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I couldn't find any review or thread over this film, so here's my thoughts.
I Am A Sex Addict (2005, Caveh Zahedi)
I get the feeling that Caveh Zahedi is a man who is pissed off that he was only nine years old during Woodstock and watched the whole hippie movement come and go before his first boner. I've never heard of Caveh Zahedi before, probably because he's only made small films and minor works. I am perplexed by the film because I admire it to a certain degree, while I'm also disgusted by it and the impish bugged-eyed director/subject.
I Am A Sex Addict is about the most narcissistic subject I've probably ever seen. Caveh Zahedi directs this autobiographical documentary about his relationships and their failures due to his addiction to sex, more specifically sex with prostitutes. Normally this would not be a glamorous thing for someone to admit, but that's where Caveh's craft and love for himself come in. The film plays like a comedy through minimal archival footage, but largely through reinactments. It's somehow fitting that his main actress is porn star Rebecca Lord who plays his first wife. Caveh constantly breaks the fourth wall as the narrator and speaks to his audience in an intelligent manner. He must speak to us in an intelligent manner because he feels himself a worthy subject.
The documentary starts with Caveh stating his purpose, talking into the camera only minutes before his third wedding. It's ironic that he's in church about to be wed, while discussing blows jobs, masturbation in confessionals, using drugs with his drunken girlfriend and so forth.
Caveh begins his story in the early 1980's and works his way up until present day, only going back momentarily to show what a sleeze ball father he had. The apple doesn't fall very far. Caveh is articulate and very thorough in his dialogue and explanations, but we get the sense that the reason he had an addiction to prostitutes was because he was addicted to himself. I really felt for anyone who had the misfortune to meet this man in their life, and while he's a physical skeleton he does have a sleezebag charm about him. And as they say women usually will fall for the ********. Caveh is all trump in that department.
While his life and insights into to himself are interesting, they aren't ground breaking and he seems naive to the idea that he's addicted to himself. Constantly he's telling his significant others that he wants to be honest with them. This kind of honest originates not from a need to be kind to another human being, but rather to make himself feel like a good person. A selfish "good deed" if you will.
I enjoyed the film but as it goes on it gets old as he does the same routines, the same music plays in the same way, and ... it becomes a broken record. Caveh is just an ordinary film school pseudo intellectual who has average talent, but will never be great because it's doubtful he will be able to film any subject besides himself with a grain of passion or insightfulness.
Watching this film was like watching someone masturbate, it might be a curiosity at first and even minorly entertaining in a perverted kind of way, but who wants to see that sort of thing for very long?
Grade: C-
Agree? Disagree?
I Am A Sex Addict (2005, Caveh Zahedi)
I get the feeling that Caveh Zahedi is a man who is pissed off that he was only nine years old during Woodstock and watched the whole hippie movement come and go before his first boner. I've never heard of Caveh Zahedi before, probably because he's only made small films and minor works. I am perplexed by the film because I admire it to a certain degree, while I'm also disgusted by it and the impish bugged-eyed director/subject.
I Am A Sex Addict is about the most narcissistic subject I've probably ever seen. Caveh Zahedi directs this autobiographical documentary about his relationships and their failures due to his addiction to sex, more specifically sex with prostitutes. Normally this would not be a glamorous thing for someone to admit, but that's where Caveh's craft and love for himself come in. The film plays like a comedy through minimal archival footage, but largely through reinactments. It's somehow fitting that his main actress is porn star Rebecca Lord who plays his first wife. Caveh constantly breaks the fourth wall as the narrator and speaks to his audience in an intelligent manner. He must speak to us in an intelligent manner because he feels himself a worthy subject.
The documentary starts with Caveh stating his purpose, talking into the camera only minutes before his third wedding. It's ironic that he's in church about to be wed, while discussing blows jobs, masturbation in confessionals, using drugs with his drunken girlfriend and so forth.
Caveh begins his story in the early 1980's and works his way up until present day, only going back momentarily to show what a sleeze ball father he had. The apple doesn't fall very far. Caveh is articulate and very thorough in his dialogue and explanations, but we get the sense that the reason he had an addiction to prostitutes was because he was addicted to himself. I really felt for anyone who had the misfortune to meet this man in their life, and while he's a physical skeleton he does have a sleezebag charm about him. And as they say women usually will fall for the ********. Caveh is all trump in that department.
While his life and insights into to himself are interesting, they aren't ground breaking and he seems naive to the idea that he's addicted to himself. Constantly he's telling his significant others that he wants to be honest with them. This kind of honest originates not from a need to be kind to another human being, but rather to make himself feel like a good person. A selfish "good deed" if you will.
I enjoyed the film but as it goes on it gets old as he does the same routines, the same music plays in the same way, and ... it becomes a broken record. Caveh is just an ordinary film school pseudo intellectual who has average talent, but will never be great because it's doubtful he will be able to film any subject besides himself with a grain of passion or insightfulness.
Watching this film was like watching someone masturbate, it might be a curiosity at first and even minorly entertaining in a perverted kind of way, but who wants to see that sort of thing for very long?
Grade: C-
Agree? Disagree?
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"A candy colored clown!"
Member since Fall 2002
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"A candy colored clown!"
Member since Fall 2002
Top 100 Films, clicky below
http://www.movieforums.com/community...ad.php?t=26201
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