60
It's the interviews with Aileen herself that steal the show as she insists her mind is being controlled by radio waves -- her Mad Hatter personality beyond the scope of Broomfield's disingenuous tone to interpret.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
100
Christian Science Monitor by David Sterritt
In addition to its own merits as a social and cultural document, Broomfield's film continues the welcome trend of more and more nonfiction movies finding their way to theater screens and attracting wide general audiences.
80
It makes an eloquent case against the death penalty, especially when imposed on the mentally incompetent. For if one thing is clear by the time she went to the execution chamber, it's that Wuornos is barking mad, her eyes wild and vengeful, yet also, on some level, already dead.
60
Village Voice by Jessica Winter
Broomfield's investigatory technique remains a frustrating pileup of unfocused Q&As and misplaced credulity. But when Broomfield travels to her Michigan hometown, he pieces together a life blighted at breech-birth: a grotesque of abandonment, incest, physical and sexual abuse, pregnancy at 13, and homelessness.
70
The Hollywood Reporter by Kirk Honeycutt
The most damning account of the failure of the criminal justice system in America anyone is ever likely to see.
50
TV Guide Magazine by Maitland McDonagh
Broomfield's film is typically self-aggrandizing but filled with unsettling moments.
80
Los Angeles Times by Manohla Dargis
She was guilty, no doubt, but as this immensely moving film makes clear, Aileen Wuornos was also heartbreakingly human.
50
Broomfield's documentaries present life on the fringes as one long, sick joke. The joke still works, but in Life And Death Of A Serial Killer, it leaves a bitter aftertaste.
70
The New York Times by Stephen Holden
Presents itself as an anguished brief against capital punishment, especially the execution of people who are legally insane...But the timing of its release smacks of the very exploitation that Mr. Bloomfield condemns.