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Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr.
EMAILPRINTLions Gate Films Inc.

Generally favorable reviews
Based on 25 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 3 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Documentary
Written by:
Directed by: Errol Morris
Release Date:
Theatrical: December 29, 1999
DVD: June 6, 2000
Running Time: 91 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: PG-13 for thematic elements
Starring Fred A. Leuchter Jr., Ernst Zündel, David Irving, Shelly Shapiro, and James Roth
A tale of ignorance, self-deception, and vanity. Documentarian Errol Morris sews together a patchwork of diverse viewpoints that seek to uncover the central mystery behind Fred Leuchter's motivations. (Lions Gate Films)
Also On Metacritic
FILM: The Fog of War The Thin Blue Line
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
Fred Leuchter is just one deluded figure, but by the end of this great and chilling sick-joke documentary he stands as a living icon of the banality of evil.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
Morris's unique blend of realism and surrealism gives the film great resonance as a portrait of one eccentric individual and, more important, a study of the morbid proclivities that run beneath the surface of our supposedly civilized society.
Read Full Review >TNT RoughCut Don Kaye
What's fascinating about Morris's riveting portrait is the notion that monsters can be born not just out of overwhelming evil, but pure egotism and stupidity -- much more mundane, yet still dangerous.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Lisa Alspector
Using archly staged interviews and reconstructions that draw attention to the components of the documentary form, Morris does justice to the complexity of hot-button issues by suggesting several layers of subtext at once, portraying the articulate Leuchter as both rational and prone to rationalize.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov
Seems more like a subtle, elegiac tone poem than an indictment of human banality and the evil that men do.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
Brings the viewer up close and personal with the face of evil.
Read Full Review >USA Today Mike Clark
With his coolly objective moon's-eye view serving a story that's bizarre by even his long-established career standards, the great documentarian Errol Morris examines the perils of vanity - though others will understandably make more sinister interpretations.
Read Full Review >New York Post Lou Lumenick
Morris' most gripping film since "The Thin Blue Line," is the year's scariest movie.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Examiner Wesley Morris
Segues from the merely quirky into the bizarrely unthinkable.
Read Full Review >Mr. Showbiz Michael Atkinson
Lacks scope and doesn't resonate grandly as a portrait of an American underbelly like Morris' earlier works do. But it still packs a wallop.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
Errol Morris' characteristically distanced documentary is empathetic without being especially sympathetic.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Stephen Holden
Morris, instead of evoking the solemnity that surrounds most films that touch on the Holocaust, has directed Mr. Death as the blackest of comedies.
Read Full Review >Film.com Ernest Hardy
Morris seduces us into stepping into Leuchter's world of delusion and ego.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Edward Guthmann
(Morris's) strangest and most disturbing portrait yet.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir
A strange piece of work, perhaps closer to an imaginative portrait or an experimental fiction that borrows elements from real life than a traditional documentary.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas
Mr. Death, which is shot through with one dark absurdity after another, emerges as a cautionary tale if ever there was one.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Ella Taylor
Leuchter is such a riveting, disturbing and finally pathetic character that his story hardly needs embellishing with Morris' fancy visuals and ominous mood music.
Read Full Review >Newsweek Andrea C. Basora
At the heart of all Morris's films -- from "The Thin Blue Line" to "Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control" -- is a fundamental belief in the unreliability of truth.
Read Full Review >Film.com John Hartl
(Morris) sees Leuchter's story as more personal, more about one individual's self-absorption and folly, than an indictment of a particular system.
Read Full Review >Village Voice J. Hoberman
Morris, who more or less invented the ironic documentary, seems to struggle here for an appropriate tone even as he allows Leuchter more than enough rope to hang himself.
Read Full Review >Slate David Edelstein
The director's beautiful detachment suggests a kind of cowardice.
Read Full Review >Dallas Observer Gregory Weinkauf
An affecting film, but it just may not be everyone's cup of cyanide.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 9.3 (out of 10) based on 3 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Lionel gave it a10:
brilliant film. if one doesn't know the underlying theme of the story beforehand, viewing is that much more profound and moving. although i read a few reviews which critique morris's humourous, detached point of view - i feel it makes this film that much more profound, moving, and in a way, congruous with his subject's mentality.
C. Crowell gave it a10:
One of the most astonishing and enriching film experiences I have ever had.
