Crime Scene: The Vanishing at Cecil Hotel.
I’ve become a little consumed by the mystery of Elisa Lam—a twenty-one-year-old student from Canada that checked in to the Cecil Hotel in downtown Los Angeles in the heart of Skid Row in 2013 and never checked out.
The documentary on Netflix splashed across the top banner of my screen last night: Crime Scene: The Vanishing at Cecil Hotel and I was 100% in the mood for a true crime binge.
The case is both riveting and absolutely tragic telling the story of a young woman under serious mental distress that met unfortunate circumstances.
A lot of the documentary centers on the infamous Cecil Hotel—a giant, 700-room inn built in the 1920s with a sketchy and spooky history of dead hookers, drug overdoses, and heaps of crime. In the midst of LA’s “homeless population containment,” the Cecil Hotel offered low-income guests short-term housing and tourists cheap, hostel-style accommodations.
I went into the documentary expecting the case to twist and turn with wild claims of paranormal activity—ghosts flying down halls, mysteriously stalling elevators, and inexplicable flickering of bathroom light fixtures—and I was ready to BELIEVE EVERY MINUTE. It doesn’t take much for me to get on the train of “a ghost had something to do with this.” I think it’s wilder to believe that only what we physically see is all there is than it is to believe that there are dimensions beyond us and maybe, just maybe, they’re able to interact with our world.
The documentary was, thankfully, much more logically thorough as homicide investigators retraced the steps of the case from beginning to end.
What made the story of Elisa Lam interesting both back in 2013 and today was that she was an avid Tumblr blogger and bore her soul in her online posts. Throughout the series, the producer shared verbatim Elisa’s posts revealing how relatable, empathetic, and introspective of a woman she was. Like poetry, her words weaved together the events of the documentary and painted the picture of a victim whose accounts of life, struggle, and change were so supremely human and consequently, comforting.
The infamous elevator security video footage that the police released during the active case was a main point covered in the documentary where “internet sleuths” and YouTubers saw the clip and were so disturbed that they began their own investigations into Elisa Lam’s case.
I get where these internet MacGyver’s were coming from. If I were a YouTuber in 2013 (or any year for that matter), I think I’d have a channel dedicated to voicing my opinions about the details of true crime investigations too. What else except old Vine compilations and parody videos is interesting on YouTube? However, in retrospect, to see how accusations began to explode on the internet as people grasped for answers and closure with limited and biased information was as equally worrisome as that elevator video.
This made me, in some way, understand why people can lose their way in the intrigue of conspiracy theorizing. We, as human beings, in our desperation will always write our own reality. We make up stories, exaggerate and fabricate facts, and deny vehemently anything that disagrees with the assessment we want to be true.
People on the internet fell in love with Elisa Lam and wholeheartedly wanted to seek and dispense justice on the person that caused her death. Because of the stunning honesty that Elisa shared on the web, people felt like they truly knew her and therefore, passionately responded to the unresolved elements of her puzzling case. Some people went as far as checking into the Cecil Hotel themselves and conducting their own investigations documenting their findings on video.
The phenomenon of how beautifully Elisa’s words reached her readers and how far her writing has gone beyond her life here on earth is astounding.
It makes me think of Anne Frank. Could she have ever imagined that her diary entries would be read across the globe? While she was writing about peeling potatoes and struggling to make sense of her family’s life of hiding, did she ever once have the idea that her story would be known by millions?
It’s strange that there are people whose lives seemingly have greater impacts once they’re gone. What could any of us be inadvertently doing today, investing in today, being honest about today that doesn’t change today, but in a thousand tomorrow’s from now, it suddenly does?
The documentary of Elisa Lam closed with one of her posts that read: “I suppose that is the human condition—to feel so big, so important, but just a flicker in the universe and the struggle to come to terms with those two truths.”
I agree with her. Rest in peace, Elisa Lam.