Director: Jonathan Caouette
Year Released: 2004
Rating: 2.0
A diva's wet dream: a chance to engage in self-flagellation for the camera (his own) and use the third person to describe his plight, but there is admittedly something so brazen about the project (home movie spookiness, perhaps, or Caouette's inclusion of footage that anyone with a shred of modesty would have taken and destroyed) that it cannot be so easily thrown aside (there's no irony here - it's pure, confrontational loathing). Edited on an iMac with iMovie for very little money, it warrants kudos for following the DIY mindset (though the psychedelic filters are overused), but the last third of the movie is questionable as 'documentary' as Caouette clearly sets up the confrontations (between his mother and grandfather) and forces himself to cry in front of his own camcorder. Completely self-absorbed, but also a product of the 'times' in which mental illness is a badge of honor (also see Dig!) and where real-life filthy laundry is so casually aired out in-front of slack-jawed, voyeuristic audiences who want/need confirmation that their upbringing wasn't all that bad.
