#wrote half of this in notes half of it in libre word so my capitalizations are all wacky

[thesugarhole]

Barring obvious potential triggers, would you recommend Human Centipede? Like just as a movie to watch? (I have never seen it)

table of contents: do i recommend it? / triggers / my opinion / red flags analysis (for funsies)

warnings for: possible spoilers out of context, unsanitary/surgical discussions, long post

do i recommend it?

alright so, before i begin i wanna say im not the type to have definitive answers to recommend / dont recommend unless its something i Extremely Liked (darkest dungeon for example). so i would recommend it in a " idk tbh lol" way. so this is all my personal, unrevised by Movie / Horror Professionals, opinions, take with a grain of salt and whatnot. im also trying to write this as objectively as possible so at worst its out of context spoilers, in case you or anyone else decide to see it.

triggers

im not sure what 'potential obvious triggers' would be in this case. i mean that sincerely this time, since im always poking fun at dnis etc and i dont want to come across as sarcastic or anything! i think it suffers from the saw/texas chainsaw effect where the first movie is very tame but people over represent its contents to the point where it gains a, imo unjust, reputation as viscerally disgusting and unwatchable. tangentially, in both saw and human centipedes case, its a self fulfilling prophecy of sorts because the sequels DO end up fitting the mold of these warnings. i know that tcm 2 is more of a comedy/horror, and then theres like 6 alternate universes just to retell the story, that i dont think quite fit the "warnings actual fit the sequels" curse, but still i felt like mentioning it, and this is because these type of movies play a lot, a LOT on how fertile your imagination is. texas chainsaw massacre (1974), saw (2004) and human centipede (2009) show very little gore, but the implications of whats going on and how it would traumatize someone physically, mentally and emotionally when you think about them later is what carries the legacy, imo. maybe human centipede got a bigger punishment in fake negative hype because on top of the central body horror theme, it also adds scat and torture.

so in terms of triggers, gore wise it would be: some blood, some cutting (surgically and self harm), and an EEK! situation of a character running away and the catheter pulling on their arm, ripping vertically across. These are maybe a 2 second scene at its longest, as the camera doesnt linger on them. a shoot out near the end as well, filling a pool with blood. there is a photo of 3 dogs lined up in front of each other meant to imply they were a doggy centipede as well, but out of context its just. dogs calmly sniffing the front ones butt lol. no animal cruelty and/or death on screen that i can remember. there is harassment, there is kidnapping, there is drugging, there is murder, there is racism, there is explaining of a surgical procedure and there is treating the resulting centipede as a pet from a cruel and abusive owner (mainly beatings, i think most also off screen). most of the surgery affected areas are covered in bandages the entire movie, exception being the glasglow smile practical effects, of which are put to use once to display infection. add squeezing some pus to the list, i know some people are Very grossed out by it.

i think thats the bulk of what is portrayed that might put people on edge the most, and anything else might be escaping into more abstract fears -like clowns for example-; no clowns in the movie but its not something youre supposed to be afraid of is what i mean. as i said before, the big threat of the movie is that it gets your imagination going on both the horrors people are capable of (unsurprisingly, doctor heiter was in part inspired by josef mengele, even sharing the first name) and what it would be like to find oneself part of the centipede. for example, you dont actually see in detail one shitting into each others mouth and the other swallowing, just all actors squirming and crying in unease as the doctor realizes its happening and cheers it on. Extra note: 2/3 of the centipede is almost always crying. Its apt that they do obviously, but quite uncomfortable to listen to for extended periods of time. And you will, if you watch the movie.

(wikipedia backing me up on this, its the >Implying thats the real terrifier here)

i dont remember where i read this but i would like to bring to attention the tenacity and endurance of the three actors that played the centipede, as it was said that some other actors that got the role soon gave up upon finding out theyd have to have their face so close to someone elses ass, and vice versa. its all practical effects and THERE IS a small, obvious distance between the elements, like theyre not straight up tossing the salad in there, but still. rough position if youre not shooting a strange sex scene. finally, and i know all you never-seen-human-centipede enjoyers have been waiting for this one: no sexual violence of any kind. really! I was surprised as well, since these types of topics also love to pull on rape and whatnot, but the first movie is fully lacking in those types of themes. The sequels have them. Whether its unfortunate or not I wouldnt know, as I don’t intend on watching them, but more on that later (%).

