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APOCRYPHA CANDIDATE: MELANCHOLIE DER ENGEL (2009)

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Beware

DIRECTED BY: Marian Dora

FEATURING: Zenza Raggi, Carsten Frank, Janette Weller

PLOT: Two middle-aged men, an old artist, and some women embark on a series of depravities.

Still from "Melancholie der engel" (2009)

WHY IT MIGHT JOIN THE APOCRYPHA: It is not only one of the most disturbing movies ever, but an incoherent mess that most of the time does not make any sense.

COMMENTS: German extremism has a rich cinematic tradition stretching from ’s infamous Nekromantik in 1988 until today. In the 21st century, where extreme cinema has developed as a distinct genre worldwide, even more disturbing works of dubious artistic quality appear. And in the extreme horror landscape of our day, Buttgereit is no longer at the forefront. A new voice has emerged, as out of our worst nightmares. The name of that voice is Marian Dora.

Melancholie der engel (The Angel’s Melancholy) remains Dora’s most widely known movie, considered by many to be the most disturbing film to ever exist. We follow two men, seemingly with no purpose in life, who seduce three women and take them to an isolated building deep inside a creepy forest, full of dead animals, worms, and slugs. An old friend of theirs introduces himself as an artist early on, bringing another, handicapped, woman with him. And the depravity begins.

Many scenes of violent torture, mostly of a sexual nature, take place both towards the women, and towards living (or even dead) animals. The violence persists from the first moment of the movie, even when its narrative function is not always clear. Rapid editing and many close-ups create a sense of disorientation, while grotesque imagery attacks the viewer from every direction. No coherent story emerges. In the tradition of contemporary extreme cinema, as we read in “Extreme Cinema: Affective Strategies in Transnational Media” by Aaron Michael Kerner and Jonathan L. Knapp, we have something more akin to an episodic structure, with the disturbing events being the episodes.

What kind of extreme imagery are we talking about? Images of decay, mostly, in its many forms. Worms, corpses, and decomposition are always in the background. However, the cinematography maintains a painterly quality, especially in its blurry landscapes. The dreadful forest that engulfs our characters reminds us of the forest in ’s Antichrist (2009), if it was even more extreme and perverted. But the real evil remains inside our protagonists, the three men, and their disgusting acts.

The women are not always the typical female victims of a slasher flick or torture porn. Sometimes they seem to enjoy the depravity around them, which makes the movie even more disturbing and difficult to watch. The exhausting duration,  around two and a half hours, does not help either. It is surely a weird movie, but it is recommended only for hardcore fans of extreme horror. Everyone else, stay away from this.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“…once we reach the house, that’s when everything starts getting progressively weirder. And filthier… If you like art films as well as scatological torture of young women (you have to like both), and you can handle pretentious dialogue and depictions of real animal death, AND you’re a fan of Marian Dora’s work (a lot of criteria to fill here), you might want to try and hunt down Melancholie der Engel.”–Sean Leonard, Horror New Network (Blu-ray)

(This movie was nominated for review by “Dee Coles.” Suggest a weird movie of your own here.)

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366 UNDERGROUND: THE BUNNY GAME (2011)

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Beware

DIRECTED BY: Adam Rehmeier

FEATURING: Rodleen Getsic, Jeff F. Renfro

PLOT: A prostitute is abducted by a trucker for five days.

COMMENTS: My goodness, that was something. Where to begin…

Slapping on the “Beware” label is a step in the right direction—The Bunny Game is a real piece of work. The film starts with super-creep: a female victim suffocating under a white plastic bag on her head. The shot is mere seconds long, but shows the filmmaker’s cards. Rehmeier has some nasty things in store for the viewer. The second shot, much longer—too long, certainly, for comfort—shows the card hiding up his sleeve: some John, viewed at the waist, his erect penis thrust into the mouth of the protagonist, forcefully “encouraging” her to fellate him. This shot goes on, it seems, until the act’s completion.

Events like this unfold for the unnamed woman (dubbed “Bunny” in the credits), going from rather bad to unimaginably worse when she proffers a blow job to a trucker who then abducts her and sexually and psychologically tortures her for five days. Heartbeat foley dominates one scene, where the muffled grunts and screams sound like they are coming through a door whilst a steady thump-thump-thump batters like an amphetamine dirge. Squeals of torsion wrench, as one nightmarish sequence blurs into the next, the timeline skipping between Bunny’s ordeal in high resolution, and a previous victim’s in grainier video. The trucker (dubbed “Hog”) mutters, snorts, smokes—coming across as a miserable, furious wreck of inhumanity as he breaks his victim.

