which is more than enough Ted Bundy a person should experience in a day. While the movie was riveting at points and had me gasp in shock during a few scenes, I was slightly disappointed with the film overall.
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The movie is told from a different perspective than most would originally expect prior to seeing it. It mainly follows Liz Kloepfer (Lily Collins) and her struggle living her life watching Ted Bundy’s (Zac Efron) criminal trials and eventual execution after falling in love and creating a life with him. She suffers psychologically from Ted Bundy- while he brutally murdered numerous women across the United States, he killed Liz in a different way.
But, the movie falls short in some aspects. For example, the crimes Bundy committed were barely mentioned, and not at all depicted on screen. I’m not asking for blood and gore, but for people who are going into this movie with no prior knowledge about Ted Bundy, it’s easy to get lost.
One win for this movie? The casting. Seeing Zac Efron’s cinematic transformation over the years from super-star Troy Bolton to serial killer Ted Bundy took some time to get used to, but the director couldn’t have cast a better actor for the role. Efron portrayed Bundy’s charisma so well- which is the underlying point to the Bundy case. So many people couldn’t believe that he killed so many women because he was a charming and handsome guy who didn’t fit the stereotypical description of a killer. While watching the movie, I wanted to like Ted Bundy because Zac Efron perfectly captured his personality- the personality that lured so many young women into their deaths.
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For anyone looking for a more historical insight to the psychotic, almost unbelievable acts of Ted Bundy, I highly recommend ‘Conversations with a Killer: the Ted Bundy Tapes,’ which is also on Netflix. The four-episode series gives more back story on Bundy’s life and goes in depth into his crimes, trials, escapes from prison, and eventual death. It gives you everything you never knew you needed to know about Ted Bundy.
Word of advice? Don’t binge watch them alone at night.