Posted : November
2013
Author : Matt
Schembari
I’ll go out on a
limb and give a rough estimation that about 97% of movie buffs have come across
at least one movie at some point in their lives that they just couldn’t watch
from start to finish. Everyone has vastly different tastes in films, different
things that make them tick and differing thresholds of tolerance for boredom,
graphic violence and gore, downright stupidity and endless cliches. There are
countless reasons why someone would decide to hit the stop button partway
through a film. Filmmakers who are
notorious for pushing the envelope are generally regarded as those who make the
most disturbing of movies, with varying degrees of success. Some do succeed all
the way and garner critical praise and lucrative financial gain, a la Quentin
Tarantino. Others, while they may achieve a certain level of praise, do split
people’s opinions straight down the middle about whether their films are
artistic, or just plain torture porn.
Take the Saw franchise for example, what started as one of the most fresh and innovative thrillers of the new millennium slowly descended into nothing more than a showcase for the many different ways of how to mutilate a human body over the course of seven films. There’s no doubt that the quality of the writing began to be overshadowed by the horrific violence because, for better or worse, the producers seemed to think that audiences’ bloodlust was greater than their intellect. In the spirit of Halloween, the release of the sixth film in the long-running Child’s Play franchise, Curse Of Chucky, and the recent release of the sequel to the mercilessly brutal I Spit On Your Grave, I’m going to focus on the treacherous uphill grind that one takes to finish a film that is packed with graphic violent content and disturbing subject matter.
Here are 7 movies
that are incredibly hard to watch.
7. Maniac (2013)
If you remember
William Lustig’s brutally psychotic film Maniac, you probably remember Tom
Savini’s head turning into a human piñata after being blasted by a shotgun.
It’s splattery, gory, and absolutely insane – but doesn’t hold a candle to
Franck Khalfoun’s brutally unforgiving masterpiece. This year’s Maniac remake
(re-imagining) not only utilized gut-wrenching violence and stomach-churning gore,
but the psychological aspect taints our minds and actually does something
despicably evil – it turns us into the killer. First of all, kudos
to Elijah Wood for delivering one of his best performances to date as lead
character Frank, an emotionally deranged serial killer who targets young women
and removes their scalps, only to use the fleshy mess as headpieces for his
mannequin collection. I know, you’re probably a little queasy already, because
Khalfoun doesn’t hold a damn thing back visually, as we watch Elijah murder
woman after woman, hearing the squishy slicing noise as he removes their
precious locks. It gets worse though, oh so worse.
Khalfoun’s Maniac
utilizes a first-person POV technique, as we watch the actions play out as
Elijah’s character Frank. We’re seeing through his eyes. We’re hearing his
thoughts. We’re uncomfortably listening to his excited panting as he stalks
women from afar. In essence, we become the killer, and it feels dementedly
disgusting. This effect is most prominent when actress Megan Duffy is
suffocated by Frank, as we watch her body go limp and lifeless in Frank’s
outstretched hands – and by that I mean our hands. It’s so gritty and real, I
almost felt like I was watching a snuff film, and I couldn’t shake this feeling
of disgust afterwards, like I’d played a part in the act.
The genius of Maniac’s
insanity is not in violence alone, but in the beautifully murderous delivery
that creeps into our psyche and digs deep without us even knowing. It’s not
just a blood-soaker like Lustig’s original, not in a longshot. Khalfoun’s Maniac
is a piece of sadistic horror that brings you as close as humanly possible to
being a killer yourself, whether you like it or not (I’m hoping you don’t?).
Watch at your own risk, because you never know what hidden feelings might be
unearthed…
6. Cannibal
Holocaust (1980)
Cannibal Holocaust is
one hell of a twisted film. Seized in Italy after it premiered, director
Ruggero Deodato was arrested on obscenity charges as well, with authorities
claiming that he had made a snuff film. Following all that, it didn’t take long
for Cannibal Holocaust to receive a ban in Italy,
Australia
and several other countries and to this day, the film is still impossible to
get a hold of in most places. Whether it’s due to
the graphic gore, the animal killings or the sexual violence, there are not
many people that I know who can sit through the entire film. If you do see it
though, and if you’re able to make it to the end, I can assure you that you
will never forget what you have witnessed.
