{"id":1634,"date":"2026-06-08T22:07:24","date_gmt":"2026-06-08T22:07:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=1634"},"modified":"2026-06-08T22:07:24","modified_gmt":"2026-06-08T22:07:24","slug":"mineshaft-the-cruising-murders-review-compelling-documentary-probes-the-legacy-of-william-friedkins-infamous-queer-thriller","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=1634","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Mineshaft: The Cruising Murders\u2019 Review: Compelling Documentary Probes the Legacy of William Friedkin\u2019s Infamous Queer Thriller"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\tThe legacy of William Friedkin\u2019s 1980 erotic thriller \u201cCruising\u201d is a complex one. A film long vehemently denounced by the queer community it purported to represent, and more recently reclaimed as a rare mainstream portrait of a vanished social scene, it is many things to many people \u2014 and in disentangling its onscreen achievements and errors in judgment from its heated production history, \u201cMineshaft: The Cruising Murders\u201d already has a lot to do. But Jeffrey Schwarz\u2019s engaging, impassioned documentary takes on plenty else besides, delving not just into the film but the climate of 1970s LGBTQ liberation, persecution and panic that enabled it, as well the horrific real-life murders that specifically inspired Friedkin\u2019s script.<\/p>\n

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\n\tThat can sometimes feel a shade too much for a film that glides by in a tight, gripping 85 minutes, buoyed by a lively, knowledgable ensemble of talking heads who variously contribute astute analysis, affecting personal investment and anecdotal spice to the subject. But the gear shifts here between pop-culture study and true-crime tragedy can sometimes feel abrupt and even a little jarring: \u201cMineshaft\u2019s\u201d bifocal portrait of a fraught turning point in American gay life wouldn\u2019t be any less fascinating on a slightly larger canvas. Regardless, this Tribeca premiere is sure to be a hit with LGBTQ-oriented festival programmers, distributors and\/or specialist streamers, abetted by Schwarz\u2019s reputation as a chronicler of queer art through such previous films as \u201cI Am Divine\u201d and \u201cTab Hunter Confidential.\u201d In a theatrical environment, it\u2019s veritably designed for animated post-screening Q&As, not to mention double-billing opportunities with Friedkin\u2019s original film.<\/p>\n

\n\tA serial-killer mystery unfolding amid the sensual thrills and supposed risks of New York City\u2019s leather BDSM scene, \u201cCruising\u201d managed to engender controversy across the social spectrum: For conservative straight audiences, its centering of a erotic queer subculture was an outrage, while to many members of that subculture, the film was a demeaning misrepresentation. But for a generation of gay men not already in that world, as cultural commentator Dan Savage points out in an introductory interview, \u201cCruising\u201d was an enticing window into kinks and desires that had never previously been depicted in popular media: However flawed, and heavily inaccurate, it minted countless leather-daddy fantasies.<\/p>\n

\n\tQueer critics like the Village Voice<\/em>\u2019s Arthur Bell, meanwhile, resented a straight filmmaker claiming that milestone \u2014 accusing Friedkin, the thrill-chasing director of \u201cThe French Connection\u201d and \u201cThe Exorcist\u201d (as well as an adaptation of \u201cThe Boys in the Band\u201d likewise unpopular with the gay community) of applying a stigmatizing straight gaze to the leather scene, presenting it as sordid and dangerous. Though Friedkin reasonably defended his artistic interest in the material \u2014 claiming not to make films \u201cfor or against anything\u201d \u2014 it\u2019s easy to see why gay men already being persecuted as deviants by influential homophobes like Anita Bryant were loath to embrace a lurid and rather bleak portrayal of their sexual liberation. As one talking head puts it: \u201cThe film shows gays as evil killers \u2014 how about the evil of the people that kill us?\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\tOn that front, Schwarz digs into a wave of brutal, mostly unsolved murders on the leather scene in the mid-to-late 1970s that provided the basis for the climate of terror depicted in \u201cCruising\u201d \u2014 focusing in particular on the death of Variety <\/em>film writer Addison Verrill at the hands of fellow gay man Paul Bateson, a mentally ill X-ray technician who, as wild coincidence would have it, played a bit part in \u201cThe Exorcist.\u201d There\u2019s nothing either salacious or particularly revelatory to be drawn from this strange and terribly sad story, though it does go some way toward explaining Friedkin\u2019s particular interest in this milieu. It also gives urgent, devastated context to the wave of vocal, sometimes raucuous queer protests that dogged the film\u2019s New York shoot \u2014 with participants anxious that their community\u2019s losses were being exploited in the name of entertainment.<\/p>\n

