Glenn Palmedo-Smith Glenn Palmedo-Smith, on the set of his feature film “The Hungry Woman,” never bought the official explanation that a troubled Ian Spiro killed his family and then himself.

Glenn Palmedo-Smith admits he's obsessed with Ian Spiro, a man he never met. Fifteen years have passed and he can't let it go.

They were both living in Rancho Santa Fe when Spiro wound up in the middle of one of the most sensational murder cases in local history.

On Nov. 5, 1992, Spiro's wife and three children were found shot to death, each in the head, in separate bedrooms of their rented home on Avenida Maravillas. Spiro, last seen disheveled and in his bathrobe by the family maid, was gone. Had he been abducted? Fled?

Union-Tribune file photo On Nov. 5, 1992, investigators looked for clues at the home in Rancho Santa Fe where Ian Spiro's wife, Gail, and their three children were found shot to death.

Newspaper accounts were filled with breathless intrigue, especially in England. Spiro was British, and reportedly a spy. There was speculation that the family was executed because of his involvement in shadowy deals in the Middle East.

A few days later, Spiro was found in the desert, slumped behind the steering wheel of his locked Ford Explorer. An autopsy determined the cause of death: cyanide poisoning.

Detectives eventually concluded that Spiro, beset with financial trouble, killed his family and himself. Palmedo-Smith didn't buy it.

Union-Tribune file photo Ian and Gail Spiro in an undated photo; He was found dead in his car a few days after his family's slaying.

“I hate having the wool pulled over my eyes,” he said. “The official explanation was too neat and easy.”

He thought he saw a movie in the case. Trained as a filmmaker at San Diego State in the 1970s, he'd gone instead into real-estate development, made a fortune and then lost it in an economic downturn in the early '90s. The ensuing bankruptcy left him in a midlife crisis about his future. Back to his passion, he decided – movies.

Never much at a loss for confidence – “I learned early on that attitude is everything” – Palmedo-Smith talked his way into meetings at various Hollywood studios.

They weren't terribly impressed. “Everybody told me that at most what I had was a TV movie of the week,” he said. Nothing against TV movies, but that's not what he had in mind.

“The Hungry Woman” A feature film about immigration and murder by local writer-director Glenn Palmedo-Smith When: Opens Wednesday in the U.S. and Friday in Mexico. Where: UltraStar theaters in San Diego and Imperial counties, and Cinepolis theaters in Tijuana, Tecate, Mexicali and Ensenada

Nursing his wounded ego out loud at a bar one day, he remembers an old guy turning to him and asking, “Why don't you tell the story through the maid's eyes?”

So he did.

“The Hungry Woman,” a 90-minute bilingual film, opens this week in about 15 theaters on both sides of the border: Wednesday in the San Diego area and Friday in Mexico. If it does well in its limited release, it could move on to more venues.

“I'm finally living my dream,” Palmedo-Smith said.

And taking Ian Spiro along for the ride.

Uphill battle

His is in some ways a familiar Hollywood story, the little guy knocking on the door over and over to get in. First there's inspiration, then rejection and betrayal, then redemption. Throw in a patient spouse, eye-rolling friends, and a dash or two of financial ruin.

Glenn Palmedo-Smith Olivia Peña (left) and Maricela Ochoa, in a scene from “The Hungry Woman.”

To work on the first script, finished in 1994, Palmedo-Smith hauled a restored 1947 trailer to the mountains near Santa Cruz for weeks-long skirmishes with the keyboard.

The story that emerged features a Mexican immigrant, Evelia, and her brother, Alejandro, who come to Southern California and live in a migrant-worker camp similar to those found in the North County.

She gets a job as a maid (for a Spiro-like family) and attracts the romantic attentions of a wealthy business heir. Her brother struggles to find steady work and gets beat up. Hope and despair abound.

Palmedo-Smith spent several years polishing the script, lining up investors, choosing a cast, scouting locations all over the county. Filming took about six weeks in the fall of 2000. The cavernous hulk of the failed trash-recycling plant in San Marcos became the set for the migrant camp.

Originally called “El Campo,” the film used the Spiro case as a backdrop to create tension and conflict. Palmedo-Smith told a reporter in early 2001 that he hoped to get the movie screened at the Sundance Film Festival in Utah.

A year later, most of the Spiro elements had been cut from the movie, and it had a new title: “Los Patriotas.”

Palmedo-Smith said he lost creative control when he brought in a lawyer and producer from Los Angeles to help finish the film. Meetings were held, papers got shuffled and he said he found himself locked out of the editing room.

