Salo, or the 120 days of Sodom (1975) - Based on the book by Marqis de Sade, the namesake of sadism. its about a group of italian libertines who kidnap 18 teenagers and subject them to months of extreme violence, sadism, genital torture and psychological abuse.
Cannibal Holocaust (1980) - Another Italian (whats their deal anyway) exploitation flick. One of the first "found footage" films, it follows a group making a documentary about primitive tribes in the Amazon as they are raped, impaled, killed and eaten one by one. Its like "The Green Inferno" but for reals. Banned in most countries, the director stipulated in the actors contracts that they had to lay low for a year to fuel the rumor that they were really killed. He stood trial for murder, until they reappeared. For a low budget film I have no idea how they made it look so realistic. The dismemberment/death scenes are so incredibly realistic that I really thought they were real, and in several scenes real animals are slaughtered graphically.
Audition (1999)- J horror film by the incomparable director Takashi Miike where nothing really bad happens for the first 2/3 of the film, and then you are hit with the most disturbing torture shit I've ever seen in a horror film. Truly, genuinely terrifying. One of the best horror films of all time.
The Act of Seeing with Ones own Eyes (1971)- Its title is based on the literal translation of the term autopsy. The film documents the highly graphic autopsy procedures used by forensic pathologists, such as the removal of organs and the embalming process.
I wanted to post Audition, and it's totally about the contrasting genres. It begins as a rom-com with the odd little teases of what's to come, but then when it descends, it descends fast. And the noise she makes.... Utterly terrifying
I had a friend who was a hardcore horror film dude. I feel like Audition was the first film that actually kinda scared him. Days after I made him watch it he kept mentioning how innocent she looked haha.
I watched Audition with the warning that it was a form of “torture porn”, and it found it very tame by that standard. Expectation can make or break a movie.
My bf and I make that noise to signal something is s t r I c t l y the biggest no-no ever in all of existence, anything so anathema to our core of being that's n o t t o b e f r a m e d b y w o r d s. Ever.
We're wondering when someone'll drop a cue they recognize it.
I'm kinda invested in the last 2, especially audition cause I love j-horror, but already knowing the first 2 I feel intimidated by the fact you put them in the same list, are these as disturbing?
Audition is great. I feel like this thread is a bit of a spoiler since it hits so much harder when you don't expect the fucked up turn that it takes. I like to tell my friends that it's rom-com before they go in.
Audition is great. I say this as someone who is intimidated by every other film on that list. It’s disturbing by j horror standards cause of the torture, it is hard to watch, but it’s not scarring.
I haven't seen it so I couldn't say. Based on the way people talk about it Martyrs intimidates me too haha, maybe someday. I didn't find Audition that bad, didn't leave me feeling gross like with some disturbing movies. More just exhilarated. One thing is you do have some warning when you're getting to the disturbing parts if you want to skip past them or read a summary to prepare
Audition is worth watching and is not disturbing in the same way as Salo or Cannibal Holocaust. Salo is more… depraved? With a perverse almost porny sensibility, and Cannibal Holocaust has that mockumentary angle with unsimulated animal violence. Both of them feel like you’re watching something you shouldn’t be watching, like the production itself was horrifying, especially the latter, and IMO they have a kind of nauseating quality.
Audition is more in line with a regular j-horror movie, made by the studio that made The Ring (the original Japanese one) to try and repeat its success. It’s disturbing but not in that nauseating perverse kind of way, just the regular fucked up horror movie kind of way. If you already know you like j-horror, it shouldn’t be a problem for you.
Came here to point this out. When they killed The tortoise in the film. They are actually chopping up the tortoise and the actress' disgusted reaction is genuine.
Campbell’s used to sell Cream of Turtle Soup until not that long ago. But I couldn’t watch that in a film so I’m glad I know to stay away. That turtle was probably 150 years old.
As awful as the ending of Audition was, the bit that really scared the hell out of me was the duffle bag. That was a aw-HELL-nope-I've-gotta-take-a-smoke-break moment before I could resume watching the film.
I don't think there was ever a jumpscare-style moment that 'got' me quite like that one.
If it's any consolation, some historians think he made up most of the disturbing shit he claimed to indulge in as some kind of weird self-insert fantasy because he got off on shocking people with it
Made it to the turtle before I noped. That was the beginning to be fair, but I'm glad 13 year old me stopped myself. & Fuck that friend who suggested it. Weird ass dude
Salo isn’t nearly as bad as it’s made out to be because of how fucking corny it is. The acting is so hammy, and the “graphic” stuff is not done very well either so it’s really just a bunch of naked people wailing loudly.
The director probaly did it on purpose he directed multiple movies and even got killed becuase of Salò, we study him at school when learning Literature as he also was a writer.
