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R: ARCHIVE, S: MOVIES, D: 11/13/1997,

Pain man

Sick hits hard -- and likes it

by Alicia Potter

SICK: THE LIFE & DEATH OF BOB FLANAGAN, SUPERMASOCHIST, Directed by Kirby Dick. A Cinepix Film release. At the Kendall Square.

In Sick, the penis endures enough torture to stop a Timex. But that's not why the film dominates as the year's most provocative release. Under the sensitive direction of Kirby Dick, this documentary about terminally ill artist Bob Flanagan brilliantly transcends its hardcore S&M roots. Alternately graphic and graceful, Sick penetrates the agony and ecstasy of one man's pact with pain.

For the self-proclaimed supermasochist, there's no separating sex from death, love from torture. One of the longest-living survivors of cystic fibrosis (he died last year, at age 43), Flanagan fights sickness with, well, sickness. Half-choking on the phlegm that clogs his lungs, he singes, pierces, slits, shackles, tapes, slaps, and binds his body. Essentially, he subverts a destiny of pain into a declaration of pleasure.

Flanagan's lust for self-punishment and his struggle with disease infuse his poetry, writing, and performance art with a whacked genius. He unleashes several new video performances for the film, the most unforgettable of which is 1994's "Autopsy." In this disturbing yet oddly touching pre-mortem, a sputtering Flanagan lies naked on a gurney; standing over him is his long-time partner/dominatrix, Sheree Rose, a Janet Reno look-alike in apron and surgical gloves. She muses about their passionate relationship, pausing to smack his cheek or stroke the topography of scars, piercings, and tattoos that covers his body. Then, like Julia Child sharing a soufflé recipe, Rose performs a sampler of S&M acts. Who knew the human rectum was so versatile?

But Dick does not shock for shock's sake. The film's shift-in-your-seat explicitness beats home Flanagan's philosophy for survival. And like John Waters, Dick injects just enough irony to temper the film's considerable grossout factor. For instance, the tune "The Hammer of Love" accompanies Flanagan's demonstration of what a trip to Home Depot can mean for his beleaguered shlong.

Sick humor indeed. With a body like Christ's and a face like Soupy Sales's, Flanagan mangles the lyrics of Mary Poppins's "Supercallifragilisticexpialidocious" to "Supermasochistic Bob has cystic fibrosis." The refrain? "Hum-diddle-diddle. I'm going to die." He also blithely riffs about what might have happened when a 17-year-old girl comes to visit, courtesy of the Make-a-Wish Foundation (Flanagan and Rose chaperone her nipple-piercing). Less effective are the scenes from various S&M clubs in which Flanagan reads from his Fuck Journal, a graphic diary of his sex life with Rose.

Above all, Sick is a love story. Not surprisingly, given her gifts with a riding crop, Rose looms as, uh, a dominant presence in the film. "As a young child, I was considered bossy," she says, perfectly deadpan. She even wrestles a turn or two behind the camera; in fact, her footage captures Flanagan in some of his most candid, acerbic -- and annoyed -- moments. And for those who get spanked only on their birthdays, the film triumphs in revealing the intense trust and communication at the heart of a consensual S&M relationship. "There," says Rose as she removes a clamp from Flanagan's waist and soothes the resulting sore. "He'll remember this now for two or three days."

As Flanagan's health deteriorates, Rose, who is also an artist, becomes even more intriguing. Like a woman who discovers her spouse has taken a lover, she jealously lashes out when Flanagan proclaims he is too frail to submit to her. Ultimately, the cystic fibrosis usurps her; she can no longer rival its pain. When she's at her most selfish and domineering, it's tempting to accuse the maîtresse of pulling a Yoko Ono. But as Flanagan lies spread-eagled on a hospital bed, a tangle of tubes keeping him alive, Rose's bewilderment is near tear-jerking.

The documentary trails Flanagan until his last choked breath. We should be prepared: he's already read aloud his own obituary; he's appeared in a coffin via video; he's joked about his numbered days. Nonetheless, the film's last half-hour hits with staggering emotion. Never mind the scrotum weights and cock rings. The most arduous part of the documentary is watching Flanagan's gaunt body shudder as he gradually drowns in his own phlegm (ironically, Rose must pound his back to loosen the mucus). His cough is haunting.

Early in the film, Rose sighs, "One thing about Bob, you'll never forget having someone like this in your life." Likewise, one thing about Sick, it's impossible to forget such an unflaggingly honest film. Yes, Sick is hard to watch. But in this case, that's not a good enough reason to close our eyes.

Kirby Dick's Sick days

Even though Sick had received the green light, director Kirby Dick had to wait several months before he could start filming. Did his funds dry up? Did his equipment break? No, it wasn't any of the typical independent-filmmaking snafus. This problem had a name: Sheree Rose.

Bob Flanagan's dominatrix had put her spike-heeled, patent-leathered boot down. No way was anyone filming Flanagan but her.

"First of all, I was sort of supplanting her," says Dick, who met Flanagan at a Los Angeles literary center in the 1980s. "Already she was videotaping and photographing Bob as part of their S&M partnership. Secondly, I was asking her to be a subject."

Eventually, Rose lowered her whip. She even relaxed for the camera. Was Dick forced to play servant to win her approval?

"No!" he laughs. "But let's just say that if I had wanted to be submissive, she would have loved it!"

Flanagan expressed immediate zest for the documentary. Says Dick, "For Bob it was different. He had been exploring these issues for so long. Right away, he was able to make the filmmaking process an intimate one. There weren't any issues of propriety for him. He wanted me to shoot not only all aspects of his life but also all aspects of his death. That was clear from the very beginning. That was his style."

The result? One of the grittiest, most explicit films of the '90s. Surely, most of us never imagined we'd see a nail impale the head of a penis, never mind see it close up and larger than life on the big screen. Was Dick surprised at Sick's national debut?

"I knew that it would get a theatrical release," he says of the film, the winner of the Special Jury Prize at this year's Sundance Film Festival. "Once we started having screenings early on, there was this completely unexpected reaction. People said that they were dreaming about Bob, that they couldn't stop thinking about him, that they went to a dinner party and he was all they talked about. And these people weren't a part of the art, alternative, or S&M scenes."

He adds, "Of course, there were others who said, `Oh no, I can't watch that!' A lot of people have come to me and said that they're very apprehensive about the film. Then they go see it and report back and say that when the big penis moments came, they understood why Bob did it."

Dick can't recall a time when Flanagan asked him to shut off the camera. However, he does remember a day when the supermasochist asked to change the subject. "Bob lived as long as he did because he fiercely denied death. He wouldn't even use the word. I once did an interview with him when he was in the hospital. I was alone; Sheree wasn't there. I set up the camera and decided that this was the time when I was going to have this long discussion about death with him. But then he said, `I really feel very uncomfortable talking about this. I feel if I do, it's the first step toward accepting it. Then if I accept it, I'm going to give up.' "

From 1994 to 1996, Dick shot more than 100 hours of footage. Flanagan died in January 1996. Two weeks later, Dick began editing the film; another year would pass before he arrived at a final cut. "It was really an intense period. But it gave me this opportunity to meditate on Bob, almost like having a dialogue with him. Even though he was dead, it was this very intimate experience. It put our relationship on a completely different plane."

And what is it like for Dick now, nearly two years after Flanagan's death? "I still catch myself talking about him in the present tense."

-- Alicia Potter