my opinion

i was about 15 when i finally decided to watch it and i gotta say, i was disappointed because i had braced myself for the worst, didnt quite receive it, and was left with a lot of tension. like honest to god, the way people describe this as almost a snuff film when its just. a boring movie. it was a bit insulting to me back then lmao. i also didnt watch it with subtitles, as its marketed to an english audience; back then id argue about the guy not really needing to speak in english all the time since hes in his homeland but, while the doctor doesnt care for them as humans, he cared for them as pets, so it makes Some sense to have at least 2/3 of the centipede understand what hes saying. however with the amount of non english dialogue in it its safer to consider it a straight trilingual between german, japanese and english. if you do watch it TRY to find subtitles for ALL THREE. dieter laser (the actor that played the doctor) mumbles a good amount and it can be hard to perceive. anyway that was my opinion then and it stayed like that for a bit: 'boring movie everyone exaggerates'. it shifted positively when i decided to hear dead meats podcast on it, aka chelsea vehemently defending it with a :grimace: james accompanying her. when the red flags song first came out i thought it was extra hilarious because in some way this probably paralleled when she first told him "human centipede, not ironically" (iirc her favorite horror movie is american psycho but I don’t care enough about them to have this memorized) i havent rewatched what was said in the podcast before writing all this because i didnt want my own thoughts to be re-influenced just yet; still, it will be linked at the end regardless, since it changed my viewpoint on it when they dropped it. at this time, my opinion was "it wasnt that good, but it wasnt that bad either… was it?"

so i re watched it maybe a week after getting this ask (editors note: due to personal tragedies it has since been two more weeks) just for you! and i uhhh. ended up liking it a lot more this time around, now that i also know a little bit more about movie making. unfortunately, i made the damn fucking mistake of watching it with no subtitles again sdajhdfk. it feels strange that i understood the japanese better than the german this time around. german, on a technicality has more similar words to my native, BUT, being a fan of j music for as long as i have, and the japanese dialogue being very simple stuff like 'i have to shit' 'whats going on' 'fuck you' I occasionally grasped some dialogue teehee. i didnt understand enough to make a difference really, but still felt like pointing it out. also, despite not having seen it with subs both times, i remember back then looking it up later what was said so i +- know the context of each scene, the one I remember less being the conversation between the detectives and the doctor. still, its something i have to rectify eventually, even if i just find clips of the non english scenes and watch them.

i think i found it boring back then because its a slow movie, with just one story going on the entire time. they take some time to introduce you to the american tourists, but im not sure it makes a difference in establishing emotional connection since they suck ass (sorry) for most of the time theyre not a centipede. definitely not enough for someone to want to see them get punished like that either, but ehh. Its a 'i got no dogs in this race' situation, unless youre a stan of the doctor (which ive since learned a lot of people are (source: bort); its not my type of character is all.

im not sure how to best explain this but theres a lot of cinematic shots. if youre someone who likes movies as works of art, or understands and analyzes the meaning of the slow scenes, angles, whats being shown etc i think this movie is worth the watch, for sure. i think the sound design is also phenomenal; music is used to a bare minimum, and tense/action scenes dont get as much of a noise as you come to expect, exacerbating their vibes by like 200%. its straight up just silence sometimes, as you would expect if that was happening irl, its great. for the imagined horror i mean. its also great for the cinematography i think. Theres a scene that stood out to me of one of the members running, hiding from and then yelling at the doctor, that stood out to me by having most of it be ambient noise only.

That said, there are some critiques to be had, mainly on the creation aspect. The doctor had an accomplished career, so youd think the procedure would be more thought out than just “german doctor sews three people ass to mouth (cool!)”.

Ill try not to enter too much of spoiler territory here, but just in case if you watch it skip this LIST then come back idk:

its an intense cut and suture process of different materials between randomly selected people with no knowledge of their medical history, so its already a recipe for things to go wrong. The doctor seemed little worried about missing people being investigated, so he could have definitely looked a bit more into them before jumping right to the surgery, the movies pace would have certainly allowed it.

The surgery itself is implied to have been a day, and the recovery maybe two? Before he forces them on their knees and starts moving them about. I highly doubt the cut on their knees would permit this without at least a month of recovery. And a month is being generous. Youre not given a strict spongebob ‘a few moments later’ screen though, so while it could be argued ‘who knows how long actually passed!’ the nature of the surgery simply doesn’t allow it. Additionally, part of the process implies removing teeth, which immediately tells you this should be something phased. Like I dunno, im not a doctor but immediately connecting bleeding gums to a fecal exit doesn’t sound like a solid plan. Maybe he cauterized them? Youre not shown these things.

