Violently Happy

Sex Positive explores the life of Richard Berkowitz, a revolutionary gay S&M hustler turned AIDS activist in the 1980s, whose incomparable contribution to the invention of safe sex has never been aptly credited. Mr. Berkowitz emerged from the epicenter of the epidemic demanding a solution to the problem before the outside world would take heed. Now destitute and alone, Mr. Berkowitz tells his story to a world who never wanted to listen.

Short documentary about Stuart, a cross-dressing dominatrix. This piece aims to look further into Stuart's identity as a man, woman, and subservient sex worker. The story follows him through one night's gig with a man from out of town.

Dom Barbudo, a pioneer in the São Paulo gay and BDSM community and elected first Mister Leather Brasil in 2017, prepares to pass on the mantle to one of the four contestants in the second edition of the contest.

A short film that follows key figures of the London kink scene on an exploration into BDSM and the notorious fetish event Klub Verboten. The film touches upon themes of psychology, trauma, LGBTQ+ rights and black representation.

A West Village dominatrix puts her 400 lb love slave on an S & M Diet and the power of the hidden phallus is revealed. An artifact, a laugh, and an ode by NYC artist Margie Schnibbe.

The story of Robert Flanagan, a man who was born with cystic fibrosis and told he wouldn't live past 20, who through a unique odyssey of masochism, art and love found a way to live decades past his expiration date.

Graphic Sexual Horror takes a peek behind the terrifying facade behind the most notorious of bondage websites, exploring the dark mind of its artistic creator and asking hard questions about personal responsibility. Interviews reveal deep fascinations with bondage and sadomasochism that run parallel, and in fact become irreversibly entwined with the lure of money.

Published in Paris in 1954, Story of O was an immediate bestseller and literary scandal: an elegantly written S&M fantasy that had all the hallmarks of being an autobiographical account by the pseudonymous Pauline Réage. In 1994 Dominique Aury, a mild-mannered, dowdy editor for France’s prestigious Gallimard press, revealed her authorship. Pola Rapaport explores Aury's inspiration, recreating the world of '50s literary Paris and setting it against dramatic sequences that bring the infamous book to life. The author as well as various French intellectuals expound on the thorny relationship between sexuality and power, submission and freedom, liberation and non-being.

SamHel follows several groups of bondage enthusiasts as they illustrate their hobby.

Nick Broomfield and a documentary crew visit Pandora's Box, an up-scale house of bondage on Manhattan's Fifth Avenue, where clients pay $175 an hour to be subservient to mistresses. Mistresses talk about their craft; a few clients, usually masked, are interviewed as well. Then, the camera watches sessions organized around fetishes: rubber, wrestling, corporal punishment, masochism, and infantilism. Mistress Raven, the owner of Pandora's Box, explains that pain need not be part of the subservient experience: it is, at its root, a transfer of power. After their session has ended, clients talk about how drained, relaxed, relieved, and at peace they are.

Fifty Shades Uncovered is a brand new feature documentary filmed in London and New York which explores the twilight zone of submissive romance and the power of the Fifty Shades of Grey film and books. Featuring the latest interviews from authors, stars and fans, take an in-depth look into why this trilogy has become such a runaway success, whether classified as erotic fiction, adult romance or mommy porn, it lifts the lid on a cultural and sexual phenomenon that won’t be restrained as it reaches world domination!