I was disturbed by Capturing the Friedmans.  It is one of the best documentaries I have seen in my life.  The film is the story of a father of a Long Island family accused of molesting young boys.  Even though we never find out whether he did or didnt, the director offers many points of view, giving us a pretty objective vision of how things went down.

The mess begins when the government intercepts some child pornography from Amsterdam that had Arnold Friedmans name and address on the envelope.  After putting a sting on the patriarch, the investigators find mounds of child porn and files showing that he has taught computer classes in his basement since he retired from being a schoolteacher.  The investigators then take the class lists around and question the children about what might have happened in these classes.  Apparently, many of the children had been touched and many of them also implicated Arnolds youngest son Jesse. We later learn that Arnold actually does have a history of pedophilia, but we never really know if he and his son actually did commit these atrocities. 

What makes the film interesting is how each person is so sure they know what happened or what should be done.  The oldest son, David, is in denial about his fathers problem, so he treats Arnold like a king.  The middle son, Seth, obviously feels ashamed because he avoided being interviewed for the film.  Jesse is hard to peg down: he couldve done terrible things to these little boys or he was totally innocent and took punishment for something he didnt do.  The investigators also talk about the occurrences as if they were fact, as do a few men who say they were molested by the two Friedmans.

The most interesting interviewee is Elaine, wife of Arnold and mother of the three sons, because she is treated like an outsider in the family.  She thinks her husband is guilty and is disapproving of almost everything that happens.  She has almost no loyalty to her husband and this estranges her from her family even more so, turning family dinners and get-togethers into screaming matches.

The movie is enhanced with home video shot by the family and obtained by the filmmakers. That is how we know so much about this family. The film will challenge the boundaries of your tolerance and shows the real human condition.  This is the best film I have seen in a long while, by far the best this summer.