Say no to meth
Man on meth steals a National Guard tank in San Diego and goes on a rampage, ending in his death on State Highway 163.
Monday was odd documentary day on The Sundance Film Channel and I was able to sit down and watch one short one. It was called Cul de Sac: A Suburban War Story. It's an obscure little work about Shawn Nelson, the guy that in 1995 stole a tank and, until the police killed him, roared along a street in Clairmont California, smashing cars and tearing down traffic poles.
You've seen the footage, I'm sure - I know I had many times, usually on one of those World's Hairiest Police Chases - type shows. He's rampaging down suburban streets, veering out of his way to smash cars like stomping on beer cans. Broken-off fire hydrants spray skyward in towering fountains. He rams a couple RV's; which explode into kindling. No backstory is ever given - only that the man was crazed.
The documentary has no voiceover - it shows a mix of interviews with Nelson's friends stirred up with news footage of the chase and historic films of Clairmont's defense industry.
That's one weakness of the film. The director tries to implicate the government's use of Methamphetamine by bomber pilots during WWII and the demise of the defense industry in San Diego (a lot of time is wasted in archive footage of happy workers at Convair and General Dynamics assembling missiles and bombers intercut with devastation in Europe and Korea - we already know all that) with the ultimate doom of Shawn Nelson. The filmmaker never closes the deal, however. The neighborhood might be spiraling downhill - but Nelson was a successful plumber at one time - his insanity and demise wasn't the government, it was speed.
Some guy in the film (I'm not sure who - maybe a local professor) has one interesting insight into the Meth terror in the town. He said, "This suburb was settled by hard-working, independent people. Methamphetamine is a terribly attractive drug to them, because, in the short term it makes you more hard-working and independent." Longer-term, of course, it kills you.
The film does succeed in painting a terrifying picture of speed addiction (a non-fiction Spun). The guy was totally freaked. He actually did something crazier (if a little safer) than steal a tank. He had a gold mine dug in his back yard. A horrifying segment of the film shows some live evening news as the frightened reporter works his way through the unbelievable trash of the house to take a look at the 25 foot deep hole dug into the back yard. When it's finally shown, you're shocked at how professional the dig itself looks.
He was serious about the gold thing. That's why he stole the tank - he was on his way down to City Hall to protest the fact that they were slow to issue him a mining claim in his backyard. He seemed to know what he was doing - at least a little. He had converted his hot tub into a sluice. He had a small army of local tweakers dedicated to helping him with his project. "It was really weird down in that hole, man," one says. What an awful picture - a bunch of speed freaks digging a gold shaft 24-7 down in a suburban San Diego back yard.
He was working his insane scam in a couple directions. "All these tweakers would do anything he wanted," one frightening woman, obviously high, said, "They all wanted out and he promised he'd teach 'em to be plumbers." They all actually believed that there was gold down there. Apparently Nelson was buying flakes of gold, mixing it in with the dirt, to, "Convince the tweakers to keep working until they actually hit the real thing." Eventually, of course, he ran out of money - no utilities on his house that was about to be foreclosed, no more gold, and, most importantly, no more drugs.
That was when he went completely over and stole the tank, refusing to give up until the police shot him while the tank was stuck on a highway median. One of Nelson's friends went on a long tirade about how the police didn't need to shoot him - that he didn't deserve it. Ummm, I realize that police and deadly force is a difficult subject, one with many issues... but this wasn't some teenager with a Saturday Night Special. The guy HAD A TANK and was not afraid to use it. He had broken out onto a freeway and was heading downtown. It's incredible that nobody was hurt - he was crushing as many cars as he could - he didn't know for sure they were empty. As one other friend said, "Thank goodness it wasn't loaded."
There is a hole at the center of the documentary, though, and that was Shawn Nelson himself. There is very little about his past. I would like to have seen more about him and less about General Dynamics. He was a veteran; that's how he knew how to drive a tank - but the film never delves into exactly how he was able to get the thing out of the National Guard Armory. Other than the drugs and the insanity he remains as much as enigma as he was when we saw that tank rumbling around on the evening news.
