Getting Inside the Minds of Killers

Arthur Dong didn’t intend to play as prominent a role in his new documentary, “Licensed to Kill,” which opened Friday. His plan was to visit prisons around the country, sit off-camera and simply observe dispassionately as men explained what personal demons drove them, not just to murder, but to murder homosexuals.

Were these men sociopaths or the product of parental and societal brainwashing?

“In the early cuts, I tried to remove all signs of my [interview] voice,” said Dong, best known for “Coming Out Under Fire,” a 1994 documentary based on Allan Berube’s history of gays in uniform during World War II. “I had no clear agenda, other than to let these men talk. What pushed them to this point where they killed a homosexual? Nine gunshots! Twenty-seven stab wounds! These were passionate acts of murder. I wanted to know if it was family upbringing or religion that taught them it’s OK to kill homosexuals.”

Eventually, Dong--an Emmy-nominated producer for KCET’s “Life & Times” series and former American Film Institute fellow--decided to leave his voice on the soundtrack. A victim of gay-bashing himself, he realized he was fated to do a cameo in his own cinema verite blend of “In Cold Blood” and one of last year’s most-talked-about documentaries, “Paradise Lost.”

In the spring of 1977, while walking in San Francisco’s Castro district, Dong and a friend barely escaped a carload of thugs shouting anti-gay epithets. A priest walking nearby wasn’t as lucky; he was severely beaten, and the incident received front-page coverage in local papers.

As part of his research for “Licensed to Kill,” Dong contacted the priest, who still had the newspaper clippings, which, to Dong’s surprise, quoted him at length. “I felt very emotionally attached to this man, whom I had never met,” Dong recalled.

And the terror of that night came flooding back for the San Francisco activist-filmmaker known for his studies of anti-Asian and gay prejudice, dating to an angry student short called “Public” and including 1983’s lyrical, Oscar-nominated “Sewing Woman.”

“It was all very strange from that point on,” said Dong. “The project changed; it became much more personal. Now I knew why I was doing this, and I made my [part of the] story stronger . . . because I too was a victim.”

Even now cringing at the word, Dong, 43, quickly added, “I did this film because I refuse to be a victim.”

Shot for $135,000 with grants from various foundations, “Licensed to Kill” combines six prison interviews with graphic crime-scene footage and the interrogation of a youth now serving time for the robbery-murder of a New York lawyer. The video (transferred to 16 mm) earned the documentary and filmmakers awards at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

To assure his participation in the ensuing debate, Dong also is hand-delivering his film to exhibitors. “It doesn’t stop here,” he said. “I’m still creating the film--creating an audience for it. With ‘Coming Out Under Fire,’ I let the distributor take care of getting the message out. What I didn’t realize is that I gave up the activist part of the process, which is why I became a filmmaker in the first place.”

Dong conceived “Licensed to Kill” as the third in a trilogy begun with “Coming Out Under Fire” and including “Out Rage ‘69” (a PBS “Question of Equality” segment chronicling the 1969 Stonewall Riots--in which gays and drag queens rebelled against New York City policemen trying to close down the Stonewall bar, which catered to gays--and formation of the Gay Liberation Front).

At least two of the killers profiled in “Licensed to Kill” talk about homosexual experiences. Others claim to be victims of child abuse. A few may have killed out of fear, not hatred. The heavily tattooed William Cross, serving time in Illinois, knifed a man to death during “a homosexual panic.” Jay Johnson--personable, frighteningly self-analytical--is a would-be politician-turned-serial killer. He stalked his victims (including a former state senator) in a Minneapolis park.

“[Cross] isn’t what we think of as a gay-basher,” Dong said. “He doesn’t hate homosexuals; he fears homosexuality in himself. Johnson, who is gay, hates being gay. When we told him our purpose, he talked rapid-fire for 30 minutes. You could tell he had all this pent up.”

In short, there are no easy or reassuring answers here.

“I’m opening up the discussion,” Dong said. “In order for us to conquer this problem we need to understand it. For the longest time, it’s been easy to point a finger and say, ‘Oh, it’s the religious right,’ or ‘It’s the neo-Nazis.’ ”

Does his research suggest violence against gays is escalating?

“It seems to be,” Dong said, “because the gay and lesbian community is more visible, more powerful.”

Dong also shows the grisly aftermath of several attacks. He debated endlessly over how much was too much and, after testing the film without the crime-scene photos, decided “it was very necessary for the audience to see the horror of the acts.”

For those who argue the documentary might inspire hate crimes, Dong is less reassuring: “Maybe some potential perpetrator will go, ‘I didn’t know gays cruise parks. I think I’ll go there and roll a couple of [homosexuals].’ I don’t know [if that will happen]. I hope not. . . . We in the gay community want to paint everything with pretty colors, but we need to acknowledge that the situation does exist. If we don’t talk about it, how can we fight it?”

Dong hopes to fold his skills into a theatrical feature. “Lotus,” his dramatic short about the now-outlawed Chinese custom of feet-binding, resulted in “breakfast after breakfast” with producers, but no studio deal.

“I’d love to do a feature,” he said. “But I don’t want to sound like a frustrated documentarian. I take Michael Apted [“Coal Miner’s Daughter,” “Incident at Oglala”] as my role model. He goes back and forth. The issue is one of fund-raising: It’s easier to raise $200,000 than $3 million.”