Alexandre O. Philippe
2022
108 minutes
This is a guilty pleasure clip show sort of documentary that has some of your favorite David Lynch moments juxtaposed with some of the more iconic moments from The Wizard of Oz--the Judy Garland one, at least. Family history and lore reminds you that there were more than one version made in the early days of film, many of which are lost to time.
One of your most renowned (distant) relatives was a silent film actor, who played the Mayor of Emerald city or some similar role in one of the earlier versions of the film. Photographs of him indicate that he looked like a tamer version of Gene Wilder from Young Frankenstein. Your exact relation to this man is not quite known since everything on that side of your family is a bit fuzzy, but he shares your relatively rare name, and anyone with that name is very likely to be related somehow.
This relative was supposed to have committed suicide by jumping to his death from the Hollywood sign, but this is of course a bizarre urban legend. Of course the truth is sad enough. Apparently the family was tainted by scandal when your relative's ex-wife was murdered by her son (his stepson), who had also killed a few other women. He was convicted and died in the gas chamber at San Quentin for these crimes.
Maybe all this isn't the best thing to be known for. But hey, that's showbiz!
Time to choose something different: