Usually my sick day show watching consists of the Price is Right followed by some sort of nostalgic TV show like Magnum PI. Occasionally, I’ll watch a documentary or two. Since this sickness was some sort of extra sick, I decided to do some extra TV watching. So, I present to you: THE GREAT SICK DAY DOCUMENTARY FILM FEST OF 2019!!!
The trick with picking a good sick day documentary is that it can’t cover a topic that will make me cry. My nose was stuffy. I already couldn’t breath from either nostril. I didn’t need any additional tears or emotion clogging up the already congested works. Eliminating movies that won’t make me cry is no easy feat. I cried at Deadpool 2. It meant no emotionally uplifting sports stories (goodbye all 30 for 30s and Andre the Giant), no recently deceased biopic of awesome musicians or handsome actors (Sorry David Bowie and Paul Walker) and absolutely nothing with baby animal death (see you later Planet Earth) and especially not awesome human facing tremendous odds and coming through adversity with grace and strength (every documentary ever.)
So, what was I left with? These 8 films presented in the order that I watched them (and the platform where I streamed them.) I review and rate them here using a special 1-5 cough drop rating scale.
Price is Right is the undisputed sick day viewing champion. It’s the best hour of any sick day, so when I discovered a documentary about the Price is Right perfect showcase bid, I knew it was the grandest way to kick off my film fest.
The movie stars Ted Slauson, A Price is Right super fan who watched the show so often, he realized that the show often reused prices. To help train for his inevitable show appearance, he developed a prize database and memorized the prices for all the prizes that the show used. He appeared in the show’s audience nearly 30 times and can be heard yelling out prices and coaching contestants in footage that spans a few decades. He did make it on the show once, but was foiled by low wheel spins and didn’t make it to the Showcase Showdown. He was eventually banned from show for yelling out to the perfect down to the dollar bid on a Showcase Showdown, which the contestant used to win the show.
The storytelling throughout is compelling and Slauson is an extremely likeable protagonist. Some of the show’s producers claim he is cheating. Is he though, when the show lazily reuses prizes as often as every four episodes? I suppose it’s up to the viewer to decide. (I did decide. He wasn’t cheating. Don’t reuse prizes, dummies. Get a mattress from another company.)
Recommended for: Everyone. Who doesn’t like Price is Right? Everyone should/would enjoy it.
Rating: 4 out of 5 Halls Menthol Cough Drops with Triple Soothing Action ($2.59 for a pack of 30, Bob)
Let me start by saying this is the most bonkers true crime documentary I have ever seen. There are at least three crazy fact revelations that felt just as bananas as the big climatic reveal in the Jinx series. I was yelling at the TV like it was a football game.
The hook here is that it recounts the true story of a young girl who was abducted by the same man twice in the early 1970s. I thought that would be most insane thing to come from the story, but no. That fact becomes almost normal compared to other parts of this story. I don’t even want to say more. I want you to watch it and then for you to call me so we can talk about how batshit it all is. It’s nuts!
Recommended for: True Crime fans and everyone I know so someone will talk about this movie with me. Seriously friends, watch this; then call me.
Documentary Rating: 5 out of 5 Cold Eeze lozenges.
Bad Parenting Rating: 5 out of 5 vitamin C drops. Bad parenting abounds. It’s through the roof. It’s so bad, it earns a rating based on items that are cough drop adjacent, but are clearly not cough drops.
This documentary could have also been called Porn Stars are People Too. Just like the title suggests it explores what happens to former porn stars after they quit the biz and move on with their lives. It turns out a lot of regular stuff happens. They play golf, become real estate agents, and parents. Some have harder paths and become alcoholics and experience the loss of a spouse. Some, like Mary Carey run for Governor of California. They all just seem so regular and so human. *feigned shock* Go figure!
I don’t know what I was expecting from this, perhaps something more salacious, but I found it to be refreshing. The most interesting bits come when the stars talk about what happens when their new friends and acquaintances discover their past lives or recognize them. Another highlight is the children of some of the former stars are interviewed. Some are embarrassed by their parents profession and some are proud. Overall it’s a nice movie, if not a little boring.
Recommended for: curious folks, the religious right (because “sinners” are normalized here), and porn fans. Of course
Rating: 3 out of 5 cherry Ludens (Those things might as well be candy.)
Nintendo Quest (Amazon)There are 678 officially licensed Nintendo games including some incredibly rare titles. In this little adventure, a big-time Nintendo nerd seeks to purchase all of them without using the Internet in 30 days time while his friends make a movie about it.
I wanted to like this movie, but I it ended up bumming me out. What could have been a rollicking road trip across the country exploring used game stores is instead a guy talking on the phone and going to his own local game stores three times. They do take some road trips, but protagonist Jay seems to have some anxiety issues that prevents him from displaying enjoyment of these trips.
