I saw this film at the 2002 Toronto International Film Festival. Fascinating material here. Auto Focus is a film about the life and murder of TV actor Bob Crane, best known for playing the titular character in Hogan's Heroes. The film traces Crane's career during and after the series, focusing on his increasing involvement with John Carpenter, a man with whom he picked up women and made pornographic films. I was hoping that Schrader would try to dig a little under the surface, since obviously this man was leading a double life, but instead he gives us a strangely upbeat voice-over from Bob Crane, who can state with equal chirpiness "the show was a big hit" and "John Carpenter was acquitted of the murder." It was almost as if the point he is trying to make is that Crane himself had no insight into his duality, and no real guilt, either. It made the film oddly unsatisfying, as if there should have been more "weight" to the story. Nonetheless, Greg Kinnear (as Crane) and Willem Dafoe were superb.
Review of Auto Focus
