Movies
Tom Six’s ‘Human Centipede’ Interview Blows My Mind: Chair Rape and Torture Porn
I’ve never met Tom Six, and haven’t really conversed with him at all. To be frank, I don’t even know what to make of him. Is he arrogant? Is he a sociopath? Is he one of those directors who only cares about shocking his audience? I’ve been in the dark ever since his The Human Centipede (First Sequence) blew my mind back in 2009. Being that I’m the kind of guy who likes to stare you right in the eye and see what makes you tick, the shroud of mystery around Six has literally drove me insane. Up until today, I’ve had no actual opinion on the Euro director.
But now, with The Human Centipede 2 (Full Sequence) premiering at the Fantastic Fest Film Festival in Austin, Texas, the director has opened up with an absolutely mind blowing interview with the NY Times where he talks about making his new villain rape a chair, and how he’s comfortable having his films tagged as “torture porn.”
Read on for some choice segments.
First, Six responds to the accusation that Human Centipede just may be “torture porn.” He embraces it: “I don’t have any problem with that, because I actually like the term,” Six tells the NY Times. “I see porno films, of course, and I like them, I have no problem with that at all. And there have been so many horror films, and that’s all torture and misery. That’s the genre. I kind of like that they combine it. I think my film is a torture porn with European art sauce or something.”
My personal favorite part of the interview is where Six talks about his approach to the first film, and then upping the ante for Full Sequence. This is the answer of a true film fan who understands what he’s doing. It reminds me of what James Cameron said about both T2 and Aliens.
“I made ‘Part I’ very much psychological. A lot of things happen in your head and you don’t actually see it on the screen,” he explains. “In ‘Part II,’ I really wanted to make it more graphic, show everything that I didn’t show in ‘Part I.’ Because I see so many horror films that have a sequel, then the sequel fails because it’s like a copy of the first one. Most of the time it’s not better, or it’s not original, and then it fails. When I was doing promotion for ‘Part I’ and starting to write ‘Part II,’ so many people at festivals all over the world, they said, “What if some maniac out there tries to copy your idea?” And then I knew that’s exactly the idea I must pursue.”
The most random portion of the feature is where Six explains that he forced Laurence R. Harvey to rape a chair in order to land the role of the new villain, Martin.
“The villain was more difficult [to cast], because people who’ve seen ‘Part I’ really admire Dr. Heiter, and that’s what I really didn’t want. I want the complete opposite of Dr. Heiter. I had this very specific character in my mind for the Martin character, and I saw a lot of people but none of them made it. And when Laurence came in, I thought, my God, that’s him, that’s him. He looks amazing. And then I asked him to rape a chair.”
He continues explaining “why” he made him perform that bizarre act: “I wanted to see, is he capable of giving it all as an actor? That’s very important for me. And he did it, and he did it so convincingly and he had no shame whatsoever. And I thought, that’s it, that’s the guy.”
This brief interview tells me a lot about Six as a person and a director. Most of all it has made me respect him more as a person and a director. You can read the entire interview by clicking below. What do you think of Mr. Six after reading?
In addition to Leigh Whannell’s upcoming Universal Monsters movie Wolf Man, Julia Garner (The Royal Hotel) has also joined the cast of Weapons, THR has announced tonight.
Weapons is the new horror movie from New Line Cinema and director Zach Cregger (Barbarian), with Julia Garner joining the previously announced Josh Brolin (Dune 2).
The upcoming Weapons is from writer/director Zach Cregger, who will also produce alongside his Barbarian producing team: Roy Lee of Vertigo and J.D. Lifshitz and Raphael Margules of BoulderLight Pictures. Vertigo’s Miri Yoon also produces.
The Hollywood Reporter teases, “Plot details for Weapons are being kept holstered but it is described as a multi and inter-related story horror epic that tonally is in the vein of Magnolia, the 1999 actor-crammed showcase from filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson.”
Cregger was a founding member and writer for the New York comedy troupe “The Whitest Kids U’Know,” which he started while attending The School of Visual Arts. The award-winning group’s self-titled sketch comedy show ran for five seasons on IFC-TV and Fuse. He was also a series regular on Jimmy Fallon’s NBC series “Guys with Kids” and the TBS hit series “Wrecked,” and was featured in a recurring role on the NBC series “About a Boy.”
Weapons will be distributed worldwide by Warner Bros. Pictures.
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