by Brian Thibodeau » Mon Apr 10, 2006 4:43 pm
Also keep in mind that the Hong Kong edition of this film is edited to shreds. SIGNIFICANT portions of the violence and gore are toned down or outright missing. From what I've read, many other versions appear to be uncut.
Saw this at a film fest years ago - in uncut form - and was, quite frankly, nauseated by some of the material on display, but afterwards I couldn't exactly convince myself that that WASN'T the point. These are sick characters after all, particularly Asano's (his torture scene with that dude hanging from hooks in his skin was a bit much). The violence is very much necessary to tell this kind of story. And as such, it's a very interesting tale...
As Gaijin84 says, though, your tolerance may be directly related to how much you've heard about the violence beforehand. Me, I had NO IDEA I'd be seeing women's faces beaten to the point of swollen unrecognizability and various people run through slowly and in loving detail with sharp instruments. Plus it was a past-midnight screening, so I was definitely susceptible to squeamishness.