Must Read After My Death (2009)

Synopsis: The audio crackles and hums over a black screen, a woman's voice speaks "Friday, November 3rd, 1967. Hartford. This tape recorder was purchased so I might put down things I wanted our children to... The audio crackles and hums over a black screen, a woman's voice speaks "Friday, November 3rd, 1967. Hartford. This tape recorder was purchased so I might put down things I wanted our children to know. Then Bruce was taken sick and it became a therapeutic device for all of us. Well, let's start out... "

This is the voice of Allis.

In the 1950's and '60s Allis made over 200 8mm home movies of her happy life family. In the '60s, she made a series of audio recordings that would eventually be over fifty hours of spoken material, documenting the decline of her marriage for her psychiatrist.

Already in '61, in spoken letters on dictaphone records to and from her husband Charley, cracks are showing in the relationship. By 1965 they have decided to seek counseling. Allis outlines her reasons for this on a tape she secretly makes for their marriage counselor of the things she is not ready to talk about in front of Charley.

This eventually grew into a 300-page single spaced typed file on her marriage that included notes and transcripts of arguments. It constitutes her ‘case against Charley’.

A series of psychiatrists helped the family from bad to worse. Allis was encouraged to record her thoughts, and even the arguments at home by her psychiatrists. Later she plays the tapes to her principle therapist, the shadowy Dr. Lenn, as proof of her innocence. The confrontational sessions just heighten their anger. Allis and Charley’s fights get worse and worse.

Between 1967 and 1969 every member of the family goes into analysis. Bruce, at the age 14, is sent to an adult mental institution for nine months because he is acting out. Douglas spends the better part of his 9th and 10th years home school. When Chuck is killed in a car accident, the family takes a hiatus from therapy.

A year later Allis writes Dr. Lenn a letter, outlining once again Charley’s failings. She leaves it on the dining room table and Charley reads it, oddly resigned. Allis’ comments on this are the last page of her file. The two days later, Charley is curled up on the floor next to the bed, dead.

Must Read After My Death, is entirely created out of the tapes, films and photos Allis and her family made. As a family, they narrate their own tragedy in real-time. The director, Morgan Dews, is Allis and Charley's grandson.--© Official Site [More]

Director: Morgan Dews

Director: Morgan Dews
Producer: Morgan Dews, Sarah Langley
Composer: Paul Damian Hogan
Studio: Gigantic Pictures