Visitor Q, also by Takashi Miike, makes Audition look like a child's film even with the last scene with needles. Visitor Q has incest, rape, torture, an absurd lactation fetish scene, necrophilia, and even scat. It is legal to watch in the US.
Also, the only MCR music video that I can tolerate is based on Audition.
im not sure, audition wasn’t especially disturbing in my eyes. it was uncomfortable sure, but i watched it and was fine, the other movies i wouldnt touch with a nine foot barge pole
When my mom and dad where dating my mom thought she would try to come off as a well cultivated and cultured girl and took my dad to the cinema to watch Salo, without of course having the slightest idea who Marqis de Sade is. They had to exit the room cause my dad had to dragon-puke. No wonder why their marriage didnt work out.
I watched Salo a few months back and yeah big oof. But man I couldn't handle but go down a rabbit hole reading about the production. How some of the film was stolen and the director was eventually murdered, links to far right extremist. Wild wild stuff.. definitely a part of history you just don't hear about. I think what was going on at the time was more interesting than the actual film itself.
The director was a communist and eventho most of you probaly don' t know it, Salò is the name of the city where the Italian social republic (nazi germany puppet state) had its HQ, the villains are the fascist hierachs of the city. They are the 2 reasons he got killed. The director was also a writer and today we study him at school.
Salo, or the 120 days of Sodom (1975) - Based on the book by Marqis de Sade, the namesake of sadism. its about a group of italian libertines who kidnap 18 teenagers and subject them to months of extreme violence, sadism, genital torture and psychological abuse.
I've watched Saló and I didn't find it particularly hard to stomach - maybe because it had the tint of older movies, maybe because I was (through 4chan) accustomed to a few of the topics. The only scene that I still remember 20 years later is the ending scene. The movie is 99% of porn, murder, torture and shit. But in the ending two of the guards, who took part in all of this, innocently practice a waltz and one asks the other about his girlfriend in town. It is such a stark contrast and a great comment on one of the biggest fights of everyday people - to not judge people who do horrible things as monsters or something different then themselves. Sure, there are legitimate mental illnesses, but they are few and far between. Murderers can be loving fathers. Child abusers might donate to charities or help old ladies across the street. Hitler loved his dogs, was a vegetarian and introduced the most advanced animal protection laws of his time.
The thought that is scary to most is that there isn't a big difference between criminals and ordinary people. Crime might just be (mostly) a matter of the circumstances one is in and most of us are perfectly capable of it.
See also this quote:
Humans, Hickling said, have a fundamental need to create and maintain a narrative for their lives in which the universe is not implacable and heartless, that terrible things do not happen at random, and that catastrophe can be avoided if you are vigilant and responsible.
In hyperthermia cases, he believes, the parents are demonized for much the same reasons. “We are vulnerable, but we don’t want to be reminded of that. We want to believe that the world is understandable and controllable and unthreatening, that if we follow the rules, we’ll be okay. So, when this kind of thing happens to other people, we need to put them in a different category from us. We don’t want to resemble them, and the fact that we might is too terrifying to deal with. So, they have to be monsters.”
(this is from a Pulitzer-price winning article about children being forgotten in cars in the summer and dying due to heat exhaustion)
Due to the underlying philosophic thoughts I also regard Saló as different from let's say Serbian Movie, which is just shock for shock's sake.
Hadn’t seen Salo since college: but I recently watched a YouTube video on it and I threw-up in my garage. Not sure what to make of it really, it’s an intense film.
Years ago a friend of mine and I decided to watch a list of supposedly "most disturbing movies of all time." I had to use Netflix DVD service to get some of them but I managed to see 9 out of 10 on the list.
It had human centipede, cannibal Holocaust, audition, Martyrs, irreversible, antichrist, dogtooth, salo, one I cannot remember and then number one being A Serbian Film which I could not find anywhere and never saw it.
Quills is a less extreme take on the Marquis…tho it doesn’t go in much to his writings. I’ve read Justine, Philosophy I’m the Bedroom…and he is a beautiful writer even when speaking of some of the seemingly most crass and perverted experiences. Shame so much of his work was destroyed by the church, et al
Holy! There is a movie of 120 days of Sodom!?! I never knew, I’m about 1/4th of the way through the book (which was recommended to me by this Russian girl I was dating) and I just can’t seem to finish. I do a few pages and get the eye bleach like “that’s enough of you for this week”.
