Wisconsin Death Trip
1999, NR, 76 min.
Directed by James Marsh, Narrated by Ian Holm, Voices by , Starring .

Michael Lesy’s macabre 1973 cult book of photographs has been given the documentary treatment in this seemingly made-for-the-movies true story. The film documents the tragedy that befell the rural community of Black River Falls, Wisconsin during the 1890s when a huge number of the population died from diptheria, the brutal climate, and economic depression. As a result, an even larger number of the immigrant community went mad. Suicide, murder, arson, and occult fanaticism ran rampant. Narrator Ian Holm reads the newspaper death accounts on the soundtrack while the voluminous death photographs are revealed onscreen.

This article appears in February 8 • 2002.

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Marjorie Baumgarten is a film critic and contributing writer at The Austin Chronicle, where she has worked in many capacities since the paper's founding in 1981. She served as the Chronicle's Film Reviews editor for 25 years.