Very few horror films these days really seem to attempt to evoke much "horror" in their viewers, but rather try to shock and disgust them without providing a lasting "horriffic" effect. The "horror" genre has mostly been saturated with high-octane action-esque pieces that focus more on speed, explosions, and copious gore effects to elicit a response, than appealing to our primary modes of fear. One may easily refute that not everyone is "horrified" through psychomanipulation, and that's a fair assessment. However, the argument that the genre is still overly actional these days is next to inarguable.
So when I was approached with the prospect of a horror movie with minimal plot, and one that promised to be "disturbing" and "100% medically accurate", I was both intrigued and put off. My experiences with the Hostel series and Saw II-VI made watching anything with a hint of "minimal plot" and/or "disturbing" themes a bit sketchy. It was then that the premise of such a movie was revealed to me, and I was beyond curious... I was obsessed with it.

In the backwoods of Germany lives one Dr Josef Heiter (Dieter Laser)--a well-renowned surgeon, famous for his splitting of Siamese twins. Two American females, Lindsey (Ashley C Williams) and Jenny (Ashlynn Yennie) are backpacking through Europe when they break down some yards away from his home one rainy night. They plead to be let in, and assistance called. Dr Heiter drugs the two women, and straps them to operating tables. They are prisoners, along with a Japanese tourist, Katsuro (Akihiro Kitamura). Dr Heiter explains that his work had inspired him to reverse his primary accreditation, and attempt to join separate individuals together to create one segmented creature. A creature that shares a singular digestive tract.
Thus is the entire plot of German director, Tom Six's horror opus "The Human Centipede".

"The Human Centipede" is everything I've ever expected from a horror film. It's violent, but not exaggerated; gory, but not completely visible; horrific, but only because it stays with you long after the silent credits roll on. To say that "The Human Centipede" is "disturbing" is to understate just what the movie accomplishes doing. During the opening minutes of the first Act, we are introduced to Dr Heiter, Lindsey, and Jenny in contrasting ways. Dr Heiter is a brief, but looming figure who stalks and captures a trucker taking a leak along the highway. Lindsey and Jenny are chattering away on cellphones to never seen contacts (assumed friends) about the state of their trip. We know little-to-nothing about Dr Heiter from this moment until the close of the first Act, while we're shown everything we can be shown about Lindsey and Jenny.
What presents the first issue with the two female leads is that they fall under the "useless bimbo" archetype of female characters. In fact, there's an intense stress on their vapidity and vacuousness throughout the start of the film. I found myself wishing for a speed up to the surgery scenes, and the succeeding "torture" frames of the movie. Both women are undeniably self-centered, whiny, and completely useless as people. They're completely unlikeable, and this is achieved in barely 10 minutes of them being on screen. And that's being generous.

But it's not without warrant. What makes them such a brilliant (yet grating) addition to the movie is just how quickly one's attitude towards them changes during Act II, when everything goes straight to hell. Around the half of Act II, I found myself feeling quite ashamed of myself for wishing this upon the hapless characters, and it truly becomes a grueling experience at that point. The way the characters are written, and the way the entire ordeal plays out, Six's creations make you pity the poor victims, and lash out at yourself for thinking like a horror fan. It comes off very real, very valid, and very engaging.
To not mention Laser's performance would be a travesty. Laser, who famously never left his role of Dr Heiter throughout the entire shooting of the film, pulls off the German doctor with a fearsome vehemence and fervor. His character is truly demented, and it shows through the superb acting of Laser. At times, it's extremely disconcerting, and very disturbing to watch him gleefully command the "centipede" to fetch, or defecate. And that scene is one that will assuredly haunt you--if not completely disgust you.

As the movie progresses to its shocking, and harrowing ending, Laser's treatment of the "centipede" becomes more and more disturbing, with most of the "action" taking place off camera, or being subtle on camera. Very little gore is actually shown during any given scene--including one very pitiful and painful scene involving a staircase. What is shown, is more than enough to activate the imagination, but not enough to overstimulate. Six makes sure that you're active in the movie's instances, and the effect is far more intimate and involved than modern "gorno" flicks. I was glad I wasn't handed every effect, because I spent more time really thinking about what was happening. Six took the idea of "show, don't tell" and properly applied it to a fantastic (see: horrific) concept. And it works beautifully.
While there is lengthy exposition (required, obviously), it is provided to us in chunklets, and delivered with such force and fervor, that one finds themselves repulsed to want to hear more. Thankfully, most of the exposition takes place during the pre-surgery, when Heiter explains what he plans to do to his victims. After that, we're left to think about everything going on.

The movie does have a tendency to drag at certain points, but then again, you can really only do so much with a movie about a mad surgeon sewing three people together with one digestive tract. Anything more would've broken the movie down, and ruined a lot of the lasting effects from the more disturbing scenes. Another nice touch was the World War II undertones (A German doctor conducting genetic experiments; the usage of Japanese and American people in the lead victim roles), which would've added a somewhat interesting commentary had it been explored a lot more. Rather, it simply comes across as just a gimmick, rather than an attempt at adding a moralistic undertone. Though, at the least it explains putting the women in the back, and the male in front. It's not sexism, but rather an allusion to Nazism (at least from this reviewer's perspective).

However, for what it is worth, everything done in the movie works only towards its advantage. More could definitely have been done in certain areas, but the minimalistic approaches taken only helped add more immersion to the experience, and create a more intense series of tragic events; all leading up to the shocking conclusion. It also proved one thing to me: there are some things that even copious amounts of alcohol cannot wash out of your mind.

The Human Centipede gets 4.5/5 stars