A QUICK warning before I begin: Today's column discusses a very R21 movie and therefore deals with some rather R21 concepts.

Still, just in case this falls into the wrong hands, I will be replacing some words with more ambiguous terms, say, Michael Jackson and Paris Hilton.

Right, on with it. In case you haven't figured out, the topic I intend to address today is the very controversial and very sensitive subject: How to make women laugh.

My long-held belief has been that men and women generally laugh at the same sorts of things, except when it comes to one particular topic - Michael Jackson.

Men love Michael Jackson jokes. They can't get enough of it. Every man knows some, even seemingly high-class serious folks. If you're ever in England, go ahead and ask any male member (hah!) of the British royal family. If you ask Prince Charles and he can't tell you one immediately, I will give you $5. (Exception: Michael Jackson may not know any.)

I personally know about a billion. I regard myself as something of an authority on MJ jokes. I challenge anyone to tell me an MJ joke I've never heard.

So anyway, through my years of experience whipping these jokes out at parties, I learnt that women do not laugh at them.

More often than not, they cringe and roll their eyes. So I just assumed women have no patience for any joke involving Michael Jackson, or for that matter, Paris Hilton.

As it turns out, I was wrong about women, again.

Last week I went to watch the movie Teeth. It's supposed to be a horror flick, but if you walked in halfway, you would've thought it was a comedy by the way the women were laughing and sniggering.

The men, however, watched in stunned silence. I was silently squirming, and had to watch most of it cuddled in the foetal position.

Let me just say upfront that if you are in possession of a Michael Jackson, you will consider Teeth the SCARIEST MOVIE IN THE WORLD.

I'm normally quite good with scary movies. I was not affected at all by The Ring or The Grudge or Shutter. But I was a wreck in Teeth. It's been a week now and I still shudder replaying scenes in my mind.

It played on all my fears: Fear of women, fear of nuclear radiation, fear of dentists, fear of arthouse flicks and, of course, fear of damage to my Michael Jackson.

Teeth, you see, is a movie about a girl who somehow mutated to develop shark-like teeth in her Paris Hilton, such that any MJ it comes in contact with is bitten off.

(As is my routine during horror movies, I frequently had the urge to yell: No! Don't go in there!)

The chomping happens several times in gory detail and must rank as the most disturbing bits of cinema ever. You couldn't tell though by the way the women hooted every time MJ got munched.

That got me thinking and I think I detect a trend. Having your MJ cut off - among men's greatest fears - is actually hilarious to women.

I remember a lot of women sniggering about Lorena Bobbitt. In 1993, Ms Bobbitt shot to fame when she cut off her husband's king of pop with a kitchen knife.

Men were running around like dogs with their tails between their legs. Women, however, seemed amused. Men started sleeping on their stomachs.

There was no less chuckling in Singapore when a national hero no less, former national athlete Fok Keng Choy, was bitten in his MJ-ticles by a python.

I still remember his quote in The Straits Times after. 'Words cannot describe it,' he said.

Similarly, words cannot describe the feeling for me watching Teeth and seeing a man have his severed MJ - guys, look away - gobbled up by a dog.

But how can someone, women specifically, laugh at that?

The consensus from my female friends was that it was funny on two levels.

First, it depicts anguish of someone who has lost something dear, a feeling women identify with.

Secondly, the movie turned the tables on men in the long-running power struggle between the genders.

I listened to them and gave it some careful thought, trying to work out the meaning of it all.

After about seven minutes of intensive thought, I had an epiphany.

It's not something revolutionary or new, rather it affirms some long-held notions.

Here it is: Women enjoy seeing men suffer.

It's that simple. I mean I used to joke about it, but Teeth actually showed me that there may be something more to it.

How else to explain this reaction from my female friend:

'You know what I thought was the funniest thing about the movie?

'You. You were squirming.'

This article was first published in The Straits Times on Apr 14, 2008.