The Human Centipede

Director - Tom Six
Starring - Dieter Leiser

Many a time I've gone to watch and each time I've remembered the storyline and thought.. "Really?"... But as Lovefilm has kindly added both films from the incomplete trilogy I got into bed with some chocolate (yeeeah I'm hardcore that way) and switched on.

The storyline is likely to be well known but for the sake of those who live under rocks.. A mad doctor, renowned for being a pioneer in separation of Siamese twins kidnaps two young women, a trucker and later a Japanese tourist to create a new project. The project is to sew three people together, anus to mouth. Why? Because he's mad obviously!

First off the acting of the two girls is terrible. Thankfully they are the middle and end piece of the creation so we don't have to hear them talk for long. The doctor who is frankly brilliant makes the movie bearable. When he describes to his patients what he'll be doing you actually shudder. He's just terrific! Kudos should also go to the Japanese guy. His final moments include a monologue which was delivered with near perfect conviction. Six's biggest mistake was including serious moments of perfection in a film that even he didn't seem to take seriously.

Now I'm under no illusion that the film is serious. There is an obvious dark humour running through it. There is a gross out factor, but like many others, I thought it wasn't explicit enough. It doesn't help the movie is incredibly over hyped by its fans, the people who disliked it because of its gross out factor and the director himself. If I had gone in blind, it'd probably had more of an effect. Maybe those people who did hype it up were the lucky few who hadn't heard so much about it.

Gore is minimal. For a film about people crapping into each other there isn't even any of that. Not that I'm complaining. However, for an "extreme" horror, there is little extreme about it. I wasn't all that grossed out like I wanted to be. Cinematography, it's fairly basic. Nothing really special here. Acting as mentioned before is pretty shocking but I'll give credit to Dieter Leiser (The doctor) for creeping me out during his explanation. There is very little to like here really. I did enjoy some of the dark comedy but it isn't a redeemable feature for the rest of the movie.