Orgasm Inc.

In my opinion there are two great skills required to be an excellent documentary film maker. The first is being able to make your subjects comfortable enough with you to be themselves and the second is to be able to edit together your multitude of interviews, graphics, animations, and other footage into a story. The first skill is far harder to learn than the second.

In Orgasm Inc. Elizabeth Canner, far exceeds any other film maker I have ever seen in the former, and this more than makes up for the ever so slight failing of the the latter. Her ability to get people who have been trained to deal with the media and the public,who have practised for hours in delivering the company line, to then reveal, on camera, things that you can clearly see they know they shouldn't even tell their own mother, is phenomenal.

At first i thought it was just down to the fact that the original company she was hired to work for trusted her because they saw her as an employee, one of theirs so to speak, but she does it with almost every drug company rep and dodgy doctor she speaks with.

The story begins with one company's attempts to corner the market on a "Cure" for Female Sexual Dysfunction, but quickly moves to the question of if this is a real disease or not, then we see the competition's efforts and focus on one women's journey as a trialist for one of the products and finally the efforts of a campaign group in trying to convince the FDA not to approve a drug for this "condition".

Canner was granted access that will probably never be available again and she has used this privilege exceedingly well, my only complaint is that the sequencing and timing of certain scenes didn't work for me, she could have edited the material a little better to improve the overall flow.

However unlike the ability to get people to reveal things they shouldn't, this is something that should improve in her work with experience.

A film that needs a far wider audience than it will unfortunately ever get, Canner has all of the good qualities of Michael Moore, she champions the underdog battling against the big corporate giant, has a playful sense of humour, and an ability to make linear connections, however, she doesn't share his ego, aggressiveness or rudeness, she let's her subjects speak and lets them tell the story.

Fortunately for us, some may wish they never met her.

The documentary started out OK, pointing out that men's sexual dysfunction has been cured with Viagra, but women's has gone on abandoned (note, Viagra only corrects impotence, not low libido, so no, it is NOT cured). The race is then on to find the equivalent V for women through various means.

First we start with the drug companies, where we find the search is not only fruitless, but the host now suggests that it is possibly fruitless because women's sexual dysfunction is not real, but rather one pushed onto us by drug companies who then want to sell us the magical cure.

Then we explore other avenues such as machines and gadgets, some in theory working much like a "super dildo". According to the host, again the search is fruitless.

Then we explore surgery. This is where things start to get nasty and hypocritical while taking on a new tone. We are told that women can get cosmetic surgery to assist them quest for sexual dysfunction. The information is presented to us in a "shock" like strategy. Once we are fully mortified, the film goes on to blame society (read "men" only) who are to blame for pressuring women into this space. We now enter man hating misandrist territory. After they complain about how its all the fault of the male, partly because they do not know how to please a women's vagina, and partly to show the result of the surgery, we are shown photos of the result, although, we don't see the photo's so how are men supposed to know? In a era were explicit penis filled movies on prime time attract a G rating (in AUS), the hypocritical misandrists have even censored out the photos. It is about here I decided I could not take any more and switched it off with about 15 minutes to go.

Another total disappointing documentary that highlights women's issues and finishes off by blaming men for all of their problems. In reality, all of the studies show that it is women who bully and shame other women about their bodies and not men, so apart from the underlying misandrist themes, I could not see any purpose to this documentary at all.

Apart from fueling more hate and resentment towards the male population in general, very little could be learned by anyone with this show.

Liz Canner clearly had her mind made up before she started this documentary. How offensive for her to claim that female sexual dysfunction is a manufactured problem that only exists because a drug company wants to sell products. Was she hiding under a rock when Viagra first came out and women left and right were asking what about helping women who have dead libidos? I am 33, and six years ago I went from being very sexual with a healthy sexual appetite, to having a dead sex drive. Even on my own, I rarely have any sensation. I can orgasm maybe once a year. Mentally I'll be attracted to someone, but physically, I can't respond. How dare Liz, or anyone, try to say that this is a made-up problem, or a variation of normal?

This documentary isn't clever or funny. It's misogynist and has the clear message of just lube up and lay back because we can technically still have sex, even if all it is it going through the motions. Why not allege that male sexual dysfunction doesn't really exist?

It was definitely OK on some levels, but the biggest problem was that it almost entirely treated female sexual dysfunction like it was just a psychological issue (stress, relationship problems, etc) or a sex ed issue (adult women not knowing where their clitoris is, etc). Only at the very end when discussing a testosterone patch specifically for women suffering from low libido after a hysterectomy were physiological causes even acknowledged to exist, and then only obliquely.

The basic gist is that if you're looking for a film that covers the dire state of pharmaceutical sex research, ranging from the fact that almost no professional in this film was able to talk without giggling, squirming, and hiding their faces, or how the industry has labeled low libido as a "disease" just to sell drugs to healthy women who just need porn and a vibrator and a partner who does their share of the housework, then this is great.

If you're suffering from low libido for non-psychological reasons and are looking for something to validate your problems and give you hope for a solution, this film is absolutely not for you.