Bob Crane, 15 minuter
It's more of a pathetic story than a sad one. Crane was a sex addict, and his career declined as he chased his compulsion. He documented his many sexual conquests on film and video. Crane was eventually bludgeoned to death in 1978 with a camera tripod (one of those incidental facts that becomes highly symbolic as we mythologize the man's life) and his murder was never solved.
In the magazine piece, writer Lynn Hirshberg uses the term '15 minuter' to describe biographical movies about quirky minor celebrities. Though it seems we should make a distinction between 15 minuter movies that are actually fond of their subject, like Man on the Moon, and those like Auto Focus, that are only interested in the subject insofar as he is useful for making a point. From the Times' review: "[Director Paul] Schrader is not really interested in Crane's psychology. Like his "American Gigolo," this is the existential tragedy of a shallow man, who is less a person in his own right than the illustration of a condition. "
The magazine piece also describes the continuing Crane family feud, where one Crane boy sells his dad's homemade pornography over the Internet (that's at bobcrane.com, if you're interested), the other Crane boy questions his half-brother's paternity, and the second wife prepares a biography of her husband. And collectively they try to wring every possible dollar out of the last seconds of Bob Crane's 15 minutes.
* A minor complaint: when I'm on the New York Times Magazine page, and I select archives, I expect to go to the magazine archives, not the general Times archives. Ditto for the other buttons--Site Index, Site Search--that run under the magazine banner. Placing that row of buttons above the magazine nameplate would take care of that problem, I think.
