Chaos: The Manson Murders

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Chaos: The Manson Murders

2025

1h 36m

Crime

Documentary

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Popcornmeter

56%

Tomatometer

34 Reviews

22%

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50+ Ratings

In August 1969, Charles Manson's followers killed seven people on his orders. Why? Explore a conspiracy of mind control, CIA experiments and murder.

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Critics Consensus

Errol Morris' Chaos chases too many red herrings to prove a definitive document on the Manson cult, but it does reaffirm why this crime spree continues to haunt the public consciousness over half a century later.

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Graeme Blundell

The Australian

Apr 21

Chaos is wonderfully weird, sensational, if in the end not all that convincing.

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Jonathan Romney

Financial Times

Mar 12

2/5

An Errol Morris film seriously grappling with the current epidemic of conspiracy theory would be worth watching, but Chaos is hardly that film.

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Alison Willmore

New York Magazine/Vulture

Mar 10

Chaos: The Manson Murders may only be 96 minutes long, but it feels padded, as though its existence is meant to serve as proof that even a documentary legend who helped establish the true-crime genre isn’t immune to the genre’s current streaming bloat.

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Daniel Gorman

In Review Online

Apr 3

It all adds up to more artless true-crime nonsense, which has proliferated at an alarming rate in our present streaming era. In this case, you’re far better off reading the book.

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Carla Hay

Culture Mix

Mar 30

Chaos: The Manson Murders is less of a documentary and more of an infomercial for Tom O'Neill's book and conspiracy theory that the U.S. government and Charles Manson used the same mind-control techniques to engineer the Manson Family cult murders.

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Shawn Edwards

Fox 4 Kansas City

Mar 20

2/5

After all the excessive mumbo jumbo, not a single thing is proven... it's just another quick grab for those infatuated with serial killers and mass murderers.

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p b

Nov 1

I read the reviews and didn't know what to expect. I will say they had some great old film footage that I don't think I saw before. It did show several sides of different theories which I found interesting. It amazed me that Manson was never put back in jail after several parole violations and one of the clinics he used was linked to some CIA and FBI activity. Overall not a bad watch if you're interested in possible reasons how and why Manson was able to engineer these crimes and how the Government may have been involved in keeping him out of jail.

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Stephen G.

@patient1 Oct 30

I've been watching Charles Manson, pretty much my entire life trying to understand how even with LSD he could be so charismatic that people would murder for him. I emotes this film greatly. They do a nice job of crime scene investigating and archival footage with Manson, and he really was quite full of himself.

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Chris H

Sep 10

This is a useful history of Manson and his cult and the sickening crimes they committed. There's nothing new here though - the CIA conspiracy thing looks like bunkum.

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Dave C

@kicks92 Jun 28

I thought this was a pretty good documentary. I enjoyed it. It makes me glad that he is gone now. What he did was horrible.

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Mark D

Apr 7

The book deserved a ten hour series, not this half baked rubbish

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Thomas B

Apr 6

Simply put, the book is WAY better. Read it. So much interesting info. This documentary isn't worth your time.

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Errol Morris

Director

Robert Fernandez

Producer

Steven Hathaway

Producer

Errol Morris

Producer

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Synopsis

In August 1969, Charles Manson's followers killed seven people on his orders. Why? Explore a conspiracy of mind control, CIA experiments and murder.

Director: Errol Morris
Producer: Robert Fernandez, Steven Hathaway, Errol Morris
Distributor: Netflix
Genre: Crime, Documentary
Original Language: English
Release Date (Streaming): Mar 7, 2025
Runtime: 1h 36m

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