Hawkins-Williams fell for Williams Jr. because he represented a kind of life she never dreamed she could have, and, after a fashion, he delivered that for them, for a while at least. They pretended to enjoy well-earned American wealth for a few years with nice homes, fine dining, and luxury hobbies. Ultimately, however, she was just another means to an end. When released from prison, Williams Jr. didn’t try to contact her, despite there being no reason he shouldn’t. They were still married during and after their incarceration.
Williams Jr. is not a murderer, that we know of. During the course of the interviews about his life, he speaks with pride about shooting individuals and people thinking he’d killed someone. When talking of his M.O. during a robbery, which was to fire one shot in the bank (earning him the nickname “the shootist”), Williams Jr. boasts: “When I ask the manager or commercial teller if they want to be the next to die, and they can smell the acrid smoke of the gunpowder, and sometimes feel the warmth of the gun barrel next to their skin… they feel pretty certain that I have just shot a customer, or have at least shot someone in my past.” He does admit at one point to attempting to kill someone and failing. Johnny Williams Jr. is an uncommon breed of animal: he looks like a person and does a middling job of imitating human emotions. However, he has more in common temperamentally and morally with a venomous snake. For reasons only he knows, Williams Jr. kept detailed ledgers of his robberies. He reviews them throughout Carol and Johnny as the written record of his greatest accomplishments.
“…riveting…”
The intent of the documentarian raises an interesting question. Did he really accept that Williams Jr. was just a rogue with a devilish smile and a taste for the good life he deserved but couldn’t afford? Or is Barnicle winking at us while sitting with the bank robber, pretending to take him seriously? We shall assume good intent and trust that he said what he had to in order to keep the man talking. One can draw a parallel between Barnicle and Truman Capote when Capote was doing his interviews with Richard Hickock and Perry Smith for In Cold Blood.
Is Carol and Johnny worth your time? Absolutely. It’s riveting to delve deeply into Johnny William Jr.’s twisted psyche with his feral, mind-blowing absence of sympathy for anyone but himself. Keep in mind, though, that this is not the media-damning entertainment of Mickey and Mallory Knox from Natural Born Killers, and it’s not Arthur Penn’s pretty spin on Bonnie and Clyde. Nor is this a parable of true love delayed. This is the story of an evil man who isn’t as smart as he thinks and the woman who fell under his absolute control as he ruined her life, who are both now just sad old ex-cons.
Carol and Johnny screened at the 2022 Tribeca Film Festival.
"…the intent of the documentarian raises an interesting question."
