Some films are just too violent. I'm as partial as anyone to a well-executed headshot with brains and blood spray exiting stage left, and I even quite like the odd severed arm, but shots of people cutting their own tongues off in EXTREME close-up, with maximum use of gruesome sound effects? Women being punched, kicked, raped, repeatedly stamped on and having their nipples stretched out on a table and severed? A man being suspended from the ceiling with 20 meat-hooks through his back and legs, then having his face skewered and boiling fat poured over him? Severed faces sliding down walls? People having their legs severed, their arms pulled off? People being cut in half and having their organs spill out (cleaning teams squishing through the intestines)? No. Just no. Japanese film-makers = bad and wrong (yes, all of them). What is it with these people?
You've got to be kidding. It's called horror movies and hollywood makes the most gruesome horror movies.
It's not a 'horror' movie. It's a Japanese gangster film. I'm being slightly disingenuous though: I thought I knew what I was letting myself in for.
And no, Hollywood doesn't make "the most gruesome horror movies". They make sterile, formulaic tat. Which is far worse.
Sounds intereting. How are the effects? More often than not I am sorely disappointed in films that others call grotesque and realistic.
Deliberately over-the-top. It's unnerving, but a lot of the blood n' guts are very unrealistic, which seems to be the typical way Japanese gore is done. 'Audition' by the same director, Miike, is also very good. Not very gory though. Why are you racist?
Since there's no comma after the 'Why' I'll assume you're assuming rather than asking. So I'll answer your assumption with a question: since when have film-makers qualified as a race? And a demand: you tell me why Japanese film-makers excel at turning extreme physical and sexual violence into pornography. And a supplementary question: are they responding to a deep-seated need in the Japanese psyche? And a closing statement: yes, I'm being a bit provocative. one raven: the quality of the effects varies. The tongue-cutting scene: stomach-churning. Other scenes: laughable, sometimes intentionally (the film does include quite a lot of dark humour). On the whole: realistically gruesome enough to distract me from the mystifying plot and leave me tensing up in anticipation of the next outbreak of bloody-minded carnage. A visceral roller-coaster ride of extremely questionable artistic merit.
I want to see a serious gore movie with effects as realistic and gripping as the straight razor scene in Pan's Labyrinth (great film, by the way - best I have seen in quite a while).
I find the Saw films hard to take too (they're brilliant though, despite what the increasingly disenchanted critics say). And the 'head-on-a-stick' scene from Wolf Creek. And, oh, loads of other ones. Maybe I'm just a wuss. I just don't seem to have enough of whatever chemical it is that makes you enjoy watching human beings being cut, bludgeoned and torn apart. Maybe I should watch the news more.
redarmy11: You know who else didn't like gory Japanese movies? Hitler. Rape is big there because the penis isn't? Possibly, but does the rote, formulaic crap (Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning, Exorcist: Dominion, etc) speak to some deep-seated American need? And American "horror" films are really just as bad about sexual assault -- they just don't show it. Which is, really, a lot worse. So was TIpper Gore. This would be more convincing had you not expressed appreciation for the hokey "Saw" franchise, or rented a movie called "Ichi the Killer." Seriously, what were you expecting? A fun filled romp through fields of clover? Singing happy animals? Its reputation had to precede it....
When they kill themselves (traditionally), they put a sword in from one side and twist it to the other side, the really honorable ones will do it the other way as well. What you see as gore, they see as strength.
Audition is a very funny movie. I watched the end with my friend and we couldn't but laugh when she said "deeper, deeper, deeper". We're probably sick... Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! That being said I dislike Ichi - too meaningless. Oh, and japanese generally do have sick movies, especially when it concerns sex.
ok, but this film goes way, way beyond mere disembowelling. My tolerance levels can cope with that, but this was an utter slaughterfest. I was expecting to see The Most Violent Film Ever Made. I just wasn't prepared for the strength of my own reactions. I thought I could handle it... and, after half an hour or so, I could, which is what I find most disturbing. Some MP3 players come with a warning: set an initial sound level and stick to it. Don't be tempted to increase the volume because, even though you think you can handle it, you're actually damaging your hearing once you go beyond a certain level. What's our creeping tolerance of films like this doing to us? Are there any limits? What would it take to shock you? I think I may be able to get hold of some snuff films - realism guaranteed. Is anyone interested? It's all most worrying.
Being a fan of Silence of the Lambs does not necessarily mean you condon cannibalism and murder. It's not real.
I knew you'd say that, but you didn't answer my other question: what, in film terms, would it take to shock (I think I mean nauseate) you? Is there anything left?
Avatar: Perhaps, but it's still awesome. redarmy11: So why whine about it now? I spent 9 bucks (okay, my boyfriend did) on "Pathfinder" expecting a cool movie about Vikings, since it was advertised as such. I watched a crapfest about....randomly appearing bears. I have reason to be disappointed. However, if I rent "Anal Auditions," I don't have reason to be offended by the pornographic content. DUH! Basically, you sound disingenuous.
In a movie that I knew was not real? I can't say I have ever been shocked. I'm not sure it is possible. I'm not really a gore connoisseur, either. I have seen very few "gore movies" simply because I prefer to watch movies that have a point other than the gore. If gore adds to it, great, but superfluous, gratuitous gore, bores me. That said, I can appreciate well-done gore as an art form. Did you see Pan's Labyrinth? It was not a gore film by any means - it was a child's fairytale. If you have, then it is hard to deny that the straight razor scene is not a work of art - it was exceptionally well done. I don't think it is a matter of tolerance or becoming desensitized at all for me - stories have always been simply stories. They are there for entertainment. the more it pulls me in and gets me emotionally involved - the better. Much more distubing to me than gore is movies like American Hostory X, which is not only realistic - it might as well be real. I see it all around me, and some parts of the story hit home on an almost unbearably real level. That's what I loved so much about it. I watch it over and over. To strike me and to move me means you did your job as a story teller well. I suppose it is pretty much the same with well done gore.
