Clean, Shaven (1993)

            This film made me want to vomit. But that’s exactly why I liked it.

Director Lodge Kerrigan glamorizes nothing in his 1993 film about a schizophrenic man fighting to be reunited with his young daughter. Clean, Shaven is shocking and disturbing, but beneath the brutal images one finds a tremendous amount of heart.

Peter Greene stars as Peter Winter, a tormented man presumably recently released from a mental institution. Peter arrives back in his hometown to visit his mother (Megan Owen), and find his daughter Nicole (Jennifer MacDonald), who has long since been adopted. At the same time, police detective Jack McNally (Robert Albert) conducts an investigation on a series of child murders. All evidence points to Peter, whom McNally pursues with fervor.

What makes Clean, Shaven so fascinating is its ability to draw the viewer into the mind of a schizophrenic. While no mentally-healthy person can ever truly empathize with the constant struggles of a person like Peter, this film brings us considerably closer. Kerrigan dwells on seemingly minute details, like the way Peter slowly spreads mustard over a slice of bread, or how he dumps several packets of sugar into his three cups of coffee. These are specifics most directors wouldn’t find necessary to telling their story, but Kerrigan uses them as tools to bring us into Peter’s shaky thought patterns. This is also achieved through some brilliant sound design. While there is little dialogue (Peter is alone for several scenes), we constantly hear indistinct voices talking over one another. Watching this film made me feel like I was going crazy.

Details are what make this film, and Kerrigan shows great vehemence in illustrating even the most gruesome. The most memorable of such moments are when Peter tries to extract the transmitter and radio devices that he believes have been implanted underneath his scalp and fingernail. This is extremely hard to watch, not because these acts are particularly violent (recent films have shown much worse), but because they are examples of self-harm. One can’t imagine what it must be like to resort to that.

This film is incredibly depressing. At times, it makes the viewer feel as if there is no love or compassion in the world. Crimes including armed robberies and child murder are touched on in realistic detail, and these scenes are made all the more frightening when the viewer stops to think that events like that actually happen. Yet Clean, Shaven simultaneously addresses this frightening realization and offers hope. In one beautiful moment, Nicole asks Peter about her mother. Rather than going into particular aspects of her personality, he simply tells her, “There’s a lot of people out there who want to hurt you. Wherever you are. But she was good.” This line will stand out in my mind forever because its message rings so true: the world can be a dangerous place, but we all have people in our lives who love us and will protect us.

Anytime a film can elicit a physical response (such as the nausea I felt upon leaving Clean, Shaven), it’s well worth seeing. This is a testament to the director’s transcendence from merely telling a story to creating an experience. If you can stomach the more grisly moments, it’s an experience well worth taking part in.