The story of Mark Brandon Read, who was better known by the name “Chopper” Read, is one of the most notorious in Australian history. Not only was he a bloodthirsty criminal who took the lives of anyone who would dare cross him (often doing it with a grin on his ghastly face), he was also someone who seemed to take pride in his work, being the consummate professional, even if it meant that this extended to murder. He was an almost folkloric figure in his native country, where his status as something of a renegade celebrity (including a comedy tour with another notorious criminal, Roger “The Dodger” Rogerson) is both terrifying and oddly amusing – never someone who was praised for his actions, but rather a counterculture icon that pandered to the sometimes dark sense of humour held by many of his compatriots, Chopper was a fascinating figure. His life was the subject of a film, aptly titled Chopper, which served as the directorial debut for Andrew Dominik, who has gone on to become one of our most celebrated filmmakers, someone who may have a relatively small body of work, but where each one, whether narrative or documentary, is artistically resonant and undeniably fascinating. Chopper is not an easy film to watch – it is violent, brutal and often quite morally ambigious, both in how it perceives its subject, and portrays his actions. However, Dominik has never been a filmmaker all that interested in playing by the rules in any discernible way, so it is ultimately not surprising that, even when dealing with a real-life figure, Dominik would prove to have quite a distinct approach to telling his story, taking this film into a dimension filled with despair, violence and dark comedy, which seems oddly appropriate considering the subject matter.

An interesting fact about Chopper is that the subject himself was involved in casting the actor who would play him on screen – and while it would seem perfectly understandable from a contemporary perspective for Eric Bana to be cast (since he has proven himself a truly versatile actor), it was actually quite a peculiar choice, and one that can easily be motivated by Chopper’s very strange sense of humour. A stand-up comedian more known for embodying the idea of larrikinism in popular sketch series, he was not someone we’d have expected to be capable of giving such a deep, insightful performance. What could’ve been considered stunt-casting actually turns out to be a stroke of genius, since Bana proves his mettle as a dramatic actor, using his background to bring a sense of darkly comical nuance to the character, but refusing to play him as a caricature or stereotype, instead getting into the mind of Chopper – and it only helps that the man himself was heavily involved in the production, serving as something of a creative consultant, mostly in allowing Bana to immerse himself in his world, interacting with him to get under his skin and fully understand what propelled this notorious criminal to commit such atrocities. Bana is simply phenomenal – he is frequently grinning from missing ear to missing ear, armed with a kind of despicable charm that only serves to showcase the psychopathic rage lingering beneath this man, as well as his easygoing mentality that some may consider to be his most terrifying trait – he’d kill someone with the same passive ease as if he was embracing a friend, and the actor brings all of these small idiosyncrasies to life throughout this intimidating but brilliant performance that stands as a turning point in a career that has seen many fascinating entries.

Tonally, there is a quality to Chopper that keeps us entirely engaged – the film makes the small but pivotal decision to base it on Chopper’s own memoirs, rather than the more well-known news stories and court cases that are known by the public. Ultimately, this decision made it clear what Dominik was trying to do – he wasn’t interested in looking at the subject’s crimes (it only focuses on two of his supposedly seventeen murders), nor the public’s reactions to it. Instead, Chopper is a small-scale character study that aims to look at the notorious criminal’s life through his own perspective – most of the film takes place in bleak prisons cells, or squalid apartments, and rarely ventures away from Chopper’s perspective. It places the emphasis on his version of events, and while most of what we see here has been corroborated as factual, what interests us is how he perceived these events. The situation leading up to his crimes, and the immediate aftermath, are shown in vivid detail, with Chopper’s varying levels of eccentricity anchoring them and adding a level of absurdism that is all the more potent when we consider how these were very likely true, at least to an extent. His intentions were opaque – the film structures itself around a highly-publicized television interview undertaken between Chopper and some journalists, and while this framing structure is effective (taking the words directly from the real interview), it doesn’t do much in explaining why he was driven to commit such crimes. Chopper dares to rebut the common theme in crime films, whereby there is supposedly some overarching motivation for one to resort to a life of crime. In the case of the titular character here, it seems that his reasons for doing what he did is solely the product of wanting to see if he could get away with it – and when he didn’t, his next logical step was to take pride in these actions. It’s a strange but effective way of looking at such an individual, the film itself being remarkably adept at both the small details and broad ideas.

Considering the subject that Dominik was working with, and the components that went into its creation, he didn’t have too much work to do in terms of bringing Chopper’s story to the screen, especially since Bana was doing most of the heavy lifting. However, never one to be upstaged by his own collaborators, the director asserts his own artistic vision in the creation of the film. Chopper is exceptionally well-made, but you might not be able to tell quite so easily, since much of what makes this film effective is how intentionally hideous it is. The life of a criminal is not glamorous in the vast majority of cases, and while it’s tempting to position one’s lifestyle as being one filled with luxury and wealth, in the instance of Chopper, it was beyond depressing, the bleak nature of his everyday life being perfectly captured throughout this film. The spaces are small and poorly lit, the camera work being jarring in a way that makes the viewer profoundly uncomfortable. The film becomes almost a psychological horror, a haunting and harrowing character study of one of the most maniacal criminals in the history of his country, whose pleasure and pride in his crimes are beyond terrifying. This is all conveyed so brilliantly in this film, which frequently (and without much hesitation) places us in a position where there is absolutely nowhere to run – the squalid nature of his life is reflected in the filmmaking, which may be as discomfiting as a film can possibly get, but ultimately serves a remarkable purpose, the likes of which are not often seen, especially not in this particular genre, which doesn’t avoid physical violence most of the time, but rarely carries the same emotional horror embedded deep in this film.

Undeniably, Chopper is not a film for the faint of heart. Dominik wasn’t intending to make a film that would appeal to everyone, with most of what propels this film being the sense of horror that underpins it. The tone is as deranged as the subject matter, with the director refusing to make it clear whether we should be laughing or screaming as he carefully explores the mind of a man who would be a prime case study for any psychological analysis into the mentality of a criminal, since not only was he compelled by factors unknown to anyone looking at his strange behaviour, he actually found a way to capitalize on cold-blooded murder. Mercifully, Chopper is not positioning him as some misunderstood outsider, but rather someone who acted in ways that were beyond abhorrent, and was suitably punished as such. Never sympathetic, but consistently entertaining, Chopper is a remarkable film, a violent but enthralling psychological thriller with brief touches of pitch-black humour, which help add nuance and elegance to an otherwise despicable human being and his actions, which were beyond reprehensible. Bana’s performance is terrifyingly impressive, and the filmmaking itself is effective, especially in how its arid nature reflects the reality of someone like Chopper, whose criminal offences were the result of an addiction, stripping his life of all colour, and turning him into a maniacal shadow of a man, whose existence would be tragic had he not lacked the fundamental remorse needed to lead a moral life, which is exactly what this film is calling into question, a subject that it has very little hesitation in fully exploring, all in the efforts to showcase the dark recesses of the human mind, as defined by a man driven crazy, not by lust for power or wealth, but impeccable work ethic, even if it meant evolving into a murderous psychopath who showed very little respect for anyone other than himself.