There just really
isn’t anything else out there like Cannibal Holocaust. It’s so extreme and
graphic and the scariest part is, it all looks pretty real. So much so, in
fact, that at the time, moviegoers were convinced that some of the actors were
actually killed on film. Then of course there are the animal slaughterings,
which are just downright disturbing to watch. Though it no doubt
has cult status, and there are those who will defend it with every last breath,
Cannibal Holocaust is not a film that I think I can ever watch again. It’s
just too much and it’s where I draw the line.
5. Se7en (1995)
The 90s were
undoubtedly an era for ushering in game-changing psychological thrillers. An
encapsulation by the one and only Sir Anthony Hopkins in 1991′s The Silence Of
The Lambs gave us one of the most frightening villains of all time in Dr
Hannibal Lecter. Following on from this came John Doe, a villain brought to
life by the multi-talented Kevin Spacey in what could only be described as the
most grisly and uneasy thriller ever conceived. Se7en focuses on
two homicide detectives hot on the trail of a serial killer who despatches his
victims in the vein of the seven deadly sins. It’s not the graphic violence
that made me turn this one off, it was the atmosphere (and maybe the fact that
I was only sixteen years old). The old saying that “less is more” really
applies here, and it is what truly makes this a film that will absolutely send
chills down your spine.
David Fincher’s
masterful direction created a world that I hope to live my entire existence
without ever being a part of. We are forced to follow detective Mills and Somerset on the unenvious
task of tracking John Doe, and along the way, evil in its purest form is
witnessed. No punches are pulled here, the introduction itself illustrates very
clearly to the audience exactly what kind of a ride they’re about to be taken
on. In one of the most
creative and effective intro sequences I’ve ever seen, the eerie images of John
Doe working on his journal and peeling skin off of his fingers is montaged over
a remix of the Nine Inch Nails track Closer. I don’t know about you, but the
song itself is enough to make me uneasy, let alone having to watch those images
at the same time. Pure brilliance.
4. Natural Born
Killers (1994)
Probably considered
to be one of the most controversial movies of all time, Natural Born Killers shoots
its way into our number four spot. Director Oliver Stone is no stranger to
making films that test boundaries and audiences’ thresholds, and Natural Born
Killers is no exception. Filled with lurid
violence, spot on performances by all and some very creative scene
construction, Stone tells his story in a unique yet disturbing way. The film
centres around husband-and-wife killing duo Mickey (Woody Harrelson) and
Mallory (Juliette Lewis) as they commit mass murder after experiencing abusive
childhoods. Along the way, they’re made out to be cult heroes by the media
after being arrested, and this is where the film gains its satire. Sure, it
certainly works as a social commentary on how the media can sway the opinion of
the masses, but how it achieves this is not easy to stomach.
The violence is
very much in your face, and the whole film itself feels like a nightmarish
hallucination. The sequence that features the late Rodney Dangerfield as
Mallory’s abusive father is played like an old time sitcom in which Mallory is
subjected to multiple instances of sexual and physical abuse. Another sequence
in which we get inside Mickey’s head gives us a glimpse of his own abusive
childhood, and that was where I had to leave.
It’s been a while
since I first tried to watch Natural Born Killers, but I have to admit that the
entire experience was not very pleasant. The film is extremely disturbing and
unsettling and more than deserves its notoriety. It also has the graphic
violence and the demented psychological aspect to go along with it. This isn’t to
detract from Oliver Stone as a filmmaker, quite the contrary. He is extremely
skilled as a craftsman and I praise him for it, Natural Born Killers is just an
experience that I couldn’t get through.
3. Tokyo Gore Police (2008)
Taking the number
three spot is probably the most bloody, gory and ridiculous movie I have ever
half-witnessed. I had to fit in one foreign film on this list and if there’s
one country who knows how to disturb us in every way possible, it’s Japan. Tokyo Gore Police
is definitely for an acquired taste and not for the faint of heart. It isn’t
even for the strong of heart. It takes someone with guts of steel to sit
through this one. Director Yoshihiro Nishimura, who worked on special effects
for other films in a similar vein, such as Machine Girl and RoboGeisha, brings
us his trademark over-the-top, gross out violence.