Ignoring the obvious -people cannot survive on just eating poop*- the removal of teeth makes sense on the sewing, since theres minimal chance to move the jaw on those conditions. It makes no sense anywhere else: if you cant chew it, you risk choking on it. other factors like coughing or vomiting have also not been accounted for.

there is never a single mention of urine in this process, which I found strange after the fact because if its left untouched, any female parts would just be painting the following sequence yellow, but theres also the fact that humans cant survive without water. It would be immensely punitive to figure out the surgery to include this, especially with urethra placements being different on male/female, but maybe worth it for the surgeon in-lore acclaims of fame if they could figure it out. Within the plot, the doctor would have certainly had the time anyway.

*i noticed next to their cage that they have an iv drop, which I think is meant to imply that the doctor wouldnt be THAT stupid and is giving the back parts the necessary nutrients to stay alive until inevitable eat-only-shit complications arise.

A lesser critique that if acknowledged would result in “but then we wouldnt have a movie would we?”, therefore not that relevant, is that katsuro should have double tapped. If you consider the neck bite a double tap, a triple tap then. Quadruple tap even like fuck man id be in there stabbing until I had human soup lmao

all that said, its a good movie. Not a bad movie by miles, but not a tour de force either. But I will say, if youre not watching it for the human centipede itself- how it came to be, how to create it, how it works, how it succeeds, how it survives, how it fails, how it ends- youre not getting anything out of the movie. Again, there is no b plot to it, no secret twist. It might be worth analyzing its movie quality (not just plot but also camera shots, characters, scenery, effects, etc) on top of that, but you have to be aware thats all there is.

(%) More on that now: I did not watch the sequels, but I don’t intend to and from the summary alone wouldnt recommend it. I already saw the human centipede once, there is little innovation that can be done here (sewing even more people to it is barely innovating in my eyes, its just stupider). Theres the added bonus/punishment of having all the sexual/gross out/possible graphical gore? schlock people warn about the first one, which would be something id be interested as a teen, not so much now. Even thinking about watching them feels like a drag, id rather do something else.

Red flags analysis:

now for something fun, since I know I got this ask because I kept talking about it lol

"the best movie of all, a masterpiece of art": we shouldnt be getting into the debate of the best movie of all right now. a masterpiece is debatable, as the movie itself is not that far removed from the art form that it shouldnt be at least considered.

“I think im gonna get murdered tonight”: youre not.

“the costume design was a highlight”: I mean, I guess? Its average clothes for the average person for the year it was shot in. the glasgow smile suture effects and the doctors lab coats (along with the fucking. aviators glasses) deserve a positive mention as they feel iconic of the movie… so yea you know what no ‘I guess’. I no longer guess. I agree.

“I like it for the plot (...) german doctor sews three people ass to mouth”: this is part of plot, not The plot. Its the catch of the movie that makes you curious about it, but I feel like the movie focuses more on the “ok, how? and then what?” to that summary than it does on the man sewing the people itself.

“please god save me”: coward.

“I think thats a red flag”: maybe.

“I don’t want to get stabbed”: you wont.

“human centipede is a tour de force”: already gave my thoughts on it, but respectfully disagree.

“im gonna be the main course”: 🤔...

“I admire the narrative of character growth”: see, this line here makes me think tom cardy/montaigne havent actually seen the movie (or if they have, dismissed it for the sake of having a good song which is absolutely fine by me, don’t get this analysis wrong). I will disclaimer that, for the doctor, it might be hidden in the german discussion with him and the detectives (but given the body language I doubt hes grown/learned anything from it) and in that case yea I missed it, but outside the centipede working together whenever possible to escape and the front going on a speech about “this happened to me because I was a bad person” theres absolutely no character growth. Its an experience they all go through and cannot recover from, much less grow from it.

Opposite of this, id like to think galoogamelady (the animator) has seen the movie, as getting reference shots of the indoor pool/wall tiles as well as dieter lasers face (to a lesser extent; write his name, he shows up) can be tricky with just google images and random ass youtube clips. I especially like that the eyebrows came out the exact same as how he had them in the movie, lol

“is this because your date is a freak” not necessarily the case (and the crowd goes ‘shes not gonna fuck you, tumblr user thesugarhole’ djkhgfhdsghskjd)

“only if the wedding is themed (…) human centipede” I wouldnt let my wedding be human centipede themed not gonna lie. Its gonna be saw themed. get in da bathroom lmao

“that way we can save on the catering bill” the implication here being all your guests get human centipeded, all your money is going to the surgery tools and prep.

“only one mouth to feed” of course, in cutting corners you could just shove some sort of weird tube between ass and mouth…

“I can finally sew a mouth to a butt” hate it when hes right about the red flag 🙄 sad! Oh well there will be other women with red hair that will defend human centipedes honor (cough) ⬇️

(^ as I said previously I didn’t rewatch this so my current opinion couldn’t get influenced by it, so I don’t remember what she said. Might rewatch after posting)

Pucker up!