CRAZY LOVE / Dan Klores (2007)

June 18th, 2007 by Scott Marks

Crazy Love (2007)

Directed by: Dan Klores, Fisher Stevens
Written by: Dan Klores
Cast: Burt Pugach, Linda Pugach
Aspect Ratio: 1.85 : 1
Running Time: 92 min.
Genres: Documentary

Rating:

It is not a pretty picture: Close-up interviews, newspaper clippings and fuzzy TV newscasts are director Dan Klores’ main modes of visual expression.

Normally repugnant, these “techniques” are cinematic beauty marks compared to the pair of toxic good-for-nothings whose gripping romance this documentary chronicles.

At a time when the average American was making $4,000 a year, lawyer Burt Pugach’s (pronounced “Poo-gosh”) was pulling down eighty grand. His practice afforded Burt a nightclub, luxury automobiles and even his own private airplane to pilot.

While the money continued to roll in, Burt Pugach was strictly small potatoes. He chased ambulances by day and the closest his night club came to star power was The Jolson Story’s Keefe Brasselle and the forgettable DeMarco Sisters.

In spite of all this (and a face that instantly brings Arnold Stang to mind), this cat was 1957’s Bachelor of the Year. Knowing what a great catch he was, the already married Pugach used his money and power to proposition every broad that passed his way.

On Rosh Hoshana, 1957, Burt, good Jew that he is, was breaking God’s law by tooling around in his Caddy. From the moment Burt first eyed Linda Riss standing outside of Kilmer Park in the Bronx, he knew that he had to possess her.

Linda was a tease, but she wasn’t easy and Burt had to work overtime to impress her. Burt could be a charmer. Every time they entered his club together the band was instructed to strike up the Jack Lawrence standard Linda.

He doctored divorce papers and even recruited Brasselle to convince Linda that Burt was free to wed. Six months later Linda called off the relationship after her mother did some legwork and discovered the paperwork for the Alabama divorce to be fraudulent.

Linda was beautiful, a Yiddishe Sophia Loren. Today, her face is covered by an enormous pair of butterfly-shaped, rhinestone dark glasses. What Miami Beach junk shop united Linda with such chalushes eyewear? Lina Wertmuller goofs on them!

God was quick to zap me with a guilt fix for snickering. The reason behind Linda’s enormous shades imbues the film with its pulpy, compulsively watchable tabloid sensibility.

Linda moved on and in June of 1959 announced her engagement to an old beau. Burt quickly copped an “if I can’t have her no one will” attitude. In the spring of 1959, before she wed, Burt hired a black thug and two of his goons to pose as messengers sent to deliver a lye-filled mayonnaise jar to Linda’s face.

Up to this point, Burt and Linda are shown in separate interviews. A queasy thought began gnawing at my brain. Please don’t tell me that we are actually going to see these two pathetic creatures united in the same shot.

In 1974, after serving 13 years in prison for maiming and assault in the second degree, Burt once again proposed to Linda and the couple was wed.

Jews don’t behave this way (do they?), particularly when it comes to multiplex airings of dirty laundry. Years ago while guesting on Larry King Live, Marlon Brando unleashed a string of racial epithets aimed at pointing out the various stereotypes at work in Hollywood films. Brando concluded his tirade by noting that the presumably Jewish-run industry seldom included contemptuous images of The Chosen in their film.

A media firestorm followed, but what Brando said was basically true. With the exception of The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, Goodbye, Columbus, Casino, Capturing the Friedmans, and Jud Süß, there aren’t many movies that depict Jews in a negative light.

Not that I’m calling for a new wave in celluloid anti-Semitism; if anything seeing Crazy Love was a very uncomfortable viewing experience and I appreciate the film’s brutal honesty. It was like watching one of my family’s Passover dinners filmed through X-Ray Specs.

Director Dan Klores does a tremendous job structuring his material. This is one true life documentary that doubles as a taut suspense thriller. Each subsequent insight and character shading keeps you on the edge of your seat wondering just how far this story will go.

Eschewing editorial comment, Klores wisely decides to leave the passing of judgment to his audience. His is a film without one likable character in it. Initially appealing interviewees eventually hang themselves. Immediately after the assault, Burt turned to one of his friends for counsel. Without flinching, his lifelong chum looks into the camera and candidly repeats his advice: “Kill the other two niggers.”

Today, Burt plays Rock Hudson to Linda’s Jane Wyman. It’s difficult to conclude which one’s magnificent obsession is more staggeringly pathetic, that of the criminal or his victim desiring nothing more than to marry well and live comfortably.