Monday was odd documentary day on The Sundance Film Channel and I was able to sit down and watch one short one. It was called Cul de Sac: A Suburban War Story. It's an obscure little work about Shawn Nelson, the guy that in 1995 stole a tank and, until the police killed him, roared along a street in Clairmont California, smashing cars and tearing down traffic poles.You've seen the footage, I'm sure - I know I had many times, usually on one of those World's Hairiest Police Chases - type shows. He's rampaging down suburban streets, veering out of his way to smash cars like stomping on beer cans. Broken-off fire hydrants spray skyward in towering fountains. He rams a couple RV's; which explode into kindling. No backstory is ever given - only that the man was crazed.
The documentary has no voiceover - it shows a mix of interviews with Nelson's friends stirred up with news footage of the chase and historic films of Clairmont's defense industry.
That's one weakness of the film. The director tries to implicate the government's use of Methamphetamine by bomber pilots during WWII and the demise of the defense industry in San Diego (a lot of time is wasted in archive footage of happy workers at Convair and General Dynamics assembling missiles and bombers intercut with devastation in Europe and Korea - we already know all that) with the ultimate doom of Shawn Nelson. The filmmaker never closes the deal, however. The neighborhood might be spiraling downhill - but Nelson was a successful plumber at one time - his insanity and demise wasn't the government, it was speed.
Some guy in the film (I'm not sure who - maybe a local professor) has one interesting insight into the Meth terror in the town. He said, "This suburb was settled by hard-working, independent people. Methamphetamine is a terribly attractive drug to them, because, in the short term it makes you more hard-working and independent." Longer-term, of course, it kills you.
The film does succeed in painting a terrifying picture of speed addiction (a non-fiction Spun). The guy was totally freaked. He actually did something crazier (if a little safer) than steal a tank. He had a gold mine dug in his back yard. A horrifying segment of the film shows some live evening news as the frightened reporter works his way through the unbelievable trash of the house to take a look at the 25 foot deep hole dug into the back yard. When it's finally shown, you're shocked at how professional the dig itself looks.
He was serious about the gold thing. That's why he stole the tank - he was on his way down to City Hall to protest the fact that they were slow to issue him a mining claim in his backyard. He seemed to know what he was doing - at least a little. He had converted his hot tub into a sluice. He had a small army of local tweakers dedicated to helping him with his project. "It was really weird down in that hole, man," one says. What an awful picture - a bunch of speed freaks digging a gold shaft 24-7 down in a suburban San Diego back yard.
He was working his insane scam in a couple directions. "All these tweakers would do anything he wanted," one frightening woman, obviously high, said, "They all wanted out and he promised he'd teach 'em to be plumbers." They all actually believed that there was gold down there. Apparently Nelson was buying flakes of gold, mixing it in with the dirt, to, "Convince the tweakers to keep working until they actually hit the real thing." Eventually, of course, he ran out of money - no utilities on his house that was about to be foreclosed, no more gold, and, most importantly, no more drugs.
That was when he went completely over and stole the tank, refusing to give up until the police shot him while the tank was stuck on a highway median. One of Nelson's friends went on a long tirade about how the police didn't need to shoot him - that he didn't deserve it. Ummm, I realize that police and deadly force is a difficult subject, one with many issues... but this wasn't some teenager with a Saturday Night Special. The guy HAD A TANK and was not afraid to use it. He had broken out onto a freeway and was heading downtown. It's incredible that nobody was hurt - he was crushing as many cars as he could - he didn't know for sure they were empty. As one other friend said, "Thank goodness it wasn't loaded."
There is a hole at the center of the documentary, though, and that was Shawn Nelson himself. There is very little about his past. I would like to have seen more about him and less about General Dynamics. He was a veteran; that's how he knew how to drive a tank - but the film never delves into exactly how he was able to get the thing out of the National Guard Armory. Other than the drugs and the insanity he remains as much as enigma as he was when we saw that tank rumbling around on the evening news.
posted by McCormick at 9:41 PM
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