Review: The Human Centipede 2

The Human Centipede 2: Full Sequence (2011)

Genre: Horror

Format: Amazon Instant Video

Director: Tom Six

When I watched the original The Human Centipede, I wasn't impressed. Tom Six's concept of a movie about connecting three human beings to each other anus-to-mouth was indeed disturbing but the movie itself was not that horrific - please click here to read my review of the first movie. This sequel however sees Tom Six back with vengeance in his heart as he presents to us one really vile piece of work that will leave a distinctive stain on the history of horror cinema forever.

The shift in the story is rather remarkable. In Full Sequence, we are presented with Martin, an obese, mentally-challenged parking lot security officer who is obsessed with the first movie. He watches it continuously and is convinced that he can make his own version of the human centipede (only with a lot more people) by copying the fictional Dr. Heiter's infamous procedure. This meta-film approach works really well because it makes the entire proceeding a lot more realistic because it suggested that the movie happened in real life versus the cinematic world where the original tale took place. To make things even more interesting, one of the actresses from the first movie return to this sequel as herself! You know that Martin is one sick bastard for wanting to actually include the original actress in the first movie to become a part of his own human centipede chain. There are other telling signs of his psychotic tendencies as well, from kidnapping people from the parking lot to the utterly merciless things he does to them to realize his depraved little fantasy.

Unlike the first movie, Full Sequence has quite a build up, that is if you even want to call it that. We get to see Martin's home life in between his kidnapping sessions, where we learn that he is a really troubled man. But surely, no justification is ever enough for the amount of torture he inflicted upon his victims nearing the end of the movie when he finally performs the surgery to join his captured men and women together. Unlike Dr. Heiter, Martin has no access to the best medical equipments out there. Instead of a scalpel, perhaps a kitchen knife would do? To get his victims to remain unconscious - which is hard to do without anaesthetics - perhaps they could get knocked in the head with a crowbar? You get the picture. It's not a pretty sight. It's totally disgusting and above all else, it's extremely cruel. When they are finally attached to each other thanks to Martin's shoddy handiwork, he then intensifies their suffering by doing a number of nasty things to them for his pure pleasure.

This movie is not for everyone. It is an interesting horror movie and it is quite a deviation, perfect for those adventurous people who wanted to watch something remarkably different. It eventually turns into a torture porn and the violence you get to witness was done for the sake of violence alone. The movie uses a stark black and white presentation, amplifying its somber, despicable mood. The way the centipede situation resolves itself is truly unforgivable and Martin will go down in history as one of the most evil characters to ever disgrace the silver screen. The story itself has some logical loopholes - they could have escaped Martin together at one point - but nonetheless, this is Martin's world after all. The version that I have watched is the international cut that clocks in at 88 minutes. After some research, a rape sequence and a self-mutilation scene were indeed shortened in this version of the film and of course, I am not entirely happy about that. Still, it is better than the UK cut with 3 more minutes of footage removed. I don't know if I should look forward to the unrated release. Perhaps I have seen too much already.

RATING: 3 out of 5