I saw this at the Stamp Student Union at the U.of Maryland and it was nothing that I expected it to be. The main subject is Jonathon "The Impaler" Sharkey, a self professed Satanist and Vampire running for Governor in Minnesota with his main policy being the impalement of criminals. I had never seen a documentary done in this format and style of pacing. At first it seemed like there was no clear narrative tool used and the scenes look to be a scattered collection of arbitrary clips. However, towards the last half of the movie you are sucked into the story and everything gels together and starts to make sense. Nothing about this movie is "in your face", everything is subtle. Subtle messages about America's obsession with fame pop up now and again. Subtle messages about mental illness and child abuse seem to be hidden throughout. The soundtrack is very well done and unexpected for a documentary on this subject matter. The filmmakers shot and edited in a very anti Hollywood style which indicates to me that it was a deliberate narrative tool used to humanize a fame and power hungry cartoon like subject.
I was laughing one minute, then a couple minutes later I was recoiling. I found myself routing for the subject one second, and then hating him the next. Just when I was about to get bored the director would throw in a twist to the story and before long the documentary turned into a mystery. Impaler is subtly funny, dark and, full of sardonic twists and questions left unanswered. The ending is unexpected and extremely powerful. Impaler made me think about it and talk about it with my friends through the rest of the night. For me that is a sign of a well crafted documentary.
While the production budget of Impaler seemed to be small, I found it to be much more engaging and captivating then well known and well funded documentaries with huge marketing campaigns behind them like Jesus Camp and Darkon. Sadly this little gem of a movie will probably go into DVD oblivion without ever finding the cult audience it deserves.
8 out of 10 stars from me.