“Los Patriotas” was shown at film festivals in San Diego, San Francisco and Florida, but Smith said when they tried to find a buyer to move the film into theaters, nobody was interested.

“It's an art film,” he was told. “Take it to PBS.”

Palmedo-Smith didn't blame them. “I hated it myself,” he said.

A few years ago, with the nationwide debate about immigration heating up, Palmedo-Smith saw an opportunity to resurrect the project. He thought there would be a market for the movie, especially among Latinos.

Working with film editor Chris Peterson (“Who Killed the Electric Car?”), he restored scenes involving the Spiro homicides and re-arranged others. A new score was added. And the title was changed again, to “The Hungry Woman.”

“The two films are truly not even in the same universe,” he said.

About 70 percent of the movie is in Spanish (with English subtitles). The rest is in English (with Spanish subtitles). Palmedo-Smith calls it “the first foreign film ever made in America.”

Wary after his earlier dealings with industry insiders, Palmedo-Smith is handling many of the logistics himself now – assembling press kits and movie-lobby signs, burning film-trailer DVDs in his home studio, talking to theater owners. He's been filming celebration videos (birthdays, anniversaries, retirements) to make ends meet.

“When he gets passionate about something, he doesn't let go,” his wife, Linda, said. “Sometimes it's hard on him, and us, but that's his make-up. It's who he is.”

His total immersion in the project can make him seem a little too calculating, though. During an interview for this story, he punctuated several of his comments with, “That's a good quote. You should use it.”

And the “Palmedo” part of his name is a recent addition. He said it's from his mother's family, which has been traced back to 14th Century Spain. He's long wanted to use it, he said, but he also acknowledged that, as the film's writer/director, having a Spanish surname might help in certain markets.

Palmedo-Smith, 55, has a thing for conspiracy theories.

In the early 1990s, he and his wife bought a painting for $3,000 at a flea market. He decided to learn more about the artist, a black self-taught painter named Ellis Ruley.

What he unearthed led him to conclude that Ruley's death in Connecticut in 1959 – an accident, according to authorities – was probably murder, maybe at the hands of the Ku Klux Klan.

That work led to a book, “Discovering Ellis Ruley,” a traveling art exhibit, a CBS interview with Charles Kuralt, and a documentary film (shot but not yet released).

Palmedo-Smith is a student of President Kennedy's assassination, too, and sides with those who don't believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. He's read dozens of books about it. He even has a piece of fence from Dealey Plaza in Dallas, where the shooting occurred.

So it's not surprising that he would latch onto the Spiro case and all the speculation that has swirled around it: Israeli and Iranian hit squads, botched helicopter deals, Lebanese hostages.

But for him, it was also personal. “This happened in my backyard,” he said.

It bothered him when detectives cited financial trouble as the reason for Spiro to kill his wife and kids. Palmedo-Smith has had his own money woes – bankruptcy, tax liens – “and the last thing I'd ever think about was killing my family.”

In the 15 years since Spiro died, Palmedo-Smith has continued to research the case, collecting documents, talking to acquaintances in Rancho Santa Fe and elsewhere, putting together his own version of what happened.

He thinks terrorists from the Middle East killed Spiro's family. When Spiro came home and found the bodies, he called his spy contacts. They lured him to the desert and killed him because he “knew too much” about various covert actions, Palmedo-Smith said, then made it look like a suicide.

All speculation, he admits – but he believes it's informed speculation. “To me, it's just so clear,” he said.

When they officially closed the case in November 1995, detectives cited their own clear evidence, including gunshot residue found on Spiro's bathrobe and a rambling tape he made about desperate attempts to get out from under nearly $5 million in debts.

People who remember the case will catch the references to it in the movie, even if the family name has been changed from Spiro to Muelhaus. Those who aren't familiar with it may gloss right over it.

When the movie was shown in June at a national convention of Hispanic journalists, a reviewer for the gathering's newspaper, The Latino Reporter, made no mention of the subplot. (He called the film “an enjoyable ride” and “a visual feast.”)

Palmedo-Smith is optimistic the film will do well. “I see this thing capturing people's imagination,” he said. “Call me an idiot, but I just believe it.”

And if it doesn't, he's got a handful of other scripts under way. He said he'd like to look back on his life one day and see a body of movie work – “a nice way of saying I was here,” he said.

He thinks 10 is a good, round number. Ten films. Ten obsessions.