Saturday 29 September 2012

Guinea Pig: He Never Dies!

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Year:1986
Country of origin:Japan
Director:Masayuki Kusumi
Genre:Disappointing gore-fest
Starring:Shinsuke Araki, Ivu, Masahiro Satô
Rating:2/5
IMDB link:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0161636/
Tagline:No tagline
Favourite line:N/A - Subtitled

The third in the Guinea Pig series, and the weakest so far.

The plot:
Hideshi is a lonely old sort. Recently dumped by his girlfriend, and feeling pressurised by a thankless job that is repetitive and tiresome, one night he takes a blade to his wrists.
Initially frightened, Hideshi is surprised when, after the initial slice, there is no pain, and the blood quickly ceases to flow.
Curious, Hideshi continues to cut, experimenting, and soon discovers that he is incapable of inflicting a mortal wound.
Desperate for revenge on those he feels have slighted him, he invites over a work colleague, and later the ex-girlfriend, and terrifies them with his acts of gross self-mutilation, culminating in him existing only as a dismembered head on a coffee table.

Hmmmm……
Guinea Pig 1 was a sick, sordid affair, with few redeeming features, but it was hard to fault, as it delivered exactly what was promised.
Guinea Pig 2 was a far more cerebral affair, with moments of genuine poetry amidst the gore-rotten exploits.
This one, though, is just confused.
The longest of the series so far, this ran to forty minutes, and the first twenty were ever so promising. As Hideshi discovers his apparent immortality, it seemed, for a while, we were going to have an existential examination of the true meaning of life, and how that would be utterly devalued if the potential for it to end were to be removed.
So far, so interesting.
Then, the friend arrives, and all turns slapstick, though slapstick involving lower intestines being thrown into people’s faces, and bladders being squeezed into the camera.
Listen, I don’t like Benny Hill, and Benny Hill with added gruel is no better.
Disappointingly anti-climatic, this actively pissed me off as I was watching, as the comedy element, whilst novel, was puerile, and only served to undermine what had gone before.
A disappointing entry but, no fear, the next one is meant to be the most brutal of them all.

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