Thora Birch

(On Cable TV, October 2022) There is definitely something a little bit dirty, a little bit guilty in watching made-for-Lifetime The Gabby Petito Story barely a year after the much-publicized tragic real events it depicts. My interest wasn’t so much in the match between film and recent news, but in seeing why actress Thora Birch thought this was a good project in which to make the feature-film directing debut. I’m all for actors turning directors, but many of them usually pick some kind of passion project or actor-friendly arthouse drama as their calling card—not a nakedly commercial project ready-made for criticism of exploitation. I’m ready to accept “desperation” as an answer—if you’re looking for a project and something juicy like this lands on your lap, well, why not? On the other hand, then there’s you being on the hook for a film made in a rush and ripe for justified criticism. The script, for instance, does not deal in subtleties in offering its interpretation of the murder-suicide at the heart of the story: There’s an incredibly familiar arc to the way a storybook romance turns sour when the male goes off his meds and becomes increasingly controlling. The woman can do no wrong in this scenario, which becomes a fascinating point when the film repeats known documented statements from Petito and her husband, and those statements don’t exactly match the more simplistic fictionalization of events we’ve just seen. The exploitation angle of The Gabby Petito Story I’m jaded about and will let slide—but there’s no mistaking the low-end nature of the production with its unpolished actors (with Birch briefly showing up), humdrum cinematography and sometimes-awkward staging. In the end, my curiosity about Birch’s directorial prowess being satiated, I’m back to my initial discomfort at having watched the whole thing. Many serious critics will tell you that all cinema is voyeuristic, but some of it feels worse than the rest.