ALL THE LITTLE THINGS (2012)
DIRECTOR: JEFF STREICH
Premiers Thursday, January 31st at 7:00pm at Whitsell Auditorium, Portland Art Museum (1219 SW Park Avenue) in Portland. Buy Tickets.
For his feature-length directorial debut, Academy Award-nominated cinematographer (and 2010 Oregon Media Arts Fellow) Jeff Streich turns to a local story. In 2003, 18-year-old Mount Hood Community College freshman Ben Cramer—described by those who knew him as soft-spoken and “extraordinarily ordinary”—was sentenced to life for the grisly murder of his friend, Cassondra Brown. Portraits of the teens emerge through interviews with family, friends, teachers, counselors, and Cramer himself, who, interviewed from the Snake River Correctional Facility, struggles to examine his past and his actions. Juxtaposing scenes of Brown’s mother sorting through her daughter’s belongings with Cramer’s mother sifting through her son’s car and baby clothes, Streich renders a complex exploration of the ripple effect of tragedies like these. (101 mins.)
Before the screening, the Northwest Film Center will announce the winner of the 2013 Oregon Media Arts Fellowship, funded through the support of the Oregon Arts Commission and the Gordon D. Sondland and Katherine J. Durant Foundation.
I am an aunt of Cassie Brown’s and although the film was sensitive and well done, it missed the real point by portraying the two as troubled with perhaps some kind of signs to be seen to avert this kind of crime.
Cassie had gone through troubling times as many teens do but during her last few years, she had found her balance. She was going to PCC, writing with a depth beyond her years and spending fun times with friends and cousins.
Jeff should have had law enforcement speak plainly to some of the facts of the case to give a true perspective of the horror of what he did, his total lack of remorse…even now and to offer a counter point to Ben’s perspective.
Elements of the case files contradict a crime of passion. So why did this director call it a documentary if the facts are so skewed? A better exploration would have been how does a monster like this develop when he had loving family, friends and seemed so normal?
Is there anywhere to view this now?
I would really like to see this movie if somebody has a link that I can download for it. I was interviewed for this movie and am really interested as to how it turned out. My husband was really good friends with him and this whole situation left us blindsided.