I also wanted to know their total budget and costs of the pricier games. They used an on screen graphic denoting how much money was left in the budget without every mentioning their budgetary constraints. This movie left me wanting for more information just like Mario is always wanting more mushrooms.
Recommend for: Nintendo collectors, I guess, mostly just Hugh and Alex from Best Buds Gaming Lounge. Alex might not even like it. Just Hugh. Really, I want Hugh and Alex to go on this adventure and make a movie about it. They would do it right. I would love the Hugh and Alex version of this movie.
Rating: 2 out of 5 Fisherman’s Friends (Have you had these? They are gross. You can’t eat have more than one.)
What do you watch after you watch a movie about collecting video games? A movie about collecting PEZ! Fun fact: I am a recovering PEZ collector. Topping out at around 180 machines, I sold the bulk of my collection on eBay many years ago. I still have about 50 of my favorite machines which include Wonder Woman, Batman, and the Lucky Charms leprechaun.
I’ve established now that I love PEZ. They are part of my identity. And you know what is not exciting? Watching people buy PEZ. Also not exciting? Listening to people talk about PEZ. The best part of this movie is the visit to the PEZ factory to see how they make the candy.
Recommended for: PEZ Heads and no one else.
Rating: 2 out of 5 Halls Breezers. (You need to eat two at a time, because those suckers do not work.)
Everyone knows about the legend of the “worst video game of all time” Atari’s ET and the urban legend that Atari buried millions of unsold cartridges in the desert outside of Alamogordo, NM. What starts out as a plan to seek the truth about this tale, ends up as an exploration of the meteoric rise and fall of the Atari company.
Along the way, the story of the ET game is explained and the game designer provides his side of the story. His side of the story is the most compelling part of the movie, he doesn’t start out being a very sympathetic character, but as he explains the circumstances of the making of the game, I started to come around to his point-of-view. The movie
culminates in the excavation of the desert landfill and the pacing is such that I got really excited about the scenes where they start digging up the dump. Will they find any ET cartridges?! Watch and find out! (Yes. Yes they do.)
Recommended for: game nerds, history buffs, urban legend fans, children of the 1980s
Sick day rating: 4 out of 5 children’s cherry flavored Sucrets (my childhood favorite, they had a weird medicinal taste that made them more gross and less candy-like then Ludens.)
Best Worst Thing that Ever Could Have Happened (HBOGo)More than 30 years after the Stephen Sondheim Broadway musical Merrily We Roll Along closed after just two weeks to terrible reviews, the original cast reunites to talk about their “big break”. The movie is directed by Lonny Price (Neil Kellerman in Dirty Dancing “If they think you're with me, they'll be the happiest parents at Kellerman's. I have to say it. I'm known as the catch of the county”) who scored a starring role in the musical when he was in his early twenties. Jason Alexander (Seinfeld’s George) and Giancarlo Esposito (Gus in Breaking Bad) were also in the original Broadway cast and Alexander is heavily featured in the movie.
The footage available to Price and his team is outstanding as it much of it was from a documentary ABC was making about the musical while it was in rehearsal. Since it was a Sondheim work, it was presumed to be a huge hit. Unfortunately it wasn’t and it bombed.
Hearing the cast talk about the play is exciting, because they capture how huge the play was to them at the time. Their innocence is on display and they all all so darn earnest and hopeful that you can’t help but cheer for them. The camaraderie between the cast after 30 years is still palpable and even though the project was a failure at the time, they all talk about the project with so much love. It’s an absolute joy to watch.
Recommended for: Broadway freaks, old friends, people in their early twenties and late forties.
Sick day rating: 4 out of 5 Cepacol (Those are the good ones that taste bad, but numb the heck out of your throat and mouth so you stop coughing for a few minutes.)
This film chronicles the rise and unexpected end of the 1980s women’s wrestling show The Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling. It highlights the neon spandex, sky-high hair, and frosted makeup of the mid to late 1980s in tons of over-the-top footage from the original show. More touchingly, it features the wrestlers reminiscing over their friendships and hard work of practicing for the show and what has happened since its cancellation.
The women in it are absolute power-houses and characters to this day. The movie features the best kind of reminiscing because so much of it is recalled with glee by the ladies. After watching, I was left with warm fuzzy feelings thinking about what happens when groups of women form meaningful lifelong friendships. It broke the main rule of sick day viewing in that it made me cry.
Recommended for: women, sports fans, 1980s aficionados
Sick day rating: 5 out of 5 honey lemon Ricola (my cough drop of choice.)
GLOW was an uplifting conclusion to the 2019 Great Sick Day Film Festival and yet, I still hope there isn’t a 2020 version. Using 3.5 days of PTO on being sick is lame. Just in case there is, what other documentaries should I consider? What are your favorite documentaries for either sick or healthy day viewing? Should I just stick with Price is Right?
In the immortal words of Bob Barker, “Help control the pet population. Have your pets spayed or neutered.”
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