There's a lot of high anxiety involved in being a teenager. I've a grand daughter going through it right now and it's frustrating trying to connect with her. And, wouldn't you know it, just as I was pondering what I could do, this documentary comes up on the Sundance Channel with a partial answer. Have her watch this movie! Now this will hardly be a risk-free or even acceptable ploy for many parents. There's some very graphic talk about explicit sex in about an eighth of this movie and some parents will want to 'protect' their children from it. The genius of this raw language, though, is that it's not that important to the movie though it definitely belongs as it's in the words of a hormone addled teenager. The heart of this movie and the phenomenon which it documents is in its title, mortification, not some sexual titillation. It's about being extremely embarrassed to reveal, years later, to an audience what you wrote to yourself in your diary or journal as a kid.
As one of the participants explains, there's a precious moment won in doing so that's been lost to you since you were that anxious teenager. Almost without exception everything you thought you were the only person on earth to feel or think is shown to have been experienced by a wide number of your fellow citizens. The resulting laughter is quite genuine and somehow extremely therapeutic. This is not anything I'd do, for sure, but I can't help admiring these brave souls for doing it on our behalf, and I can't help thinking there isn't an adolescent in the country who wouldn't benefit from hearing it now, while they're going through it, for the solace it offers.
I've never seen anything more likely to break through to teenagers whether straight or gay, male or female. I've given this movie a very high rating, not for its cinematic niceties but for its message which is: the mortified movement is quite unique and valuable.
As one of the participants explains, there's a precious moment won in doing so that's been lost to you since you were that anxious teenager. Almost without exception everything you thought you were the only person on earth to feel or think is shown to have been experienced by a wide number of your fellow citizens. The resulting laughter is quite genuine and somehow extremely therapeutic. This is not anything I'd do, for sure, but I can't help admiring these brave souls for doing it on our behalf, and I can't help thinking there isn't an adolescent in the country who wouldn't benefit from hearing it now, while they're going through it, for the solace it offers.
I've never seen anything more likely to break through to teenagers whether straight or gay, male or female. I've given this movie a very high rating, not for its cinematic niceties but for its message which is: the mortified movement is quite unique and valuable.