Choke

    Surreal in a very real sense. Sobriety without tolerance. A subject so serious, it's funny. What the heck am I talking about? A picture so ridiculous, it's unique and worth the cost of a rental.

    The subject is sex addiction, and our protagonist has got it real bad. There is much about our protagonist, Victor Mancini played by Sam Rockwell, but all is subservient to his sex addiction, and to a lesser extent, his care of the woman he knows as his mother, Ida Mancini, played by the versatile Angelica Houston. It's complicated, and I plan to watch it again, but first and foremost, the picture made me laugh.

    Considering the film is about sex addiction, one can imagine that the film takes one to a pretty dark place, and sex is a very serious subject but often quite funny, so could fathom that the picture makes fun of everyone - especially Victor. Victor does seek help in a sex addicts' support group, and has made it to the 4th step, however, Victor often uses this situation to score women that have the urge for to get physical just as mush as he does.

    Fortunately for Victor, his best friend, Denny, played by Brad William Henke, offers support for the bewildered Victor by attending the meetings with him. Why? Besides being his best friend, they work together at a colonial theme park (a scaled back version of Williamsburg, Virginia) and Denny is a sex addict too - but one of a different variety. Denny often treats his body as if it is an amusement park - up to 15 times a day.

    Factor in the fact that Victor uses the scam of actually choking on food (and he's not faking it) in restaurants as a means of raising sympathy money, from his newly empowered rescuers, which helps him pay for Ida's hospitalization in a private psychiatric facility, and one can see that Victor needs help, and fast. Kelly Macdonald as Paige Marshall, also in the hospital, could be the answer, but don't count on it. It's a crooked path that Victor is on and the audience is drug along on his wild, wacked-out path for nearly the picture's entire 92 minutes of runtime.

    The film is directed by Clark Gregg, who also wrote the screen adaptation of the Chuck Palahniuk novel, who also wrote "Fight Club." The film has the feel of a twisted Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. adaptation, but darker. The subject matter is pretty twisted, so, if you offend easily, do not rent this film. For everyone else, it is a whole lot funnier and smarter than "Rachel Getting Married," so give it a whirl and don't come whining to me if it's a bit more than you can handle.

    Rated R. Released on DVD February 17, 2009.