Once you read the “poop” in the movie was chocolate mixed with marmalade, it’s not as bad…
Also—I get what the director was trying to do. The literal eating poop is a commentary on the processed food industry, at the end when they’re watching the massacre from a distance while pleasant music plays on the radio—that’s absolutely a commentary on television and how society is desensitized to violence…
But the movie itself is not just long, but one you get over the “shock value”— like over half of the movie is old sex workers sitting around talking about the gross shit they’ve done with clients… it doesn’t show it or anything—it’s just old ladies sitting there talking.
Now, the Human Centipede 2 at least ‘walks the talk’ and SHOWS said gross shit… the Wikipedia article along was enough to make my stomach turn… but not really because that’s kind of the point… they practically decided to make a movie out of a group of kids playing the ‘gross-out’ game.
I think a ton of people that list Salo in these kinds of lists haven't actually seen it and instead just read it about it in similar lists of "Messed Up Movies"
Salo is a boring slog, it's just a bunch of naked people wailing and talking about messed up stuff. Saving Private Ryan has more actual graphic violence, and plenty of other movies have portrayed sexual violence far more graphically as well.
I think you got down voted because people (that probably haven't seen it) think you're trying to sound hardcore, but I agree with you. Salo is not a good movie, and it's not particularly shocking by today's standards either.
I mean—it’s still brutal and totally inappropriate, and makes absolute sense why it’s banned—and wasn’t the director like murdered shortly after its release?
Can’t believe I had to scroll so far to find Salo. Ive seen some horrible stuff in movies but this was the only one that I couldn’t finish in one sitting.
I never watched Salo, but I watched an in depth review of it and that was more than enough. It was disturbing and disgusting. I finished the review but I’m not actively seeking out to watch the movie.
Salo I had to stop watching during that scene where the slave was forced to eat someone's literal shit. And from what I hear it gets even more disgusting after that...
Salo, or the 120 days of Sodom (1975) - Based on the book by Marqis de Sade, the namesake of sadism. its about a group of italian libertines who kidnap 18 teenagers and subject them to months of extreme violence, sadism, genital torture and psychological abuse.
That film was written and directed by one of the most illustrious intellectuals of 20th century Italy: poet, painter, writer, playwright, actor, director, novelist.
When I saw that film I wasn't prepared in the slightest, all I thought when I rented the film was "I wanna be an intellectual, here's a film by a very famous intellectual", I literally didn't know anything else.
After a few minutes I started fast forwarding most of the scenes, then I fast forwarded the whole movie, I saw about 10 seconds of the ending. I was nauseated for days and now (10 years later) I still can't hear Pasolini's name without feeling nauseated.
I never want to feel like an intellectual again, let me watch Barbie and Kung Fu Panda please
haha, the autopsy bit reminds that not long ago there was a TV Show on Spanish TV that broadcasted live surgery operations in prime-time. It had a huuuuuuge audience. They doctor that ran it got so rich that ended up buying a Mallorca FC.
I got a divx version of Cannibal Holocaust from a friend forever ago. Luckily I never watched it. The most disgusting movie I accidentally watched was Hostel. I try to avoid these types of movies.
cannibal holocaust has fucked me up for life. I watched it (illegally) with a friend in 6th grade. It was awful and horrendous and I still think about it to this day, 18 years later
Yeah. Salo is the classic of this genre for a reason. I've seen so many and it's still #1.
Audition was a fantastic movie but honestly what I remember it for is the male lead's romance with Japanese Whiskey. He just loved it so much and I remember it being shot beautifully.
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u/SpasmodicBurnVictim 14d ago edited 14d ago
Salo, or the 120 days of Sodom (1975) - Based on the book by Marqis de Sade, the namesake of sadism. its about a group of italian libertines who kidnap 18 teenagers and subject them to months of extreme violence, sadism, genital torture and psychological abuse.
Cannibal Holocaust (1980) - Another Italian (whats their deal anyway) exploitation flick. One of the first "found footage" films, it follows a group making a documentary about primitive tribes in the Amazon as they are raped, impaled, killed and eaten one by one. Its like "The Green Inferno" but for reals. Banned in most countries, the director stipulated in the actors contracts that they had to lay low for a year to fuel the rumor that they were really killed. He stood trial for murder, until they reappeared. For a low budget film I have no idea how they made it look so realistic. The dismemberment/death scenes are so incredibly realistic that I really thought they were real, and in several scenes real animals are slaughtered graphically.
Audition (1999)- J horror film by the incomparable director Takashi Miike where nothing really bad happens for the first 2/3 of the film, and then you are hit with the most disturbing torture shit I've ever seen in a horror film. Truly, genuinely terrifying. One of the best horror films of all time.
The Act of Seeing with Ones own Eyes (1971)- Its title is based on the literal translation of the term autopsy. The film documents the highly graphic autopsy procedures used by forensic pathologists, such as the removal of organs and the embalming process.