Cult Time, featuring the role of hand embroidery in the Manson Family 🧵🪡
Footage from ‘Manson’ (1973) by Robert Hendrickson and Laurence Merrick. Music by former Manson Family members Paul Watkins and Brooks Poston.
Hendrickson shot most of the remarkable observational footage in ‘Manson’ and had basically unlimited direct access to the Manson Family for years. His collaborator, Laurence Merrick, with whom Hendrickson got into legal battles, was later murdered at the acting studio he owned by a troubled man who contended Merrick cast a black magic spell upon him during an audition.
A few years after this film’s initial release, Manson Family member Squeaky Fromme (seen speaking in this clip) was arrested for an attempt to assassinate President Gerald Ford. Her motive, she said, was to draw attention to the destruction of California’s giant sequoia forests. The ‘Manson’ film was then banned in the Eastern District of California by United States District Court Judge Thomas MacBride in order to preserve Fromme’s constitutional right to a fair and speedy trial. Hendrickson got the ACLU involved to fight this ban, and they filed motions against it. ‘BANNED IN CALIFORNIA’ became a marketing angle for the movie.
Fromme was sentenced to life and imprisoned, and she later escaped from a West Virginia prison in an attempt to travel to see Charlie, when she heard reports that he was suffering from cancer. She was captured two days later and ended up serving a total of 34 years before she was released on parole in 2009.
