Mortified Nation

Filmmaker Michael Mayer's insightful and often entertaining documentary follows a cross-country tour built on an interesting concept: adults voluntarily going on stage before a live audience to read from the journals they wrote during childhood and adolescence. As one might expect, the revelation of secret and intimate thoughts recorded during a sensitive time alternate between being very funny and sadly poignant. Many of these volunteers expose pangs of first love or sexual desire, while others unleash a barrage of rage (with some very creative invective) toward the parents who didn't understand them or who in some way treated them unfairly. Other folks reveal how they felt about being homeless or desperately trying to repress their gay identity or just being terribly lonely. The film interviews several mental health experts who talk about why kids keep journals and how this can be a healthy exercise. But viewers also see footage of the show's producers vetting potential readers, sessions that look oddly like therapy. Mortified Nation captures an unusual project that lies halfway between comedy and tragedy, one that audiences eat up—not because they feel superior but because they can identify so much with what they hear. Recommended. Aud: C, P. (T. Keogh)