I know the Charles Manson Helter Skelter story very well. This is a made-for-tv half-assed attempt at telling a story featuring supposed dirty hippies that have outfits straight out of the hippie version of Abercrombie & Fitch.
And how is it that they could not find an actor that resembles Charles Manson even a little bit? The guy playing Charlie looks like Kenny Loggins. Not very terrifying. Again very lazy.
Spahn Ranch looks like a Disney Amusement Park version of Spahn Ranch, far too nice, instead of the decrepit dump it actually was. The Interiors of the ranch feature stuff you would find in a Williamsburg hipster's apartment, not in a dirty hippie commune. And the dialogue is trite, stereotypical, and just plain silly..
The girl who plays Linda Kasabian is one of the only high points, she's fantastic. But the rest is pretty sad and dumb, one of the only good things is that the story itself is so striking. Hopefully Quentin Tarantino's big budget version will be something that will make us forget all these half-assed versions (with the exception of the original Helter Skelter movie that came out around 1974 or 1976).
