Laughology

Laughology
1 Disc Widescreen edition, released September 7, 2010

"Laughology" is the first ever feature documentary about the subject of laughing, written and directed by Albert Nerenberg. One man's loss of laughter after a string of bad events motivated his journey to find out more about laughter, why we laugh, what it does for us, how contagious it is, and hopefully how to get his own laugh back.

Laughing is a human action that occurs without learning. Babies do it without example, even deaf and blind babies can do it. We inherently have the need to laugh within us.

"The man with the most contagious laugh in the world" is a real hoot! Doug Collins has a silly, distinctive laugh that is so ridiculous, it once kept an audience in stitches for twenty minutes straight. His youtube video of laughter has been replayed over and over again by countless listeners on youtube who are in need of cheering up.

Norman Cousins engaged in laughing to save his life. He was painfully ill and found that ten minutes of good belly-aching laughter could result in half an hour of pain-free sleep. He watched tons of old episodes of Candid Camera to generate his laughter and much later found himself cured much to the surprise of all.

Laughter clubs have broken out everywhere including laughing yoga for exercise. There was a laughing disease epidemic in Tanzania in 1962 where thousands of people laughed for eighteen months, tested came back with nothing abnormal detected. Africa isn't the only place with laughter epidemics. A South African minister has brought holy laughter to Massachusetts resulting in falling down, rolling laughter.

The conclusion being reached was that just faking laughter can result in true laughter! This is a funny and interesting documentary and I challenge you not to laugh along with it! It's only 66 minutes long and pretty funny.

Special Features:

Over 40 minutes of extras that are even funnier than the documentary starting with the laughing yogi's routine which is utterly ridiculous and uproariously funny and includes an interview with him explaining what he does and why. Other extras include the origins and science of Dr. Kataria, the laughologist, longer interview segments with Sophie Scott and Doug Collins, and an interview with Robert Provine on understanding laughter.

As a laughter yoga professional, I was aware of the buzz surrounding the release of Laughology. Everyone was excited to have a full length documentary about laughter. When I finally saw it myself, I was delighted to realize that it's more than just a film about laughter--it's an exceptionally great film about laughter!

Albert Nerenberg frames the journey of this film with his own story. Like so many others, he had "lost his laugh" by becoming a serious adult leading a stressful life. In a desperate attempt to rediscover his inner joy, he explores the many ways in which laughter is therapeutic. Along the way, he highlights important figures in this field including Dr. Robert Provine, Norman Cousins, Dr. Madan Kataria, and Doug Collins--the man with the world's most contagious laugh. Nerenberg travels to a number places around the globe and even goes to Africa to investigate the laughter epidemic that happened in Tanzania in the 1960s. This is a particularly fascinating piece.

Laughology is intelligent, informative, entertaining and hilarious. Interspersed throughout the film are great clips of people laughing contagiously, which makes it such fun to watch. Nerenberg plays the straight man so well by not laughing in the presence of laughing people. This, too, is funny. My laughter club members were falling out of their chairs watching it. I highly recommend this film. I'll be showing it at all my laughter yoga seminars from now on. To bring more laughter into your own life through a daily practice, check out Be Laughter.

The practice of laughter has been in the past and even today discouraged in most churches, public schools, funerals, in business and political meetings, and other gloomy somber places like court rooms, government offices, subways, city public buses, lines at the Post Office, and at my mother in law house.

With a destructive tendency to take everything seriously the filmmaker with an inability to laugh and enjoy life began researching about the subject of laughter in Canada, Africa, England, Tennessee, Massachusetts, and India where he discovers that organized laughter clubs worldwide take laughing very seriously.

In Africa he met some people who participated in the 1962 Tanzania so-called laughter epidemic, in Massachusetts he discovered a church where the folks laugh allegedly to get closer to the Divine.

Obviously there are great benefits derived from regular laughter but certain controlling powers do not want people to realize the tremendous positive impact for human unity, health and freedom involved in a planet inclined to regular laughter practice be that spontaneous or fake laughter as regularly done in laughing clubs.

The idea behind laughter clubs, originated in India in 1995, is that laughing due to a joke is not the only approach to trigger laughter but that by faking it we get the same benefits as real laughter, yet we usually end up laughing for real.

Regular Laughter practice stimulates friendship and good will among those who otherwise would be at each other's throat, it is a simple solution to fear, sadness and even anger, it lowers blood pressure cures stress and it has proved to be a sure short cut to joy and contentment.

I recommend this well researched DVD documentary to everyone.

NOTE: Norman Cousins who in 1964 was completely cured of a so-called terminal illness is the first person that we know of who successfully used laughter as medicine.

See the book Anatomy of an Illness.