1 BILLION ORGASMS: A Documentary In Need Of Better Storytelling
If this premise already interests you, knock yourself out. Directors Brent Kinetz and Terence Mickey are not exaggerating in this true story of middle-aged engineer Aaron Headley. What started out as a side project became a product that arguably revolutionized the sexual experience for millions (or billions) of people in the world.
Headley’s invention is the “squirt watch”. What it essentially does is it uses motion sensors and LED lights to guide the wearer on how to properly perform on the female recipient so she can have an orgasm. And apparently it works. In the hands of professional adult actor Marcus London, the woman can finish in three seconds. Perhaps this device really can help some people.
Odd Storytelling Decisions, Tasteful Animation, and a Lack of Narrative
The first two paragraphs of this review gives you information that the documentary itself wouldn’t give you until the 28-minute mark. What I’m referencing is the product and what it does and how it works. Kinetz and Mickey start their film by exploring Aaron as a person, as a father, as a husband, and as a son. Around ten minutes in, I knew more about Aaron’s parents than his product. Weird storytelling decision, if you ask me.
The benefit of the film is it never leaves Aaron’s side, from his home to the AVN Adult Entertainment Expo in Vegas. When Aaron gets excited over potential opportunities, you can’t help but get excited with him. It even finds some tasteful ways to avoid showing the parts where graphic nudity come into play. Kinetz and Mickey would often have the camera look away so the audience can only hear the audio. Other times, they go the extra step and provide some animated sequences with a cheeky metaphor to help us visualize the female anatomy.
Where the documentary itself occasionally falters is the lack of narrative. A majority of the film’s runtime is just following Aaron around, filming whatever he’s looking at or talking about, without presenting any kind of conclusion, thesis, or point. At the Vegas expo, a woman rejects Aaron’s offer of the watch and creates some unexpected friction. For a moment, I thought the documentary was finally going to present some sort of challenge or obstacle to Aaron, but it turned out to just be an incident that… came and went. It’s not until the last 10 minutes of the documentary that finally text appears, and real obstacles came and blocked Aaron’s path.
Interesting Topic, the Story’s Not Over
With the end credit text informing us that Aaron still attends AVN annually, it becomes clear that his story is not yet over, and this documentary only covered the beginning of his journey. While it is an interesting subject matter to learn about, it doesn’t hold that much narrative weight or compelling thesis to keep me invested from start to finish.
This documentary literally opens with one of Aaron’s teachers calling him the next Einstein, yet when half of the subject matter is about the watch, we don’t get a look at the reception of the product. Where are the interviews outside of Aaron’s circle? Where is the customer feedback? I know this documentary is on Aaron’s side, but what do Kinetz and Mickey want us, the audience, to take away from it all? I think Kinetz and Mickey have a compelling story to tell here, but perhaps it’s still at an early stage that they’re not sure what to say about Aaron’s journey yet.
If you were to strip away the sex elements and just look at 1 Billion Orgasms as a tale of entrepreneurship, it still doesn’t have an attitude on whether or not that pursuit is worth it. It makes a big deal on what happened to Aaron’s daughters, yet we never got to see how entrepreneurship affects internal family relationships. We rarely get a chance to see Aaron at a low point –any of it that is there is told through text, not shown on screen.
1 Billion Orgasms: Conclusion
As of now, 1 Billion Orgasms feels like the behind-the-scenes footage that is supposed to accompany the feature presentation. I think there are more layers that can be added in to this story, from commentary on entrepreneurship to how that plays a role (if any) in the adult entertainment industry. I can guess this is not the last time we hear about Aaron Headley and I’m sure Kinetz and Mickey will have more to work with in the future.
Did you see 1 Billion Orgasms? What did you think of the film? Share below!
1 Billion Orgasms was released across all VOD/Digital/DVD platforms in the US on February 5, 2019.
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