WATCH TRAILER

Life After Manson

A film by Olivia Klaus

US | 2014 | 25 minutes | Color/BW | DVD | Order No. 151160

Host a screening
Watch on Kanopy
Watch on Docuseek

SYNOPSIS

Life After Manson is an intimate portrait of one of the world’s most infamous crimes and notorious killers. At 21 years old, Patricia Krenwinkel callously murdered three people at the command of Charles Manson. Now 66 years old, she continues to be demonized by the public and haunted by the suffering she caused over four decades ago. Through an exclusive interview with and never before seen footage of Krenwinkel, filmmaker Olivia Klaus (SIN BY SILENCE), frames a historically irreconcilable story through a complex emotional lens, offering insight into what led a suburban girl to commit crimes the world will never forget. A provocative and powerful character study, LIFE AFTER MANSON reveals a broken woman struggling with her past, her arduous effort to evaluate the cost of her choices, and the possibility of self-forgiveness.

PRESS

"A great teaching tool to begin to understand how, and under what circumstances, a woman could commit such and appaling crime. This film is a must for courses in Criminology, criminal justice, women and crime, psychology and sociology."

Dr. Barbara Bloom, Criminology Professor Sonoma State University

"Using a masterful combination of modern shots, dramatization, archival footage, photographs and firsthand interviews, Klaus gave a fresh perspective on Krenwinkel that allowed the audience to feel for the person and not focus on the act."

Vox Magazine

"This film reveals the unexpected – how the most unlikely inmate could be the symbol of rehabilitation, resilience and survival. Patricia breaks the mold about the mystique of women in prison, to provide an incredible resource that showcases a journey of reflection from behind bars to create a life of meaning, against all odds."

Dr. Stephanie Covington Co-Director, Center for Gender & Justice

"The conclusion to the social and cultural upheavals of the 1960’s.."

The Independent

"...an emotional account..."

The New York Times

"...reflective and intimate, well-shot and directed"

Independent Film Quarterly

"...a masterfully and beautifully shot film..."

The Blot.com

*** "...Krenwinkel explains how she fell under the sway of Charles Manson. A sobering portrait, this is recommended."

Video Librarian

SCREENING HIGHLIGHTS AND AWARDS

  • DocUtah, Best Short Film
  • Montreal World Film Festival
  • Rhode Island International Film Festival
  • New Orleans Film Festival
  • Seattle International Film Festival
  • Citizen Jane Film Festival
  • Starz Denver Film Festival
  • Tribeca Film Festival
  • St. Louis Film Festival
  • San Francisco Intl Festival of Short Films
  • DocAviv
  • Arizona Underground Film Festival

ABOUT FILMMAKER(S)

Olivia Klaus

Olivia Klaus is an award-winning documentary filmmaker who passionately believes in the power of visual stories to create positive social change. Her work has been seen on various networks like CNN, Discovery, MTV and The History Channel. SIN BY SILENCE, her directorial debut in 2009, went on to win numerous film festival and advocacy awards, and highlighted by People Magazine, NPR, HLN, and The Insider before being broadcasted on Investigation Discovery to over 2.5 million viewers. The film went on to inspire unprecedented legislation in California based on the documentary to improve the paths to freedom for nearly 7,000 currently incarcerated domestic violence victims who have spent decades behind bars. In 2014, she premiered her second film LIFE AFTER MANSON at the Tribeca Film Festival and an excerpt was featured on the prestigious New York Times Op-Docs series. Her producer/consultant credits include the Netflix Original LESSONS FROM A SCHOOL SHOOTING, the 2016 Sundance film NEWTOWN, 2020 Sundance film US KIDS, and Emmy-nominated BRAVE MISS WORLD. She is also the Creative Director at Orange Static - a multimedia agency specializing in documentary film websites.

YOU MIGHT ALSO BE INTERESTED IN

Sin by Silence

From behind prison walls, a group of extraordinary women are shattering misconceptions of domestic violence. An important film that profiles Convicted Women Against Abuse (CWAA), the US prison system’s first inmate initiated group and led by women, SIN BY SILENCE is an essential resource featuring more than two hours of bonus materials, including interviews with experts on abusive relationships, law enforcement leaders and leaders in faith-based communities about domestic violence, and more. Created by Brenda Clubine in 1989, CWAA has changed laws for battered women, raised awareness for those on the outside, and educated a system that does not fully comprehend the complexities of domestic abuse. Like many CWAA members, Brenda’s years of inflicted abuse were never fully revealed. But because of CWAA’s work and advocacy, new laws were enacted that now allow incarcerated survivors to challenge their original conviction. With unprecedented access inside the California Institution for Women, this emotionally packed documentary tells the stories of courageous women who have learned from their past, are changing their future, and teaching us how domestic violence affects each and every person.
Learn more

