Psychopathia Sexualis (2006)

Fetishes flourish in this film version of the first treatise on perversion, Psychopathia Sexualis (2006). Published in 1886 by noggin doc Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing, the seminal manual of abormal sexual ritual was meant to be educational—Doc Dick wrote it in a high, dry style to discourage lay readers from getting wet, getting ideas, and setting out to get laid in the most twisted of ways. But, stuffy stuff be damned, lay gents and ma'ams got their dirty hands all over the titular literature anyway, and it's in this spirit of pseudo-pedagogical snog that writer-director Bret Wood presents a set of dirty case histories that come off like something The History Channel would watch to get its rocks off. Candles flicker and violins hum over TV-reenactment-style shots of Victorian deviants: Masochists! Sadists! Pervy shadow puppets! Chicken choking, blood sucking, and creatures most fowl! The film is critical of many of Doc Dick's stances, such as his belief that educated ladies are incapable of going cuckoo for hoohoo.