Interesting argument. I'm not sure I felt the film was exploitative merely for exploitation's sake. What I mean is, I didn't get the feeling that the film centered on these people simply to entertain people, as if they were novel sideshow acts. At least for me, it was an interesting insight into the lives of two people who had something specific in common.
However, I think you could argue that if the director simply wanted to focus on Tiffany fans, he didn't have to focus on two very obsessed people. And maybe his intention to seek out people who were delusional and obsessive shows a deliberate will to exploit them on his part. But maybe it was also because he found their stories compelling, and/or maybe he thought telling their side of the story (for how often do those articles about Jeff's stalking convey him as a human being rather than a mere creep/sicko/criminal?) could serve to open a discourse about mental illness. For me, as I watched it, I felt as if I got to know more about two people who are systematically denied a social standing in society, about their backgrounds, their interests, their relationships, and then their delusions. The movie was about much more than their obsession with Tiffany, which for me saves it from being totally exploitative. And I never saw an opportunity to "make fun of" any of the people in this film.
As a side-note though, I wish the filmmakers could have tried to include a portion where Kelly could talk about what it really means to be intersex. For some reason many people on here are confusing being intersex with being transgender. There are similarities between the two, but they're not completely the same.
"Chaos is what killed the dinosaurs, darling!"
reply
share