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Date: March 09, 2021 07:29PM
I skimmed through the series a second time, with this interesting review (posted on the previous thread) in mind:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.tvguide.com/amp/news/murder-among-the-mormons-review-netflix-true-crime-series/From the review: “A vast majority of the Netflix audience will overlook the message written in invisible ink throughout the series. But for anyone who grew up in Mormon culture, they'll be able to see a central thesis written in big, bold letters: Joseph Smith was the Mark Hofmann of his day. (Only if they want to see it, of course.)”
Having taken a second look, I think if the filmmakers intended any such message then it was written very subtly indeed. I happened upon the Twitter feed of Tyler Measom and he is certainly not giving anything away in his tweets along those lines. I noted, though, that Measom was also involved in making the film “An Honest Liar” about magician James Randi which had the same theme: the capacity of humans to be deceived.
The thing is, though, that there just isn’t a lot about Joseph Smith in the series. There’s a little, but so little that a deliberate comparison of Hofmann and Smith on the part of the filmmakers seems like too much of a stretch.
On the other hand,the Hofmann = Smith irony is where my own mind went immediately, even from the beginning of episode one. Is this because the filmmakers did something to set this up? Or is it just because the Smith/Hofmann parallels are definitely there and I know enough Joseph Smith history (from hanging out on this board years ago) to see it, despite being non-Mormon.
I did notice that the filmmakers bookend the series with the same clip of Shannon Flynn. They give special prominence to this clip by opening and closing with it. At the start of episode one is a shorter version of this clip of Flynn talking:
“Can I ask a favor?
Don’t make me answer that.
Don’t make me answer that.
Let somebody else do it.
I don’t want to make a hero out of him.”
(Then Flynn pauses but a second later speaks again, apparently not being able to resist doing what he just said he didn’t want to do):
“Because he was fantastic.
No one has come close to doing what he has done.”
That’s the kick off to the show and that’s when I immediately thought, well he could just as easily be talking about Joseph Smith there couldn’t he, especially as the name Mark Hofmann isn’t even mentioned. Kind of perfect. Even if Shannon Flynn didn’t intend any such meaning, which he probably didn’t.
At the very end of the series, they use this exact clip again but it’s a longer version of Flynn’s statement accompanied by a visual montage of Hofmann’s crimes. Flynn’s statement starts as quoted above and then goes on:
“The depth of knowledge and understanding...
...and his autodidactic ability is unprecedented.”
(The visual montage at this moment in Flynn’s speech is of a man’s hand, forging a signature with an old pen, on a yellowed piece of paper, the name: Joseph Smith)
“His ability to deceive-
Unparalleled.
I should have suspected.
We all should have suspected.
We didn’t.
(Pause)
People don’t want to know.”
(Flynn shrugs)
For me, that little bit at the opening and closing of the series is some slight indication that the filmmakers MIGHT be ever so covertly saying Hofmann and Smith are more or less the same guy.
The painter Marcel Duchamp once said that an artist does only 50% of the work in creating art. The remaining 50% is in the viewer’s brain. Because of the way Mormonism touched my life and what I have learned about it, my brain easily filled in this ghostly parallel story in Murder Among the Mormons that the filmmakers may have suggested with only the faintest scratched lines (or maybe not at all). Others’ results may vary.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/09/2021 07:35PM by 2+2=4.