Blind Spot: Murder by Women

Because murder by women is still relatively rare--only one out of eight murders in the United States is committed by a woman--women's own stories provide unique insights into the circumstances leading to these violent acts. In this absorbing documentary, intimate one-on-one interviews with six women murderers are combined with re-enactments of their background experience and visual re-creations of their interior lives. Sharing and reflecting on their memories, fantasies, dreams, and anger, the six women candidly describe their actions as perpetrators in detail and address the issue of having taken a life. Interspersed between their separate stories are their individual reflections on coping strategies, and life and relationships in prison. From the Academy and Emmy-award winning filmmakers responsible for DIALOGUES WITH MADWOMEN, BLIND SPOT is a provocative and riveting encounter with throw-away children, out-of-control adults, and the emotional, psychological and spiritual consequences of murder.
Learn more

900 Women

“The Louisiana Correctional Institute is located in the swamps of southern Louisiana in the small town of St. Gabriel. Built in 1970 to house an increasing population of female convicts, today it houses the state's most dangerous female prisoners and often exceeds its population capacity of 900. 75% of these are mothers and one fourth of them are serving sentences of fifteen years or more. The prison compound has a surreal quality; there are no searchlight-capped towers or barbed wire fences. Filmmaker Khadivi delivers a striking, sensitive portrait of life in this deceptively peaceful atmosphere, which is filled with stories of life on the streets, abuse, freedom, childbirth and motherhood. Six women - a grandmother, a young high school student, a pregnant woman, a recovering heroin addict, a prison guard, and the only woman on death row - were brave enough to share their frustrations and hopes. Produced by Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Jonathan Stack ("The Farm").” - Human Rights Watch Film Festival Catalogue
Learn more

Troop 1500

Their mothers may be convicted thieves, murderers and drug dealers, but the girls of Troop 1500 want to be doctors, social workers and marine biologists. With meetings once a month at Hilltop Prison in Gatesville, Texas, this innovative Girl Scout program brings daughters together with their inmate mothers, offering them a chance to rebuild their broken relationships. Intimately involved with the troop for several years, the directors took their cameras far beyond meetings to explore the painful context of broken families. Powerful insight comes from interviews shot by the girls themselves, which reveal their conflicted feelings of anger and joy, abandonment and intimacy—as well as the deep influence their mothers still have on them. An estimated 1.5 million children have incarcerated parents and 90 percent of female inmates are single parents. Their daughters are six times more likely to land in the juvenile justice system. TROOP 1500 poignantly reveals how an inspired yet controversial effort by the more than 90-year old Girl Scouts organization is working to help these at-risk young girls deal with their unique circumstances and break the cycle of crime within families.
Learn more

Mothers of Bedford

Women are the fastest-growing U.S. prison population today. Eighty percent are mothers of school-age children. Jenifer McShane's absorbing documentary gives human dimensions to these rarely reported statistics, taking us inside Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, a maximum security prison north of New York City. Shot over four years, MOTHERS OF BEDFORD follows five women - of diverse backgrounds and incarcerated for different reasons- in dual struggles to be engaged in their children's lives and become their better selves. It shows how long-term sentences affect mother-child relationships and how Bedford's innovative Children's Center helps women maintain and improve bonds with children and adult relatives awaiting their return. Whether it be parenting's normal frustrations to celebrating a special day, from both inside and out of the prison walls, this moving film provides unprecedented access to a little known, rarely shown, community of women.
Learn more

Private Violence

Emmy-nominated PRIVATE VIOLENCE explores a simple but deeply disturbing fact of American life: the most dangerous place for a woman in America is her own home.
Learn more

Faces of Harassment

FACES OF HARASSMENT is an experiment in storytelling about trauma. When the hashtag #MyFirstHarassment swept across Brazil, it showed not only the widespread experience of sexual harassment and assault, but a widespread hunger to bring it out of the shadows. FACES OF HARASSMENT amplifies this movement, by opening space for women to speak their own truth. The film was shot in a mobile storytelling van, parked in rich and poor neighborhoods alike across São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro and open to any woman. The van was a free, autonomous space, where women spoke to the camera directly, no interviewer or other influence present. FACES OF HARASSMENT offers an honest and unflinching look at the scourge of sexual harassment and assault - and at the radical possibilities for dignity and healing that can happen when women are free to speak completely for themselves.
Learn more

A Better Man

A BETTER MAN follows a series of intimate conversations between a woman and her former boyfriend when she confronts him about their history of domestic abuse.
Learn more

What Doesn't Kill Me

Every day, 5 million children in the U.S. either witness or are victims of domestic violence.
Learn more

A Woman on the Outside

A deeply American story about the legacy of mass incarceration. Kristal Bush, who has watched nearly every man in her life disappear into prison, channels her struggle into reuniting other Philadelphia families divided by the correctional system.
Learn more

Belly of the Beast

Filmed over seven years with extraordinary access and intimate accounts from currently and formerly incarcerated people, this Emmy-winning documentary exposes a pattern of illegal sterilizations, modern-day eugenics and reproductive injustice in California prisons.
Learn more

Apart

Against the backdrop of a Midwestern state battling industrial decline, an opioid epidemic, and rising incarceration rates, APART offers an intimate portrait of three women who return home from prison and rebuild their lives after being separated from their children for years.
Learn more
Shopping Cart