Flash cuts, reverse footage, shaky camera, and other stylization tools simultaneously undercut and enhance the visceral malice. The movie weaves a subtle, but pernicious, electronic score throughout. The two leads obviously give us their all. But to what end? The Bunny Game technically qualifies as a narrative, I suppose: there is at least a through-line of events to follow. However, there is no climax, and no conclusion. As once observed: “If you want to tell stories, be a writer, not a filmmaker.” Rehmeier makes an experience with this film—a journey through malignant refuse, or a distillation of white hot agony.

In the Blu-ray disc extras, Rehmeier explains, “…we tried to maintain this negative energy throughout the production, and I think we were successful.” (And if pretentiousness through understatement is a thing, the filmmaker nails it.) But if The Bunny Game might be written off as pretentious Art-House-Shock-Shlock, at least it spares the viewer any affectations of deeper meaning: what you see is what you get—and what you see is mightily disturbing.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“Sort of an unholy merger between extreme performance art and experimental horror film, The Bunny Game essentially dares viewers to sit through it without crying uncle.” — Nathaniel Thompson, Mondo Digital

The Bunny Game [Blu-ray]

The Bunny Game [Blu-ray]
  • A prostitute is abducted by a deranged trucker who subjects her to five days of torture and madness.
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CAPSULE: SLEEPLESS BEAUTY (2020)

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Ya ne splyu

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DIRECTED BY: Pavel Khvaleev

FEATURING: Polina Davydova

PLOT: Two orderly researchers trap unsuspecting Russian, enacting potent operational reprogramming, neurologically.

Still from Sleepless Beauty (2020)

COMMENTS: In case my subliminal message didn’t sink in, here’s an illustrative rhyme to clarify:

“T” is for “trying“, the squeamish beware;
“O” is for “overt“, showing all it dares.
“R” is for “retching“, a result that’s sought;
“T” is for “tension“, one’s throat in a knot.
“U” is for “ugly“, most violent of crimes,
“R” is for “razor“, it’s used oftentimes.
“E” is for “endless“, may blood never cease,
“P” is for “prodding“, in places liked least.
“O” is for “offal“, of the human kind,
“R” is for “rotting“, of body and mind.
“N” is for “nasty“, how it has to be–
It spells “Torture Porn”, unsettling with glee.

Like most porn, “torture porn” is an “I know it when I see it” kind of thing. In Pavel Khvaleev’s latest film, Sleepless Beauty, I saw plenty of it. Khvaleev takes cues from the Saw franchise (woman locked in room facing various “challenges”), the Dark Web franchise (a chatroom transcript springs up at intervals throughout), and the Hieronymous Bosch franchise—illustrated by an extended animation sequence that can only be described as “Boschian”. (And yes, technically there isn’t a film franchise under that Dutchman’s auspices, but hope springs eternal.)

For the most part, Sleepless Beauty is spot-on. The introduction gives the viewer enough grounding to follow what’s happening to “Mila” (a very much put-upon Polina Davydova), even if we don’t necessarily know what all this sturm und drang is storming and driving at. Joining us in our confusion is a peanut gallery of chatroom personalities who have opted to watch the web broadcast of the ordeal (on some server even TOR-ier than TOR) in pursuit of lurid thrills. Two chat-room “Admin” voices have a conversation during the feed that increasingly hints at what is actually going on.

To the extent torture porn can work, Sleepless Beauty works well. The chatroom vignettes provide some great black comedy moments. And the seemingly-unrelated framing story about a Russian ambassador nicely wraps everything together. However, whoever cast the English-dub actors should be fired from show business. This is a dark Russian movie, and one should be able to watch it and listen and hear the kind of casual fatalism that can only come from Russian actors whose Russian can be heard. The low-rent Californian-English “coming” from Mila’s somber-looking parents effectively ruins the movie every time they appear—and the less said about the C-grade vocalizations for the world-weary Russian detective, the better. I have a hunch I could give this movie “Recommended” status if I had been able to view the original language cut.

