Tickled

While the title might suggest a film about a harmless fetish, this procedural-style documentary uncovers more emotional pain than physical pleasure. In the prologue, a TV reporter describes narrator and director David Farrier as "New Zealand’s favorite pop culture reporter." Always on the hunt for unusual stories, Farrier comes across a call for a "competitive endurance tickling" contest that involves flights to Los Angeles, four-night hotel stays, and $1,500 in cash. On the evidence of the video clips, it all looks rather wholesomely homoerotic (the male participants remain fully clothed during tickling sessions). Farrier proceeds to contact Jane O’Brien Media for an interview, but representative Debbie Kuhn refuses to speak to the openly gay journalist, noting that competitive tickling is "passionately and exclusively heterosexual." She follows up with a series of homophobic insults, which only inflames Farrier’s curiosity, so he enlists Dylan Reeve as co-director to help figure out what the heck is going on. And that’s when things get really weird. After blogging about their experience, the pair receive a letter from an attorney threatening legal action, and then three Keystone Cop-like Jane O’Brien functionaries fly to Auckland to try to talk them out of their planned film project. Undeterred, Farrier and Reeve travel to California and Michigan where they interview the only participants who are willing to speak about their tickling experiences on the record. Suffice to say that the individual behind the whole bizarre scheme turns out to be one of the biggest loony-tunes to ever hit the documentary circuit, exhibiting a sadism borne of a need to humiliate and control. A disturbing truth-is-stranger-than-fiction tale, this is recommended. (K. Fennessy)