The most notorious mass murderers in American history.
The Manson Family is a 2003 American True Crime horror film about Charles Manson. Unlike the many other films based on the case, this one is told from the point of view of the Family themselves.
This film contains examples of:
- A God Am I: While Charlie never outright says he's Jesus Christ, he loves to strongly imply it.
- Big Bad: Charles Manson, manipulative leader of a murderous hippie cult.
- Cult: One of the many films dramatizing the Manson Family cult.
- Dark Messiah: While the Family initially starts as just another hippie commune, Charlie has a dark charisma about him and manages to convince them to start worshipping him. They eventually claim he can raise the dead and start killing for him.
- Devil Complex: During the Tate murders, Tex says "I am the Devil, and I am here to do the Devil's work."
- Dumpster Dive: The Family get their food from various dumpsters.
- Horror Hippies: A dramatization of the Charles Manson case, which codified this trope.
- Insistent Terminology: The Family called breaking and entering "creepy crawling."
- Jack the Ripoff: The film ends with a group of Manson fans killing the host of the in-universe documentary and going on a rampage.
- The Last DJ: Subverted. Charlie claims that he's a master musician standing against the cold, capitalistic record industry. However, what he sees as corporate drudgery is what others would call professionalism and actually putting out a product.
- Mockumentary: The film's Framing Device is an episode of a documentary Show Within a Show, where members of the Family themselves are interviewed. Interspersed are various flashbacks to the events described.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: Charlie despises mixed-race marriages, and his final scheme is to start a race war.
- Polyamory: The Family are constantly having sex with each other, outright claiming that monogamy is an old-fashioned hang-up.
- Right-Wing Militia Fanatic: The Family slowly descend into this, moving into a compound in the desert to prepare for a coming race war.
- Team Title
- Villain Protagonist: This film follows the Family, a hippie cult trying to start a race war.
