The Honeymoon Killers

USA 2015

115 min

For audiences aged 16 and above

Fernandez and the 29-year-old, 200-pound Mrs. Beck, known as the "Lonely Hearts Killers" at the time of their trial, made a career of stealing from lonely women whom Fernandez met through correspondence clubs, with Mrs. Beck, a trained nurse, posing as his sister. Two of their more recalcitrant victims were murdered, and a third died as a result of an overdose of sleeping pills administered by Mrs. Beck.

The movie follows the killers from just before their meeting (through a lonely hearts club correspondence) until just before their trial. Although it takes only the slightest (and most essential) liberties with the facts of the Beck-Fernandez case, "The Honeymoon Killers" is basically a fiction film—of a type virtually unknown in recent years, except as transmuted in the myth-making romanticism of, say, a "Bonnie and Clyde." Within the limits of its type it is one of the best and, curiously, most beautiful American movies in recent years.

Roger Greenspun, The New York Times, 1970

Director: Leonard Kastle

Screenplay: Leonard Kastle

Cast: Shirley Stoler, Tony Lo Bianco, Mary Jane Higby, Doris Roberts, Kip McArdle

Production: nimi / Roxanne

Print: Hollywood Classics