In Which I Dare You to Question
by Britt Hayes
The Human Centipede crawled into theaters last weekend, and with the exposure to a wider audience, I’ve heard opinions left and right on the film. Unfortunately, these aren’t necessarily critiques of the film; instead, what I’m hearing a lot of is, “It was okay, but it wasn’t as fucked up as (insert film name here).” Since when did we start judging movies, especially horror movies, based on our ability to sit through them?
When did we stop asking ourselves if we enjoyed the film and start asking ourselves if it was more difficult to watch than some other movie? When did we start keeping a bracket in our heads, pitting horror films against one another, mentally keeping the victor in mind and waiting for another film to surpass it, graphically? A friend of mine pointed out on Twitter that he enjoyed Human Centipede, but that Martyrs was more difficult to watch (and to that friend, I still like you, you’re just an example). Why does that matter? Why does it matter if it was more difficult or less difficult to watch? Isn’t the more relevant question: Did you enjoy it? What did you like or dislike about it? Why? As a critic, these questions are the first, most basic questions you ask yourself. Surely Average Joe would ask themselves the same thing after seeing a movie? No? Why not?
The idea of pitting horror films against each other in some sort of lame Battle Royale isn’t new. In the 70′s and 80′s, films like I Spit On Your Grave, Cannibal Holocaust (and its sister film, Cannibal Ferox), and Last House on the Left emerged and remain the sort of films you dare your friends to watch, to see who can sit through them the longest without wincing. These are films that deal with weighty material like rape and human on human brutality. Where plenty of horror films rely on boogeymen in masks, these films instead choose to toy with your emotions by showing you people who aren’t much different from you getting caught up in some seriously awful situations – the types of situations we often fear the most because they’re just so simple that they must be plausible. Getting accosted in the woods by some sinister yokels who force you to piss your pants while they rape your friend doesn’t seem so far-fetched, whereas a guy named Jigsaw with a pig mask and elaborate death traps seems more fantastic. Rape and brutal murder at the hands of sadistic hillbillies with little motive? Frightening. Being stuck in a giant death trap by a guy in a pig mask with a God complex? Fine family entertainment.
It’s because of the way we relate to films like I Spit On Your Grave and Cannibal Holocaust that we fear them much more, and if we fear them much more, we assume the people we know will feel the same way. Sitting through a film like that deserves a badge of honor, so it becomes necessary to subject our friends and loved ones to the same “endurance test”. For me, this type of horror movie daring ended in my teen years. I sat through Italian horror, exploitation films, and everything inbetween all for the sake of proving my mettle to some boy I liked or some friend I needed to one-up. What you discover is: A. It’s only a movie. B. After a while, castration, rape, and impalement all sort of blurs together and loses its meaning. Why would anyone want to desensitize themselves to that degree? It’s fun to dare yourself and your friends to watch horror films, sure, but to spend that much time viewing explicit, blood-soaked acts surely desensitizes you quite a bit.
I enjoy being affected by film. I love that something as simple and non-threatening as The Lovely Bones can make me sit with my mouth hanging open, endlessly creeped out by Stanley Tucci and his comb-over. I also loved being emotionally affected by Red, White and Blue at SXSW this year, and visually assaulted by Serbian Film that same evening. I contend that much of being affected by film rests on the viewer’s willingness to allow themselves to be affected. I also believe that if you make it your primary objective to watch nothing but the most gruesome and exploitative in cinema, surely nothing will shock or affect you anymore. At this point, it may be wise to go on a diet of Disney and Pixar until you’ve recovered some of your humanity.
These days, it’s films like Martyrs, Inside (A l’interieur), Irreversible, Audition, and Grace that have people daring each other to watch. As far as most horror fans go, the current reigning champion of “difficult to watch” is Martyrs. But when I ask people what they liked about it or why they are drawn to the film, I get this redundant reply about how hard it is to stomach. No one says that it’s a depressingly beautiful film that resonates with them on an emotional level. No one says that it’s the existential meditation on the afterlife and bearing witness to something beyond the realm of humanity. No one goes off on a tangent about the absence of God or how this film reminded them of the time they swallowed a bottle of 50 Excedrin PM and can’t for the life of them recall the incident at all, but this movie definitely reminds them of that week in their life.
No. Instead it’s just people bragging about how they sat through it and how brutal it was, and daring everyone they come in contact with to watch the film. It’s all so….pedestrian. I say this knowing how pretentious I sound, and I don’t even care. There has to be something more to these films than shock. You want to watch The Descent with a group of friends and a bucket of popcorn and tell me afterwards in Neanderthal-speak that it was “awesome” and “dude, we totes have to watch this again.” Okay, I agree with you. But the films I listed above (the bulk of them being French, go figure) have something more to them than just an unusually high level of blood and brutality. Since when did it become okay to turn your brain off with every movie you watch? You want to do that with a Platinum Dunes slasher remake or Cabin Fever (no offense, Eli Roth, I love you), go ahead. But not every horror or action film requires this suppression of brain activity. Surely you must already know this. I shouldn’t have to tell you this.
When I ask someone about Inside or Audition, all I get is, “It was so fucked up!” There’s no intelligent discussion of the how’s and why’s, just one phrase that seems to sum it up for everyone. Fucked up.
So when I hear someone say that The Human Centipede was okay, but Martyrs was more difficult to watch, I am confused. Human Centipede and Martyrs don’t have much in common outside of being horror films crafted by foreign directors. The plot isn’t the same. The characters aren’t the same. The message isn’t the same. Why are we comparing them again? Oh, right, because it isn’t about the film. It’s about how disgusting and vile it is and whether or not you feel you deserve an award for sitting through it. It’s about whether or not you can dare your friends to watch it. It doesn’t matter if the film was good, or the cinematography was well-executed, or what the story said to you personally. No. What this is really about is how it rates against another horror film in terms of the sheer gross-out factor. Everything in between those visceral moments is just boring filler.
If you had this same reaction to the Child’s Play series, I could care less. But I strongly believe there is a difference between brain candy and cinema, and something like The Human Centipede or Inside stands out to me as film. It shouldn’t be dismissed carelessly. If you don’t like these films, I expect you to have valid reasons. Similarly, if you enjoy these films, I expect you to have something more to offer than how high it rates on your “fucked up” meter. If all that matters to you is how shocking and gross the film was, we have nothing to discuss.