But I didn’t. If you find yourself curious at this point, seek out the subtitled version and I can all but guarantee that, if you are a fan of this genre, you will enjoy yourself tremendously, as horrible things are enacted on the protagonist-cum-test subject.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“…the online viewers constantly asking for ‘more action’… brings a strange edge, together with the bizarre virtual reality clips, which are stop-motion animations looking like a mix of Terry Gilliam, the Quay Brothers, Jan Svankmajer, with some Giger and general biology thrown in for good measure. A good thing that is too, as the film needs that edge, because… there is not that much to look at beside a woman being tortured.” -Ard Vijn, Screen Anarchy (contemporaneous)

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CAPSULE: ICHI THE KILLER (2001)

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Koroshiya 1

DIRECTED BY:

FEATURING: , ,

PLOT: A sadomasochistic Yakuza relishes being hunted by a mysterious hitman named Ichi, hoping the killer will bring him to undreamed of heights of pain.

Still from Ichi the Killer (2001)

WHY IT WON’T MAKE THE LIST: Ichi is strange, for sure, but as important as it was in developing Takashi Miike’s cult and bringing his work before more round-eyes, it values gruesomeness and shock value over pure weirdness.

COMMENTS: Ichi is notorious for its violence and sadism, and rightfully so; but, as a Takashi Miike joint, it bears an undeniable brand of quality and style. Also, as is typical with Miike, it’s uneven, almost by design, changing from yakuza intrigue to gross-out torture fest to campy black comedy at the crack of the director’s whip. The complicated plot echoes both Yojimbo (in the way one character pits rival crime factions against one another) and Memento (in the way a vulnerable man’s memories are manipulated to make him a tool of vengeance). Tadanobu Asano gives a cool, cult star-making performance as Kakihara, the ruthlessly sadomasochistic villain with dyed blonde hair and unexplained facial scars that have carved his face into a perma-Joker grin. As with every Miike movie, it contains a few moments of transcendent gonzo poetry—my personal favorite being when Jijii (played by Tetsuo director Shinya Tsukamoto) strips off his shirt to reveal an improbably jacked physique.

Still, even Miike’s best movies tend to have troughs along with its peaks, and Ichi has a number of problems that prevent it from rising very far above its nihilistic base. The ostensible protagonist—Ichi of the title—is not at all believable as a legendary assassin; in fact, his prowess at killing is completely absurd in a way that doesn’t match, or serve, the serious and frightening tone of the Kakihara’s segments. Nor does the performance of otherwise fine actor Nao Ohmori fully exploit the sympathy one might have for the character, had he been portrayed in a less cartoonish manner.

Even more problematic is the film’s violence—not its extent so much as Miike’s inconsistent attitude to depicting it. At times, torture and cruelty are depicted with a realism that makes one cringe and empathize with the victim, while at other times it’s treated with a insouciance (as when a shocked face is detached from its head and shown sliding down a bloody wall). Sometimes these inconsistent tones coexist in the same scene: Ichi witnesses a brutal rape, with the victim’s face painfully swollen from a merciless beating, then dispatches the assailant by splitting him vertically from head to toe with his razor shoe. In some sense, alternating the absurd and realistic approaches to violence makes the scene more nightmarish, keeping the audience off-balance by mixing fearful anticipation with an unexpected result. I can appreciate this effect, to some extent, without actually enjoying or approving of it. The problem is that it’s more authentically sadistic to treat suffering as a joke than to face it head-on; Ichi too often takes on the sadist’s attitude that others’ pain is entertainment. Although torture and gore is pervasive and extreme throughout Ichi—including a man hanging suspended from hooks dug into his skin, among other atrocities—the violence in Miike’s previous Audition is far more harrowing and meaningful, because a fleshed-out human beings whom we can care about suffer (and inflict) it, instead of the pain being just a revolting exhibition occurring between two caricatures.

Ichi the Killer is one of those canonical cult movies (like Donnie Darko) that is constantly being restored, tinkered with and reissued in new home video editions. The latest on offer is the 2018 Blu-ray from Well Go USA, which bills itself as the “definitive remastered edition.” While it is reportedly an improvement on the 2010 Blu from Tokyo Shock, it lacks any significant supplemental features aside from the decade-old commentary track from Miike and original manga writer Hideo Yamamoto recycled from an old DVD release. In any release, it should go without saying to beware the English-language dub.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“…the kind of deeply horrible and bizarre movie that really can only be viewed from between your fingers, or behind the sofa, for most of its two-hours-plus running time.”–Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian (contemporaneous)

(This movie was nominated for review by Caleb Moss, who called it “Pretty weird, more leaning on subtle absurdity, but when [Miike] goes for it, he can deliver some really great black comic intellect…” Suggest a weird movie of your own here.)

