Sick-The-Life-and-Death-of-Bob-Flanagan-Supermasochist Kirby Dick’s documentary; Sick: The Life and Death of Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist from 1997 is getting a re-release due to the fact that 3 particular minutes of somewhat disturbing footage have been added back into the film after being cut by the BBFC upon the film’s original release in 2001.

Sadly the missing footage doesn’t add anything, it’s just 3 minutes of some of the most unpleasant behaviour ever captured on film outside of a Jackass movie. Now that comparison is where the humour stops because this film is one of the most unpleasant yet moving documentaries ever made even though it feels oddly unfinished.

For those of you who don’t know, Bob Flanagan was a stand-up comedian, performance artist and poet who was born with Cystic Fibrosis and given a prognosis of not living beyond his early twenties. Around his teens Flanagan found an interest in sadomasochistic practices and humiliation, in the early 80s he was lucky enough (depending on how you swing) to find Sheree Rose as a partner whose slave he became. Maybe because of his viewpoint and what he preferred to get up to in the bedroom, Flanagan became a minor celebrity and even appeared in an early Nine Inch Nails music video. He became something of a hero in counter culture and his stand up often self depricatingly mocked his illness and festishes. Flanagan’s art was concerned mainly with illness and disease as well as self-harm and in spite of his extreme lifestyle, Flanagan lived until the ripe old age of 43, some twenty years later than expected.

There will be people who will reject this film outright, the subject matter is dealt with in a frank and up front way and is just going to be too much to handle and truthfully after watching something like 100 horror films this year alone, this was the first film to actually turn my stomach. Nothing here is hinted at or not shown, it’s all there, all on camera for the world to see. Talking about the practices Sheree and Bob engage in would have been enough but Kirby Dick is a documentary film maker and should be commended for showing his subject in all his demented glory. Kudos too to the late Bob Flanagan for appearing in the project and even allowing his sad, lingering death to be filmed (a condition of doing the film apparently). Seeing a man hammer a nail into his Johnson is one thing but the final scenes of Flanagan slowly dying in his hospital bed are the most affecting. Seeing a woman who has humiliated him his whole life as an act of love reassuringly tell Bob that ‘she will see him tomorrow’ as his eyes have already glazed over is possibly the most heart-breaking thing I have seen.

All of this is challenging and thought-provoking viewing and a lot of the man’s behaviour is explained as a reaction against his essentially being given a death sentence at an early age and him raging at this finality by turning himself into a piece of extreme art. Where the film falls down is in its hinting at the subject’s choice of an S&M lifestyle possibly prolonging his life. Flanagan lived much longer than anyone thought he would but was this because of S&M or in spite of it?, There is no answer and the film would have been better left as a portrait of an extreme life choice featuring a larger than life character who just happens to be real.

Sick is truly one of the most challenging and up front pieces of cinema I have ever seen but it’s not for everyone. Those who are going into it with an open mind will be disturbed but will be presented with much food for thought and a portrait of a life lived large and without shame or compromise.

[Rating:3.5/5]