Creepy "Cropsey" on Investigation Discovery Tonight

Filmmakers Joshua Zeman and Barbara Brancaccio used to hear all about the mysterious boogey man "Cropsey" during their separate childhoods growing up on Staten Island, and they turned their fascination with the NY area urban legend into the acclaimed documentary Cropsey, receiving its TV premiere tonight on the Investigation Discovery Channel. An audience and critical favorite on the film festival circuit, Cropsey looks into the gruesome 1987 murder of a young girl and the unsolved disappearances of three other children, the crimes ultimately pinned on a former resident of a facility for the mentally disabled which was the preferred locale for the scary Cropsey tales.

Here is the ID Channel's promo for their presentation, which starts at 9pm tonight:



Cropsey seems the perfect Friday the 13th fare, unfortunately all the more eerie and ultimately more affecting for being a true story with every element of a perfect urban legend -- frightening hermit, abusive mental institution, missing kids never found, abandoned public buildings -- that couldn't be put down. Much more than just an exploitative look at a cruel murder and its unsavory details, Cropsey is an unblinking look at our need to peek into the scary dark corners and explain them away, either with bravado or thru the law.

Here's the original theatrical trailer for Cropsey, twice as long as the TV promo:

Cropsey airs tonight beginning at 9pm on Investigation Discovery, nominally in two parts with the second part at 10pm but it's the whole movie, and repeats at midnight and 1am tonight, and also early tomorrow morning at 7am and 8am (yikes!). Investigation Discovery thrives somewhat under the radar, but they program an interesting collection of true crime docs, celebrity death investigations (I just watched one last night on the death of Princess Grace), and other crime-y stuff; do take this opportunity to acquaint yourself with them.