Reality Reels: Have you met Jonathan ‘The Impaler’ Sharkey?

I am all about supporting one’s freedom of religion and freedom of speech, but this is one of the most disturbing movies I’ve seen in a long time. ‘The Impaler’ deals directly with the topic of our freedoms in America and how they apply to everyone, for better or for worse. Thus, we get to meet Jonathan “The Impaler” Sharkey and are taken on a tour of his life as a self-proclaimed Satanic Dark Priest, Hecate Witch and Sanguinary Vampire.

‘Impaler’ was directed by W. Tray White. I hadn’t heard of this documentary, released back in 2007, until I was playing around on Hulu recently and stumbled upon what I initially thought was a mockumentary. That is, until I actually started watching the movie and realized it was for real. I immediately found myself fixated on watching the bizarre story unfold, as is often the case with my taste in peculiar and strange documentary subjects.

‘The Impaler’ jumps right in at the beginning and reveals for us Sharkey’s experience running for governor of Minnesota, having successfully achieved getting his name officially on the ballot. Good for him, but it’s not difficult to believe from a state that elected Jesse “The Body” Ventura into the governor’s office and has voted Al Franken into the Senate.

No one in the film wants to take Sharkey seriously, except for himself and the less frightening and oddly tragic character of Julie Sharkey Carpenter, Jonathan’s wife. Julie comes across as a relatively sweet and innocent woman with “alternative” beliefs and ideas who is the unfortunate victim of being with the wrong guy at the wrong time. This is illustrated best when she loses her long-time job as a school bus driver. She was very good at her job and beloved by the kids and parents and teachers alike, until Jonathan revealed in a campaign press conference that she was a Pagan and subsequently was fired. Right or wrong, she was a casualty of Jonathan’s war.

While the first half of ‘Impaler’ focuses on Sharkey’s shot at a professional career in public office, the second half of the movie touches on his checkered past and his time as a professional wrestler. While both of these portions are detailed with fascinating interviews with characters from Sharkey’s past and present, it’s the moments of intimate conversation with Jonathan himself that create the tense and troublesome mood of this movie more than anything else.

Listening to Jonathan Sharkey tell about his beliefs, his lifestyle and attempt to intelligently explain his political ideology is an exercise in tolerance. Even the most open-minded viewer of this film is likely to find themselves questioning whether an individual like Jonathan Sharkey should be allowed to even run for public office. As we learn more about Jonathan and dig deeper into his life, we see him for the person he is and do eventually come to accept him, if not begrudgingly, as a fellow American acting on his rights as an American.

Overall, the movie is not perfect and could have used some additional time in the editing room, but is anything but boring. For some, ‘Impaler’ will have eyes wide with shocking disbelief and some won’t even bother to finish watching, while for others it will likely be a testament for their own life experiences. I enjoyed peering inside Jonathan Sharkey’s mind and his life (from a distance) but the added straight-on to the camera final moral message from Jonathan himself was a pure failure in documentarian filmmaking and ultimately dropped my rating by half a point.

[Overall: Formerly 3.25 stars out of 5, but dropped to 2.75 by the end credits]