Nominated for Best Documentary Feature
Content Warning – Sexual Content
Exploring the prolific career of sex educator and television personality Sue Johanson, a nurse-turned sex educator, television host and trailblazer who hosted the Sunday Night Sex Show and offered comprehensive sex education from a pleasure-driven, feminist perspective, this documentary reveals the unexpected and exciting ways her legacy lives on today.
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Winner of the 2023 Canadian Screen Award for Best Documentary Programme, Lisa Rideout’s feature-length documentary deftly weaves together personal memoir, audience reminiscence and the cultural legacy of Dr. Sue Johanson. Defiant, trailblazing, no-nonsense – Sue’s late-night, hands-on approach to sexual education captured the hearts (and libidos) of millions throughout the 80s to the early 2000s.
Interspersed with anecdotal commentaries from numerous figures such as Danny Savage, Nina Hartley and Delta Work, Rideout demonstrates the breadth of Sue’s impact; from activists, to performance artists, to BBC news correspondents, Sue’s work was a delicious paroxysm of factual, comedic, nonjudgemental pillow talk that catalysed a generation of media and entertainment personalities.
It can be seen as a criticism of the 20th century that sexual education was nonexistent to the point where it was picked up, morphed and spearheaded by these unassuming figures; but it is the unlikeliness of Sue Johanson that structured and determined her almost universal appeal. Queer cinema in popular culture nowadays is often shaped and motivated by sex education, and this recent bloom in mainstream sex positivity can be seen as a gradual culmination that is, at least in part, attributable to the 80s radio musings of an elderly woman with oversized glasses and a tool belt of pleasure toys.
Bryony Chellew
This film is Triple F Rated.
