Would you recommend it?


I'd really like to see this movie, but I'd like to know if I'd actually be able to. I can sometimes be quite a sensitive viewer; I'm moved easily, I can't handle rape scenes and I guess I'm easily disgusted too. Do you guys think I could watch it anyway? I get more and more intrigued by this movie the more I read about it, and I just don't want to end up disgusted and suicidal after seeing it...

I've seen Lilja 4 Ever, and liked it, and didn't get too depressed (if I remember it right). But I guess it can't compare?

So, to get down to brass tacks: just HOW disgusting is this movie, really? I'm not asking about the quality of the film, I'm asking specifically if you could recommend it to half-sensitive viewers?

reply

I appreciated this film greatly (not sure "enjoyed" is quite the right word - defininately not the first time I saw it, anyway). The director is quite clearly trying to provoke reactions of disgust and detachment from the viewer (not merely in the plot, or specific acts; but things like the use of white noise and flickering)... so....well, when I saw it in a cinema in central London, I reckon around one third of the audience walked out during the film.

Would I recommend it to half-sensitive viewers? Possibly; there are occasional moments of help and liberation (even if they exist mostly in the imaginiations of the characters); and there is a definite reason for why it is as bleak as this is: Dante had to write Inferno before Purgatorio or Paradiso after all!

So long as you know what you are dealing with (quite a challenging, thought-provoking, disturbing film - far more so than Lilya4Ever) I would say "go for it": just don't expect it to be a bundle of laughs. Some Dogme or similar films strike me as being far more unwatchable ; as it is clearly something like a negative print of a photo: the positive is, mostly, deliberately ommitted.

reply