It has a strange effect to see “The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox”, the new True Crime series coming on August 20 on Disney+. It tells a crime in fictional form that everyone, unfortunately, we remember very well, that of Meredith Kercher, the English student found dead on November 1, 2007 in Perugia.

The point of view of the story? It is not that of the victim, killed at the age of twenty -two in his house in via della Pergola where he lived as a student Erasmus, nor that of his family or friends.

To give a very personal and precise perspective to the story, in fact, it is one person: Amanda Knox, the twenty year old American initially stored guilty of the murder of her roommate Kercher and finally acquitted, definitively, in 2015 after almost 4 years of preventive detention.

To take on her clothes, in the series, is the actress Grace Van Patten (Nine Perfect Strangers).

A very American and caricatured series

Behind the entire American production of this title – created by Kj Steinberg (This is us) – there is the same Knox who chooses to aim the spotlight on himself and adapt his autobiography of 2013 ‘Waiting to Be Heard: A Memoir by Amanda Knox’ for the small screen. The goal? Show everyone his truth, his essence and change the narrative on his person to definitively get rid of the prejudices that have overwhelmed it over the years.

This unilateral choice of perspective, inevitably, has consequences on the rendering of the story: Americanizes and makes it rather stereotyped and caricatured especially in the image it proposes of Italy of which the cultural rates, the judicial system, the superstitious nature are “mocked”.

What this series focuses on the most, which does not stand out for the quality of interpretation, script and direction, is not the memory of the figure of Meredith Kercher or an in -depth analysis on the dynamics of the crime but wanting to portray Knox as a modern heroine, a aspirational model, the protagonist of a “romantic” fairy tale.

And romanticism is one of the predominant and more controversial aspects of the story. The direction of direction, the effect dialogues and even a soundtrack of the series make the story almost fairytale, dreamy, making us forget, for a moment, that we are talking about a murder.

And this is how attention moves all on entertainment, on the storytelling “catches emotions”, on the idealization of Amanda Knox.

Yet another spectacularization of a crime

Seeing “The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox”, especially for those who have witnessed all the phases of this judicial affair, can be disturbing and leave a feeling of bitterness.

It now seems that, nowadays, in the world of entertainment, as well as in real life, the craving for popularity, the search for sensationalism and the manias of protagonism are essential elements to be able to tell a story even if this features a girl brutally killed at just over twenty years.

True crime have always been part of the oral, literary, cinematographic tradition of humanity and will continue to be part of it but one wonders: is this kind of story really idealize the best way to satisfy our thirst for entertainment?

VOTE: 5.9