I don't get many WTF moments when watching film. Not anymore. I guess spending decades searching for the most bizarre, scandalous and banned films from around the world has resulted in my flatline response to scenes and screen situations that others might find shocking. It's a true pleasure when I do come across a film that solicits a bottomless jaw reaction. A Serbian Film, Cannibal Holocaust and even to a lesser degree, The Human Centipede were all films that caught me off my usual guard. And in a good way. Now, as of yesterday's screening, my small list of WTF's has increased by one.
Moebius stars Lee Eun-Woo and Cho Jae-Hyun as a married couple with emotional problems beyond repair. The wife (the characters are not given names) is enraged over the husband's infidelity and her descent into madness results in a knife attack where she attempts to remove her husband's err .ummm .manhood. With her efforts thwarted, the woman moves to her teenage son's room and with less resistance she cuts off her son's penis while he is sleeping. The husband hears his son's cries and bursts into the room where he and his wife again wrestle with wild abandon. The husband attempts to retrieve the severed appendage from his enraged spouse, but she is able to dispose of the detached organ in a way that gave me the first of my many WTF moments.
And this all happens in the first 10 minutes.
The son is rushed to the hospital but without the item to be reattached, there is little the physicians can do. The son returns home and is confronted with a life of ridicule from classmates and street thugs aware of his err .ummm .situation. Meanwhile, the father scours the internet looking for information to give him hope that his son could receive a successful penis transplant or in some way have the feeling of a male orgasm.
Not yet at the film's half-way point, the son takes a keen liking in a beautiful shop girl that is more than willing to bare all for her admirer. The father and son learn through internet searches that inflicted pain during sexual encounters could lead to a heightened faux-orgasmic reaction. Knives and sharp rocks provide scenes that will again incite orated "WTF's" as the son and father explore a sick mix of simulated sex and pain.
By the time you get to the film's final act you realize there will be no let-up from writer/director Ki-duk Kim. The final reel contains even more stunning events within the family that are beyond full description let alone comprehension. The relationship between son-father-mother continues off the rails leading to a crescendo every bit as perverse as the previous 80 minutes leading us to the end credit's conclusion.
Ki-duk Kim is no stranger to controversy in his films. In 2000's The Isle, Kim included scenes of animal cruelty that included a frog skinned alive and live fish that were mutilated. These scenes resulted in the film being delayed from its intended release. But The Isle can't hold a candle to Moebius wherein each new scene a demented and perverse story of mutilation, cannibalism and awkward sexual decadence is displayed with peacock feathered pride. And it is all accomplished without a single word uttered by any of the on-screen characters.
To simply shock an audience is easy. Eli Roth and Takashi Miike have been doing that for years. But to shock, engage, repulse and captivate while still producing a watchable (even if it is between your fingers) and recommendable film, well, that is a talent that is ambiguous at best. Moebius is that film.
www.killerreviews.com
Moebius stars Lee Eun-Woo and Cho Jae-Hyun as a married couple with emotional problems beyond repair. The wife (the characters are not given names) is enraged over the husband's infidelity and her descent into madness results in a knife attack where she attempts to remove her husband's err .ummm .manhood. With her efforts thwarted, the woman moves to her teenage son's room and with less resistance she cuts off her son's penis while he is sleeping. The husband hears his son's cries and bursts into the room where he and his wife again wrestle with wild abandon. The husband attempts to retrieve the severed appendage from his enraged spouse, but she is able to dispose of the detached organ in a way that gave me the first of my many WTF moments.
And this all happens in the first 10 minutes.
The son is rushed to the hospital but without the item to be reattached, there is little the physicians can do. The son returns home and is confronted with a life of ridicule from classmates and street thugs aware of his err .ummm .situation. Meanwhile, the father scours the internet looking for information to give him hope that his son could receive a successful penis transplant or in some way have the feeling of a male orgasm.
Not yet at the film's half-way point, the son takes a keen liking in a beautiful shop girl that is more than willing to bare all for her admirer. The father and son learn through internet searches that inflicted pain during sexual encounters could lead to a heightened faux-orgasmic reaction. Knives and sharp rocks provide scenes that will again incite orated "WTF's" as the son and father explore a sick mix of simulated sex and pain.
By the time you get to the film's final act you realize there will be no let-up from writer/director Ki-duk Kim. The final reel contains even more stunning events within the family that are beyond full description let alone comprehension. The relationship between son-father-mother continues off the rails leading to a crescendo every bit as perverse as the previous 80 minutes leading us to the end credit's conclusion.
Ki-duk Kim is no stranger to controversy in his films. In 2000's The Isle, Kim included scenes of animal cruelty that included a frog skinned alive and live fish that were mutilated. These scenes resulted in the film being delayed from its intended release. But The Isle can't hold a candle to Moebius wherein each new scene a demented and perverse story of mutilation, cannibalism and awkward sexual decadence is displayed with peacock feathered pride. And it is all accomplished without a single word uttered by any of the on-screen characters.
To simply shock an audience is easy. Eli Roth and Takashi Miike have been doing that for years. But to shock, engage, repulse and captivate while still producing a watchable (even if it is between your fingers) and recommendable film, well, that is a talent that is ambiguous at best. Moebius is that film.
www.killerreviews.com