The Butcher is a brutally twisted low budget, South Korean indie film about the making of a snuff film, and shot from the perspective of both the victims and the killers.
It's a sort of pseudo-doc, where every shot comes from either the perspective of the victims (who have been kidnapped and forcibly equipped with helmet cams); the gang of killers (who either wear helmet cams or carry camcorders); or surveillance cameras (which have been set up in the pens). The exploitation of this tactic gives the whole thing an aura of realism that puts Guinea Pig to shame.
This is all going down in a disused hog farm slaughterhouse turned human abattoir- which the gang uses as their base of operations.
We watch as 2 of 4 people- who have been kidnapped, gagged and bound- are tortured and killed by these sadistic individuals.
Hilariously, at one point, the director stops to take a phone call from his wife...about going to church.
When it comes time to torture and kill the couple, the male is given an ultimatum: survive 10 minutes of whatever happens to you, and you can both leave... I suppose any deal is better than nothing, under the circumstances, but 10 minutes at the hands of a scissor wield psychopath in a pigs mask doesn't sound like a much better deal.
As you might have guessed, once the torture gets under way...we find ourselves observing, real time, from the perspective of the victim's helmet cam...which is particularly dizzying and discomforting (...though I couldn't help but laugh while he was getting raped by the pigman).
At one point- after offering up suggestions on how they should kill his wife (upon request, under duress)- the gang decides he is too twisted to kill...so they let him go. But they had booby-trapped his attempted escape route...so he doesn't manage to make it too far.
In the end, whereas he takes the brunt of the action...it's safe to say his wife fares the worst.
This is one intensely dizzying experience that is offensive on pretty much every conceivable level. For this reason- along with it's excessive amounts of brutality and gore- it's not for the easily offended, faint of heart or those who suffer from motion sickness. While not even a long film, I found that I kept checking the time and thinking: "damn, still that much more torture to go, eh? f*cking hell." With that being said, however, it is exaggerated enough to not come off too realistic. But you still feel a bit guilty up for laughing at parts, after the fact. This film literally made me feel sick, and it certainly makes you think about how media violence desensitizes you.
4 out of 10.
It's a sort of pseudo-doc, where every shot comes from either the perspective of the victims (who have been kidnapped and forcibly equipped with helmet cams); the gang of killers (who either wear helmet cams or carry camcorders); or surveillance cameras (which have been set up in the pens). The exploitation of this tactic gives the whole thing an aura of realism that puts Guinea Pig to shame.
This is all going down in a disused hog farm slaughterhouse turned human abattoir- which the gang uses as their base of operations.
We watch as 2 of 4 people- who have been kidnapped, gagged and bound- are tortured and killed by these sadistic individuals.
Hilariously, at one point, the director stops to take a phone call from his wife...about going to church.
When it comes time to torture and kill the couple, the male is given an ultimatum: survive 10 minutes of whatever happens to you, and you can both leave... I suppose any deal is better than nothing, under the circumstances, but 10 minutes at the hands of a scissor wield psychopath in a pigs mask doesn't sound like a much better deal.
As you might have guessed, once the torture gets under way...we find ourselves observing, real time, from the perspective of the victim's helmet cam...which is particularly dizzying and discomforting (...though I couldn't help but laugh while he was getting raped by the pigman).
At one point- after offering up suggestions on how they should kill his wife (upon request, under duress)- the gang decides he is too twisted to kill...so they let him go. But they had booby-trapped his attempted escape route...so he doesn't manage to make it too far.
In the end, whereas he takes the brunt of the action...it's safe to say his wife fares the worst.
This is one intensely dizzying experience that is offensive on pretty much every conceivable level. For this reason- along with it's excessive amounts of brutality and gore- it's not for the easily offended, faint of heart or those who suffer from motion sickness. While not even a long film, I found that I kept checking the time and thinking: "damn, still that much more torture to go, eh? f*cking hell." With that being said, however, it is exaggerated enough to not come off too realistic. But you still feel a bit guilty up for laughing at parts, after the fact. This film literally made me feel sick, and it certainly makes you think about how media violence desensitizes you.
4 out of 10.
