Movie Review: Tread

Tread *** ½ / *****

Directed by: Paul Solet.

Written by: Paul Solet.

 

Marvin Heemeyer believed his adopted hometown of Granby, Colorado screwed him over big time – a grand conspiracy by the town’s wealthy people, the town council and the media just to get to him, so in 2004, he decided to get his revenge on the town itself. He spent months inside a small garage, retrofitting a bulldozer he had purchased, to make it virtually impossible to stop. He then proceeded to methodically get his revenge on the people he was convinced had screwed him, by destroying their businesses, their home and everything else in his path. Miraculously, the only person who ended up dead that day was Marv himself – but not until he had accomplished much of what he set out to do.

 

Paul Solet’s documentary Tread tells this story – and is basically divided into three acts. Act one is built around the many hours of tapes that Marv left behind before going on his rampage – where he lays out how Granby tried to royally screw him over. It all started, according to Marv, when he purchased a plot of land at auction to build his muffler shop. Another man was interested in that land to build a concrete plant – and left angry. That man would eventually buy a piece of property adjacent to Marv’s – and went about getting the permits to build there. This angered Marv – as did the requirement the city that he had to connect with the town’s sewer’s system. It gets kind of bureaucratic – but essentially, Marv thinks that everyone was out just to screw him over personally – and that everyone was against him. We hear as much from him on the tapes – and from some of his friends, who remain sympathetic to Marv.

 

To hear the people who “screwed” Marv over however, nothing could be further from the truth. And while you know that they are telling their version of the story, the one that will make them look blameless, and Marv isn’t around anymore to counteract that – it’s hard to argue with them. Marv was able to build a business on that plot of land that he purchased for $45,000. It made him good money for a decade. He could have sold that land at a hefty profit a number of times – and did indeed sell it the year before his rampage for $400,000 (the new owner then promptly connected to the town’s sewer without complaint). The town council did take his complaints about the concrete plant seriously – seriously enough that restrictions were put on it to try and appease Marv, and others who weren’t happy about it. But to Marv, it all amounts to a conspiracy to screw him over.

 

The final 30 minutes is dedicated to the rampage itself. We have some footage of what happened that day – and most of the people who were there are interviewed about what precisely Marv did. It was a systematic destruction of everything he could in that town. His bulldozer what outfitted with metal sheeting – there was nowhere to shoot that would get him. He had a gun – a 50 caliber – that he could shoot out though, keeping people back. It really is like something out of a horror movie – an unstoppable machine of destruction.

 

Director Paul Solet has mainly made horror movies before tackling this documentary. He builds slowly, laying the groundwork in the first hour, so you understand what you’re going to see in that last 30 minutes. He doesn’t strain for political points – because he doesn’t have to – it’s all right there. What drove Marv is the same type of anti-government hatred that drove incidents like Ruby Ridge, or what drives people like the Bundy’s – who occupy a piece of government land because they feel it’s their god given right, that they are the true American patriots, and that America has become, essentially, a fascist state. It’s an incredibly sad story – mainly because Marv couldn’t see past his own anger, his own rage to see, really, how good he had it. You can’t fight City Hall – but Marv couldn’t even see he didn’t need to fight it at all.