\n\tPacily edited by Schwarz himself, the film\u2019s own energy and chatter effectively convey a rising tide of queer resistance to socially entrenched homophobia \u2014 only for the tone to turn muted and melancholy as AIDS enters the picture, and the feverish New York scene of the 1970s goes quiet, its venues hollowed out and gentrified, its patrons dying en masse<\/em>. Still, that air of mourning is very different from the burning, personal grief expressed by Verrill\u2019s sister Pamela, as she struggles to comprehend what her brother died for: \u201cMineshaft\u201d (titled after the key leather bar of the era, replicated in \u201cCruising\u201d) can\u2019t altogether align these sentiments as it reaches for a kind of closure in its finale. But Schwarz\u2019s documentary is ultimately most perceptive on the enduring power of Friedkin\u2019s film itself \u2014 both as a formative, titillating queer text in its own right, and as a early, heedless case study in the industry\u2019s ongoing debate over representation and story ownership on screen.<\/p>\n

Read more \u2018The Odyssey\u2019 Challenge: Tom Holland Encourages Letterboxd Users to Document the Large Format Screens They See the Film On<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\t\t\u2018Mineshaft: The Cruising Murders\u2019 Review: Compelling Documentary Probes the Legacy of William Friedkin\u2019s Infamous Queer Thriller<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n

\n

\t\tReviewed online, April 7, 2026. In Tribeca Film Festival (Spotlight Documentary). Running time: 85 MIN.<\/p>\n<\/h2>\n

    \n
  • \nProduction:<\/strong>
    \n(Documentary) An Automat Pictures presentation. (World sales: Submarine Entertainment, New York City.) Producers: John Boccardo, Jeffrey Schwarz. Executive producers: Ron Nyswaner, Robbie Rogers, Alan Eichler.\t\t\t<\/li>\n
  • \nCrew:<\/strong>
    \nDirector, editor: Jeffrey Schwarz. Camera: Brian Wengrofsky, Jesse Dana. Music: Makeup and Vanity Set.\t\t\t<\/li>\n
  • \nWith:<\/strong>
    \nDan Savage, Michael Musto, Randy Jurgensen, Don Scardino, Robert Geary, Pamela Verrill Walker, Andy Humm, Frank Henenlotter, Jim Hubbard. \t\t\t<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Examining the controversy around ‘Cruising,’ Jeffrey Schwarz’s ‘Mineshaft: The Cruising Murders’ captures a tipping point in pre-AIDS queer culture.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1633,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1478,1479,1480,1481,1482],"class_list":["post-1634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-film","tag-cruising","tag-jeffrey-schwarz","tag-mineshaft-the-cruising-murders","tag-tribeca-film-festival-2","tag-william-friedkin"],"yoast_head":"\n\u2018Mineshaft: The Cruising Murders\u2019 Review: Compelling Documentary Probes the Legacy of William Friedkin\u2019s Infamous Queer Thriller - Relocation Observer<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/relocationobserver.com\/?p=1634\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u2018Mineshaft: The Cruising Murders\u2019 Review: Compelling Documentary Probes the Legacy of William Friedkin\u2019s Infamous Queer Thriller - 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