Hulu continues its streak of true crime adaptations with The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox. I was provided with a screener for the full season, which is good because there are swings and turns that make some of the early frustrations with the show make more sense.
The story starts in 2007 and centers around the investigation into the murder of Meredith Kercher, a college student from England studying abroad in Italy. Her roommate, Amanda Knox from Seattle, is swept up in the tangled mess of an investigation and becomes the prime suspect in her murder.
The show does a good job of hooking the viewer because, even though Amanda’s innocence is established in her narration at the start of the show, it’s interesting to see how things went wrong and where the truth lies. The word “twisted’ in the title doesn’t describe some kind of disturbing or depraved story, but the tangled mess of bias, miscommunication, and sensationalism that is at the core.
Early episodes don’t paint Amanda in a great light. Even though her situation evokes sympathy, her extreme naivete can make her look like a complete airhead. At times, she’s aloof or overly affectionate with her Italian boyfriend in front of the police, which fuels their anti-American bias. However, in later episodes, she matures and connects her story to the broader nature of how false accusations can traumatize someone.
Grace Van Patten does a good job of portraying Amanda through her arc. From a naive college student who is out of her depth in a seemingly rigged game to an understanding adult who seeks deeper meaning from what happened to her. Giuseppe De Dom also puts in a good performance as her boyfriend, Raffaelle Sollecito.
Maybe it’s a subconscious thing, but the setting adds a good amount of dramatic gravitas to the story. A lot of the diaglogue is in Italian, and seeing the old architecture in the city of Perugia makes the story more compelling. It conveys that despite all the modernity in the city, there’s still deep-rooted prejudice among its citizens.
It seems like true crime stories have a tendency to frustrate the audience, usually by showing how flawed or biased the criminal justice system can be. That’s especially true here, where that trope compounds with the fact that the system in Italy has certain quirks that would seem wacky to those of us in the U.S. The show paints the police handling the case in Italy as almost cartoonishly biased and uncaring. Ignoring evidence, crafting sordid fantasies to make Amanda look deviant, and even going as far as bullying her into giving a false confession.
While the second half of the show meanders around in terms of plot progression, it does a good job of completing Amanda’s arc. The message of understanding and forgiveness is a bit schmaltzy and unrealistic, but it fits Amanda’s character. The moments of intrigue and catharsis make it worth it by the end.
While there’s no shortage of true crime content out there, and while these kinds of dramatizations aren’t often reliable for revealing the complete truth, The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox succeeds in being an entertaining and worthwhile mini-series.
Author Bio:
Ulises Duenas is a senior writer and film critic at Highbrow Magazine.
For Highbrow Magazine