Editorials
The Skin-Crawling Madness of ‘Centipede Horror’ Must Be Experienced [VOD Pick]
The American Genre Film Archive, or AGFA, is a non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of genre films and their legacy. Essentially, they collect and distribute films that might’ve otherwise disappeared forever. Centipede Horror, for example, never received a home release in the U.S. and could only be found through rare bootlegs. AGFA found the only 35mm print in existence and restored it, now available to rent on VOD. This 1982 Hong Kong horror film is the precise type of gruesome, skin-crawling insanity worth watching right about now.
Centipede Horror follows Wai Lun, a man that allows his sister to travel to Southeast Asia for a trip despite strict orders from their mother and grandfather that the siblings never, ever, visit the area. When Wai Lun’s sister mysteriously dies from an affliction that stumps all medical professionals, he’s determined to get answers. It leads him on a horrific path that includes sorcerers, a family curse, and, I can’t overstate this, an endless number of centipedes.
This nasty little horror movie earned a certificate from the Hong Kong censors office as a Category III film, a distinction given to films that contained extreme graphic violence, gore, and explicit sexual content. The strictly enforced category ensured no one under the age of 18 could rent, buy, or watch Category III films, which also includes titles like The Seventh Curse and Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky. Of note, Centipede Horror is the only Category III film penned by a woman: writer and actress, Suet Ming Chan.
Similar to films like The Seventh Curse, the further into the plot Centipede Horror ventures, the crazier it gets. There’s nudity, bizarre sorcerer rituals, death, and a surprising amount of characters vomiting up creepy-crawly things. One victim winds up vomiting blood and scorpions, but the central evil sorcerer prefers to inflict centipede curses upon people. Sometimes that means they’re just stung to death by a horde of them, and other times it means getting a stomach full of them to give the sorcerer puppeteer-like control.
The pinnacle, gross-out moment of the film sees actress Tien-Lang Li barf up centipedes. It’s a moment best served to go in on an empty stomach, but it’s made all the more impressive in that Tien-Lang Li stuffed live centipedes in her mouth for this scene. That’s either an unyielding commitment to the craft or a level of fearlessness most will never achieve. Or both.
If there’s a downside to this pick, it’s that the faded age of the film doesn’t mesh well with the white subtitles, especially in the early parts of the film, where things are still bright and cheerful. It’s a small nitpick that will likely bug some. Still, the reality is that this movie is too bonkers for that to be a major sticking point- the plot quickly becomes too convoluted and nonsensical for any subtitles to make sense of things anyway. That’s part of the charm.
We’re talking dancing chicken skeletons, uncomfortable rituals, gore aplenty, sorcerers battling it out to the finish, over the top deaths, laugh-out-loud moments, and so many freaking centipedes that you can’t help but wonder how many escaped the bug wrangler’s grasp to skitter off into the night. There’s something extremely unnerving about a centipede, and this movie showcases them to an uncomfortable degree. Director Keith Li’s horror movie is as over the top as it is gnarly, making it easy to see why the film earned its Cat III status.
Aside from the rarity of this title making it a worthy VOD pick, it also offers up a virtual Alamo Drafthouse experience. The rental page comes with two free videos- a preshow complete with previews and an intro by AGFA’s Joe Ziemba that gives more insight to the film. It’s a rare VOD title that gives you a little more bang for your buck. Though, the skin-crawling madness of Centipede Horror is more than enough to warrant a rental from the adventurous horror fan.
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
You must be logged in to post a comment.