America

Whole movie review

In the age of express liposuck and lunch hour genitalia remodeling, what’s the big deal if someone wanted their leg removed? Is repeatedly shaving down your nose or shooting botulism into your brow any less crazy? Aren’t both cosmetic alterations developing from a societal urge to conform, an out-of-control fear of rejection? Why is the obsession with voluntary limb amputation considered a deeper illness?

Although more people than you think have what is casually tagged as “BIID” (Body Integrity Identity Disorder, a slight on Apotemnophilia which is more of a sexual desire), it is still relatively recent, making it difficult to treat or seek medical assistance for resolution/assisted amputation. In most cases, psychotherapy inflicted damage far worse than the disorder itself. BIID may not be something that can be treated, because it is, like any obsessive compulsive disorder, ultimately squelched only by execution. Unlike superficial surgery, the “cure” is not easily attainable. For the afflicted, this means self mutilation. For George Boyer, it meant obliterating his own leg with a shotgun.

In the solid documentary Whole, we learn that George Boyer not only planned and executed his mutilation, he cohesively, even poetically, scribed the incident in his journal. The puzzling part about BIID is that it affects otherwise “normal” folk; intelligent people who can rationalize their deviant desire. A desire they know may eventually lead to suicide if denied.

The human brain is so powerful; a person with BIID can trick themselves into believing that their limb “feels” numb, like it doesn’t feel natural. One participant in Whole described how he meticulously wraps up his perfectly healthy leg as often as thrice a day, tying it tightly against his body, pulls on some baggy trousers and goes about his business as a pretend amputee, no one none the wiser. Whether he be taking a stroll in an overcast public park or helping his wife with medial chores, he proclaims he is elated due to the sheer visual absence of his lower leg. Unfurled, he stares at his appendage bleakly and says it doesn’t “belong” to him.

Whole shows cases that are seemingly purely psychological, some tracked back to childhood memories of familial estrangement, possibly transfixing societal success on amputees who were well-loved in the community. Others simply had no explanation, other than their limb and their disgust with it were spiraling burdens. One man who lived with BIID for 50+ years, finally went to the extent of recruiting his wife to help him freeze off his leg in a vat of dry ice; the plan went slightly awry and he could not complete the procedure himself. Later, he bemoaned the ER doctor’s “mistake”, repulsed by the millimeters lost or gained around his invisible demarcation. You get the sense that he may someday take to carving his flesh to rectify it, like some twisted sculpture project, but for now he is immensely proud of being able to “trick” the system.

Whole does a wonderful job at revealing a topic as bizarre as BIID warmly, well as warm as a documentary can get (I forgive filmmaker Melody Gilbert and crew for muffled mics and zooming in on tears). Whole leads me to believe that most BIID sufferers (aside from the ones that may be neuro-biological), just like most humans, have a bloated perception of perfection. That maybe with a little understanding, maybe a little regulated surgery, the afflicted can achieve that sense of relief, the sense of release. The feeling of completeness that we all seek. The irony being that the more a community establishes their oneness, the more certain individuals will lose their ability to feel and become whole.

About the Author

Kris Kobayashi-Nelson says these directors/screenwriters rarely disappoint: Peter Greenaway, Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Krzysztof Kieslowski, Gus van Sant. Gregg Araki. Kris claims that Jake Gyllenhaal, Cillian Murphy, Desmond Harrington and Casey Affleck are much more than pretty faces.