Review #937: 'The Human Centipede 2 (Full Sequence)' (2011)

Once the media circus died down following the emerging release of The Human Centipede (First Sequence) back in 2009, people actually sat down to watch it. Behind the reports of a macabre, utterly depraved film in which people were sown together ass-to-mouth and forced to shit through each other as one huge digestive system, the movie itself was actually pretty tame. This was the main gripe a lot of people had with it, and it became a victim of its own hype (although I'm sure the film benefited from it financially). Director Tom Six's reaction to this was to make First Sequence seem like 'My Little Pony' compared to it's follow-up.

And Part II does exactly that. Six has created an experience so utterly deplorable that even the most die-hard of gore-hounds will undoubtedly cringe at the horror on show. Every aspect of the film is designed to repulse it's viewers, causing critics of the first film to question whether this was the kind of debauchery they were hoping for in 2009. This approach may have been affective had Six demonstrated any hint of subtlety or artistic flair, but instead he delivers shock after shock like a cinematic endurance test and points and laughs at us like a giddy teenager showing someone 2 Girls 1 Cup for the first time. The idea came to him when he was asked if he thought a deranged fan could actually try and create their own human centipede, and his new antagonist was born.

Overweight car park attendant Martin (Laurence R. Harvey) spends his days watching The Human Centipede on his laptop in his toll booth, and is such a huge fan of the film that he keeps a scrapbook containing movie stills, photographs of its actors, and hastily drawn diagrams of the grisly, yet '100% medically accurate' surgical procedure. Asthmatic and mentally retarded, he lives with his abusive and overbearing mother and was sexually abused as a child by his father. Tired of his miserable, repetitive existence, Martin decides to turn his fantasies into reality and create his own centipede. Not content with the work of Dr. Heitler in the first film, Martin plans a 12-strong centipede and starts to mutilate and kidnap his victims, storing them in a warehouse while he awaits the arrival of actress Ashlynn Yennie, who he has conned into coming to London on the promise of an audition for the next Tarantino movie.

Six makes a point of showing Martin's lack of surgical skills. While First Sequence was crisp, clinical and in colour, Full Sequence is grimy, messy, and filmed in a depressing black-and-white. Rather than drugging his victims, Martin bashes them over his head with a crowbar, and unlike the surgical precision of Heitler, Martin duct tapes his victims and staples them together. It makes for a brutal experience, but its effects are dulled by some lazy writing - we are expected to believe the victims wouldn't struggle while their teeth are being knocked out one by one with a hammer or having the ligament in their knees removed. While I can certainly appreciate Six's desire to create something different to its predecessor, this is simply an unpleasant experience. I could appreciate disturbing, but Six opts for disgusting, and this exists simply to push your buttons.


Directed by: Tom Six
Starring: Laurence R. Harvey, Ashlynn Yennie, Vivien Bridson
Country: USA

Rating: *

Tom Gillespie