Reproductive donor documentary Spermworld undoes its sensitivity with cynicism
Spermworld. // Courtesy FX
It’s hard to know where to start with Lance Oppenheim’s documentary Spermworld, which digs into the world of online sperm donation, where men directly donate their goods (usually for free) to women hoping to conceive.
Do we look at Ari, who’s fathered over 160 children and insists on trying to spend time with as many of them as he can? What about Tyree, the mechanic who makes time to donate his sperm to everyone but his fiancé, who desperately wants a child? Then there’s Steve, a 60-something divorcee who forges an unexpected friendship with Rachel—a young woman with cystic fibrosis who wants a child despite the medical risk involved.
All three of the subjects Oppenheim follows are fascinating real-life characters, and the more we learn about each of them, the more curious they and their lifestyle choices become. However, as compelling as Oppenheim’s stranger-than-fiction film is, there’s an overwhelming sense that he’s more interested in the oddity of his subjects than in finding empathy for them or the women who come into their lives. You never quite know whether Oppenheim wants us to think of his subjects as human beings in bizarre predicaments of their own making, or to judge them, quizzical eyebrows permanently raised.
In Oppenheim’s defense, some of his subjects naturally invite those raised eyebrows. Ari, specifically, could easily be the subject of a documentary (or inspire an incredible narrative film) all by himself. Ari appears to be addicted to donating his sperm, taking pride in the vast number of children he’s fathered. He has no home, instead spending all year visiting his children or meeting with sperm recipients, with occasional breaks to visit his parents in Florida.
As he approaches 50, Ari’s parents understandably think it’s time for him to settle down. His jovial best friend, who resembles a Jewish lawyer version of Flea, alternately shames Ari for not spending more time with his aging mother, who has cancer, and sees his fecundity as a blessing. Ari, for his part, feels uncertain whether he should “retire” as a donor, or keep going until he has nothing left to give.
Oppenheim, who has an Errol Morris-esque taste for unique characters and settings (his previous film Some Kind of Heaven profiled a Florida retirement community), shoots all this with an amused remove. This leads to some appropriately bizarre sequences, as when Steve invites Rachel over to his house to watch David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive in perhaps the most awkward viewing circumstances known to humanity. The approach is augmented by Ari Balouzian’s playful synth-forward score, which exudes both wonder, curiosity and no small amount of side-eyed humor.
It’s the humor, though, that’s the problem. At every moment, it feels like Oppenheim is nudging us going “Isn’t this weird? Aren’t these people strange?” And to be sure, some of them definitely are. Giving your sperm away for free to strangers on the internet is a hard mindset to understand, as is that of the women accepting the unvetted seed of men whose generosity and genetic markers they don’t really know for sure.
But these are also highly sensitive circumstances for the women depicted in the film — folks like Rachel, who wants a baby despite the significant risks to her own life, and Tyree’s fiancé Atasha, who can’t get her partner to take a break and see to her needs. Oppenheim makes it so easy to laugh at his subjects that the film often overlooks the actual pathos lying beneath.
Spermworld is a stylistically assured film that uncovers a wild corner of the internet, with several incredible moments that are tailor-made to embed themselves into popular culture (I’ve already used the line “there will be no retirement” a dozen times since I first saw the film). However, it’s hard to shake the feeling that for all its curiosity, Oppenheim’s film has all the empathy of a Vice documentary, an aspect that leaves behind an uncomfortably bitter aftertaste.
