If you like documentaries on serial killers or murderers, this is obviously one for your collection. Nick Broomfield has you captivated from the outset. My only gripe is that I felt that Broomfield laid a bit too much pressure on Wournos. He kept repeating the same question over and over to her and you can sense it is tiring her out, even aggravating her. The repeated questioning also has you believe that Broomfield is doing this for his own agenda and not for getting the points that Wournos wanted to get across to the viewers.I personally felt she was remorseful for her actions. She was doing her time and she knew where her fate lied. She didn't want to be judged anymore, she was exhausted and just wanted everything to be finalised.A shocking start to her life, you can empathise with Wournos. There's no getting away from the fact that what she did, deserved a life sentence, but death? In my opinion, definitely not. As Broomfield points out, she was clearly insane and even more so towards the end of her sentence, as I guess almost anyone would be in that situation. A tragic tale of a human life that was definitely drawn the proverbial 'short straw'.Don't forget the tissues, for the ending.

English writer, producer, film editor and documentary filmmaker Nick Broomfield's 15th documentary feature and second documentary about American serial killer Aileen Wuornos (1956-2002) who was executed by lethal injection in Florida, USA after having been on death row for twelve years. It premiered at the 2nd Tribeca Film Festival in 2003, was screened in the Real to Reel section at the 28th Toronto International Film Festival in 2003 and is a UK-USA co-production which was co-directed by documentary filmmaker, cinematographer and producer Joan Churchill and produced by producer Jo Human. It tells the story about Aileen Carol Wuornos, an American-born woman who was brought up in the city of Rochester in the state of Michigan after her birth in 1956. Aileen's parents Leo Pittman and Diane Wuornos who came from Finland to America as immigrants were divorced before she was born and she never met her father who after spending many years in prison for having raped a 7-year-old girl, hanged himself. In 1960 when Aileen was about to turn 4-years-old, her mother abandoned her and her one-year older brother Keith leaving them with their grandparents Lauri and Britta who that same year legally adopted their two grandchildren. Already as a teenager and after having been sexually abused by her grandfather and having a consensual sexual relationship with her brother, Aileen began supporting herself through prostitution. She became pregnant in 1970 after supposedly having been raped, but after the birth of her son she had to put him up for adoption. Shortly after her childbirth she dropped out of school, and as a 15-year-old girl she started living in the woods after having been kicked out of her grandparents' house by her grandfather. Aileen spent many years hitchhiking and living in Southeast America as a vagrant, a prostitute and a criminal, and while staying in the city of Daytona Beach, Volusia County, Florida in 1986 as a 30-year-old woman, she met a 24-year-old hotel maid named Tyria Moore at a gay bar. Aileen and Tyria became a couple, but all though this good thing might have improved her outlook on life and provided her with a sense of prospect, this little spark of love might also have instigated her road to damnation and her yearning desire to avenge the men who during her adolescent years had taken away so much of her dignity, deprived her of her innocence and made her life a living and endless nightmare. This biographical early 21st century documentary which is narrated by British filmmaker Nick Broomfield and which had its theatrical release approximately seven months after 46-year-old Aileen Wuornos' death penalty had been carried out in the State of Florida in October 2002, is an illuminating true story which in an investigative manner examines the life and upcoming death of a lawless woman who suffered an almost unimaginably horrifying childhood and who throughout her life was deceived by the ones that were closest to her. All though confessing to having murdered seven men in late 1989 and early 1990 after being arrested in 1991, Aileen Wuornos (1956-2002) claimed that many of them had raped her and that she was acting in self-defence. While taking a clear stand on the practice of capital punishment and more specifically the execution of people who are mentally insane, this unsentimental depiction of a death row inmate's deteriorating mental state which is notable for Nick Broomfield's presence in front of the camera, his rare voice-over narration, his commendable interviews and conversations with Aileen Wuornos, the timely use of music and the atmospheric score by composer Rob Lane, gives a neglected, exploited and tortured person who was pushed over the edge and who eventually retaliated, a voice. Aileen Wuornos was both a victim and an executioner and all though this documentary is lesser concerned with the families of the victims, in scrutinizing the gruesome crimes and tries to establish whether or not she was acting in self-defence, it does not in any way attempt to exonerate the perpetrator or paint an incandescent picture of her. Nick Broomfield and Joan Churchill's understanding portrayal of a person with an explosive and violent temper who in a state of madness and faced with the ultimate judgment seemed to be so powerless and out of touch with reality that she had lost the strength to plead for her life, essentially makes one see the possible reasons for why and how a Christian woman who hated men and placed her blame on the media, the police and society, became a murderer. This heartrending and disenchanting documentary feature is a look straight into the eyes of death which leaves a remarkably strong impression and which underlines how the name and stories of an unorthodox serial killer is used as a product.

The honest truth can get very ugly. British filmmaker(Nick Broomfield) directs this documentary that deals with appeals court appearances of infamous serial killer Aileen Wuornos, who went on a murder spree in 1992. Growing up in Michigan Aileen was selling sex for cigarettes at the age of 9. Dealing with abuse most of her life, Wournos had very little respect for men...but knew she needed to use them for her survival. In the state of Florida Aileen became a highway prostitute as a teen and was convicted of killing six semi-truck drivers claiming she was defending herself from rape. This film shows a very troubled woman that runs in and out of paranoid schizophrenia. Actual footage from court appearances plus personal interviews with the killer; as well as family members of the "johns" she murdered makes for an undaunted, matter-of-fact, in your face documentary. Wournos makes no bones about what she did; but she is adamant about the criminal justice system failing her. Her story was loosely told in the acclaimed 2003 movie MONSTER starring Charlize Theron in the lead role.

After watching this movie, one can only wonder how Hollywood had the gall to make the "Monster" movie. It's clear from this - and Nick's previous docu on Aileen - that Hollywood's only concern was to make money out of Aileen's misery. Negotiating with the police officials involved in the case and with her former lover for the inside story before judgment had even been passed. Shame on Hollywood. Shame on law enforcement. And shame on her ex. A sickening and a sad reflection on society in general.Aileen was mad. Mad as a hatter if her performance in this docu is to be believed - and I have no reason to doubt its authenticity. Clearly, she should have been locked up - not murdered. And if life imprisonment actually meant "life" then the pro-capital punishment lobby would not have a leg to stand on. But it doesn't. And so they do.There were times when Aileen came across as likable. Genuinely likable. And one could fully understand why the film maker felt a rapport with his subject. When she was lucid she made sense. She knew she had been stitched up by the media. The validity of her argument must be obvious to anyone with a brain.Not everyone who is abused becomes a serial killer. In fact virtually NOBODY who is does. Contributing factor, Yes. Justification, No. Indeed, there is no justification in the final analysis. She killed people.No justification for "Monster" either. I for one will NOT be watching it.