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CAPSULE: HARD CANDY (2005)

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DIRECTED BY: David Slade

FEATURING: ,

PLOT: A teenage girl turns the tables on a sexual predator, subjecting him to torture in retribution for his misdeeds.

Still from Hard Candy (2005)

WHY IT WON’T MAKE THE LIST: For regular consumers of torture-based horror, the turnabout of predator and prey in Hard Candy is an interesting surprise. But twist aside, what’s notable about the movie isn’t how strange it is, but how it uses the genre to address heavy questions about guilt, justice, and gender roles.

COMMENTS: In January of this year, confessed serial child molester Larry Nassar was forced to sit quietly while 156 women confronted him about his crimes and the pain they have endured ever since. And Larry Nassar did not like it. This man, whose systematic abuse was aided by America’s top gymnastics coaches, abetted by the country’s gymnastics federation, and protected by Michigan State University, submitted a letter to the judge protesting that having to endure the testimony of his many targets was detrimental to his mental health and asserting that he was a good person who was being unfairly victimized by hateful, hateful women. Suffice it to say, the letter was poorly received.

The reason I bring this up—aside from maybe wanting to add just one more link on Google that reminds the world that Larry Nassar is heinous slimeball—is because Hard Candy does a fantastic job of getting inside the deluded mind of the privileged sex criminal: rejecting the existence of a crime, then mitigating its seriousness, and finally claiming victimhood for himself. The film’s subject, photographer Jeff, uses all these techniques to deceive us into sympathizing with him, even as we watch him go through all the steps of sexual predation: grooming, leading passively, shifting guilt back onto his targets. And he’s good at it, so when the 14-year old girl he’s been expecting to seduce drugs him, ties him up, and proceeds to insult and threaten him, there’s still this lingering sense that he’s a decent guy who has just gotten himself into a real pickle.

The plot evokes memories of Audition, which is appropriate, as Brian Nelson’s screenplay was evidently inspired by news reports of gangs of girls in Japan who lured businessmen into traps online. But where the earlier film hides its intentions behind the tropes of romantic comedy, Hard Candy quickly adopts the conventions of horror, including bondage and body mutilation. The film’s innovation is to flip the script and turn the diminutive (Page is a full foot shorter than her co-star), incautious heroine into the diabolical, unstoppable engine of terror. The result is that she can be read as a violent lunatic, when it is vital to remember that the man she is tormenting is a very bad person.

Movies can be victims of changing times. In 2005, many reviewers called Page’s Hayley a psychopath and lamented the film’s second-half descent into cat-and-mouse thriller. But today, she comes across more as an avenging angel come to force the guilty to acknowledge their sins. It’s noteworthy that the scene that falls the flattest—Page has to sidestep Sandra Oh’s inquisitive neighbor—is the one that tries the hardest to impose the conventions of a thriller onto a battle over the nature of evil. Hard Candy turns out to have been ahead of its time.

Page is truly magnificent, by the way; this was her breakthrough performance, and she has never since had a role that equals it in power. But it’s worth noting that she has a good partner in Wilson, who hits all the right beats for a character who is innately gifted at evading, deflecting, and denying responsibility for his actions. His bland dismissals and patronizing defenses are essential in pushing her forward, validating her anger and justifying her ultimate plan.

The final woman to stand up to Larry Nassar in court was the woman whose testimony triggered his downfall. Rachael Denhollander— whose name also deserves to be remembered—demonstrated unbelievable magnanimity by promising to pray for Nassar, that he find true repentance and forgiveness. And that is probably the most moral and decent response that anyone could hope for under the circumstances. Hard Candy suggests an alternate response, and while it plays more toward wish fulfillment and is by no means appropriate in a civil society, in the face of an evil that is often unspeakable, the movie shows why it still has appeal.

WHAT THE CRITICS SAY:

“Hard Candy is one sick movie. Sick and horrifying. Sick and mesmerizing. Sick and well-scripted, well-acted, well-directed and well-shot. Sick and comical; sick and suspenseful; sick and surprising; sick and sickening. Maybe if I take another shower, I’ll feel less scummy for enjoying it so much.” – Amy Biancolli, Houston Chronicle (contemporaneous)

(This movie was nominated for review by ralph. Suggest a weird movie of your own here.)