I barely even
remember what this movie is about, all I know is that there is a sword-wielding
female police officer and a bunch of people having appendages sliced off and
strange alien like creatures growing in their place. There was just so much
blood and gore that I couldn’t really tell what the hell was going on. By the
time the halfway mark hit, I was completely lost. I’m not a prude when it comes
to violence, but in this case, I had to draw the line. I can’t really say
much more about this one. It wasn’t psychologically disturbing, the violence
was just so continuous and graphically depicted that I couldn’t watch anymore,
and it takes a lot for me to say that.
2. The Devil’s
Rejects (2005)
Coming in at second
place is Rob Zombie’s sequel to his directorial debut House Of 1000 Corpses. I have to hand it
to the guy, he knows how to craft a good horror movie, and he knows how to do
it retro-style. I only just survived through House of 100 Corpses as I’m not
the biggest fan of the horror genre, but it felt like an old 70′s exploitation
film and while the premise wasn’t totally original, I could definitely
appreciate what Zombie was trying to do. The Devil’s Rejects
however, was much more of an ambitious film in the sense that Zombie tried to
mesh together a crime caper, a road trip film and a revenge thriller, and it
worked quite well. I will admit that
Rob Zombie is a talented filmmaker, but this particular movie was even harder
to sit through than his previous effort. I put it down to the fact that in the
first film, the sick and twisted Firefly family basically stayed confined to
their titular house and that’s it, you wouldn’t hear from them if you didn’t
come a knockin’. In this one however, the Firefly family are forced to flee
their house once a vengeful sheriff comes a knockin’ with some serious
firepower. It is then that their killing spree begins on the open road.
What made The
Devil’s Rejects hard to sit through is not only the degree of brutality and
torture that is bestowed upon innocent people by the Fireflys, but also just
how unconditionally evil they all are. Just when you don’t think it could get
any worse, a poor woman is forced to wear the peeled off face of her dead
husband and run out onto the road for help, only to get completely demolished
by an oncoming truck. I understand that this is a horror film at heart, but
this just tested my threshold time and time again. The best
description of what to expect from The Devil’s Rejects is illustrated in the
following line said by the character Otis as he’s about to kill a victim: “I am
the devil, and I am here to do the devil’s work.”
1. A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Lo and behold, our
number one contender, and another in the ranks of most controversial films ever
made, is Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece, A Clockwork Orange. Based on Anthony
Burgess’ novel of the same name, the film is set in future Britain where
juvenile delinquency runs rampant and rape and ultra violence is the order of
the day. Young Alex De Large
(played flawlessly by Malcolm McDowell) narrates the film as he and his droogs
terrorize as many unknowing innocent people as possible, before ending the day
with a bit of Ludwig van Beethoven. Once captured and forced to face the
consequences for his actions, the government places Alex in an experimental
trial program in an attempt to rehabilitate him by forcing him to view extreme
violence until he can no longer handle it.
A Clockwork Orange
is a difficult movie to talk about, because it’s one of those ‘you have to see
it for yourself’ kind of films. While the violence depicted is certainly tame
by today’s standards, it doesn’t detract from the psychological ramifications
that come with viewing it. The whole film is just one big social commentary,
and one that stimulates much discussion about the fine line that we tread
between punishment and inhumane treatment. The entire movie
has quite a perplexed atmosphere too, as the tone teeters on the theatrical
whilst delving into brutal violence, and this is where it works brilliantly. It
probably didn’t help that I tried to watch it when I was sixteen (what was with
me at this age?), but I again had to turn it off halfway because I found it far
too disturbing at the time. It was two years later that I finally finished the
film and vowed never to watch it again.
There are countless
movies out there that are much more disturbing than any on this list, but
again, one can only draw on personal experience and these ones did get the job
done.
~Admin~
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