Speaker 1: On the Dog Cast, the questions asked if movies have
Speaker 1: women in um, are all their discussions just boyfriends and
Speaker 1: husbands or do they have individualism the patriarchy? Zef In
Speaker 1: best start changing it with the Bell Cast. Hey, Caitlin, Yeah, Jamie,
Speaker 1: what was the last meal? You eight? I'm just asking, well,
Speaker 1: it it doesn't matter because I threw it up after
Speaker 1: watching this movie. Oh well, I just I was like, well,
Speaker 1: we're two friends and we've been on vacation together, and
Speaker 1: I just I was wondering what your last meal was here, wait,
Speaker 1: let me let me try again. It was definitely not
Speaker 1: someone else's poo pooh. Oh, what a disappointment. I was
Speaker 1: really hoping it was going to be someone else's poop poo. Well, well,
Speaker 1: egg on my face, uh and poopoo in my mouth.
Speaker 1: I didn't realize, Um, why what what was your last meal? Jamie?
Speaker 1: It was poop? It was it was it was, you know,
Speaker 1: and depending on I think the beauty of and today
Speaker 1: we are. We we thought, listen, like there's a lot
Speaker 1: going on. It's just like a really stressful, heavy time,
Speaker 1: and so we wanted to meet the moment with an
Speaker 1: episode about I think one of the most politically impactful
Speaker 1: pieces of I'll just go ahead and say art. Well,
Speaker 1: not only that, I would call this this is not
Speaker 1: only a feminist text. Oh yeah, I would say that
Speaker 1: this is a feminist masterpiece. Oh yeah, I totally agree.
Speaker 1: And so we wanted to like, we wanted to spotlight
Speaker 1: great feminist art um, to just start April and to
Speaker 1: to really just you know, I think it's like this
Speaker 1: is a if we're talking about gigantic feminist watershed moments
Speaker 1: in cinema. I'm shocked it took us almost five years
Speaker 1: to get to the Human Snipede, which is what we're covering. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and this is our probably most commonly requested episode. I
Speaker 1: think it's requested at least fifteen hundred times at this point,
Speaker 1: if not more. Um, the people are just gagging on
Speaker 1: pooh for us to cover this movie and finally we're
Speaker 1: here and we're doing it, so um, the time is now.
Speaker 1: First of all, wanted to apologize that it's taken us
Speaker 1: so long to cover it because the response, as you
Speaker 1: were saying, Caitlin, it has been really overwhelming and I
Speaker 1: feel like I'm getting two or three messages a day
Speaker 1: to say to the point where people have figured out
Speaker 1: what my home address are and they're sending me handwritten
Speaker 1: letters being like where is it? Where is it? Where
Speaker 1: is it? And so here it is. You know, it's
Speaker 1: understandably it's going to be, you know, a really serious episode.
Speaker 1: And but but I think that we're gonna have a
Speaker 1: really really rich, fiber full conversation and it's just gonna
Speaker 1: be a mouthful of fiber. I feel like in terms
Speaker 1: of what the episode is gonna be, like, what's gonna
Speaker 1: be you don't like to listen to? Yeah, so so
Speaker 1: this is the back pedcast. It's a really serious podcast. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I apologize for laughing. It's prior to what's going to
Speaker 1: be such serious. It's not funny. Yeah, this is a
Speaker 1: serious episode. Sometimes we do an episode on something, you know,
Speaker 1: like National Treasure where we can just go and sometimes
Speaker 1: we do something club or This is not one of
Speaker 1: those episodes. This, this is going to generate some very
Speaker 1: serious discourse. And I apologize for laughing because I was inappropriate.
Speaker 1: We laugh. Humans laugh in response to fear, and human
Speaker 1: centipede and human centipes um probably shouldn't laugh because their
Speaker 1: mouth is full. They can't they can't laugh if they
Speaker 1: laugh it's muffled. Um yeah, what if one of them,
Speaker 1: one of them gets a cold and their nose gets
Speaker 1: stuffed up? Do they just suffocate? I feel like we're
Speaker 1: introduced with kind of a cat dog dilemma with this film.
Speaker 1: But it's also just like what if there was a
Speaker 1: third animal between I mean, I guess with the human centipee,
Speaker 1: what separates a human centipede from a cat dog is
Speaker 1: the third piece is the centerpiece, Because apparently if you
Speaker 1: remove the center of the human centipede, all you have
Speaker 1: is a hilarious children's TV show. Um. But but the center,
Speaker 1: the center person, really is what elevates it to a
Speaker 1: feminist text, right, Yes, because I don't know. I mean,
Speaker 1: did we did you watch? Did you ever watch Cat Dog?
Speaker 1: I didn't know. I was a big cat dog fan,
Speaker 1: and and and fans of cat Dog and people who
Speaker 1: don't give a shit about cat dog are well versed
Speaker 1: in the argument in just the discussion of like where
Speaker 1: does the peepee come from? Where is the poop? Who
Speaker 1: come from? Does it come from the cat's mouth, does
Speaker 1: it come from the dog's mouth? Does it come from
Speaker 1: somewhere in the middle of the tube, And in the
Speaker 1: cat dog because cat Dog is like a cat head
Speaker 1: on one end and then a dog head on the
Speaker 1: other end, and they're just sort of like both attached
Speaker 1: at the abdomen kind of thing. Yeah, they're just it's
Speaker 1: a long animal tube and there's a cat at one
Speaker 1: and a dog on one end, and they're just, you know,
Speaker 1: they're just simple links and they have a sweet relationship,
Speaker 1: and they couldn't be more different. But they're on the
Speaker 1: same tube. But um, pooping, as far as I know,
Speaker 1: never comes up in the show, and and I think
Speaker 1: that that's maybe intense textually intentional, but there are times
Speaker 1: where okay, so in cat Dog, just to like ease
Speaker 1: us into the discussion, where I believe and cat dog
Speaker 1: heads please correct me if I'm wrong, I believe there
Speaker 1: are instances or perhaps a whole episode where cat gets
Speaker 1: hairballs and they come out of dogs mouth. So that's
Speaker 1: extremely confusing because it's not like cats poop out hairballs,
Speaker 1: they come out of their mouth, and so they're just
Speaker 1: kind of operating on a separate, separate level. Well, Cat
Speaker 1: Dog doesn't sound like it's medically accurate, which the human
Speaker 1: centipede claims to be. And as jam you and I
Speaker 1: are both doctors. We are, Yeah, we can confirm that
Speaker 1: the human centipeate is medically accurate. Yes, this is if
Speaker 1: if you were to do this, this is everyone would
Speaker 1: look like the Joker, except their head is attached to
Speaker 1: someone's butt. Um. That's exactly how it would go. And well,
Speaker 1: by the way, I mean, if this is your first episode, welcome,
Speaker 1: This is a really serious podcast that we started to
Speaker 1: really start human discussions. And I feel like our podcast
Speaker 1: is kind of a human centipete of ideas and in fact,
Speaker 1: we've really we really just we started the podcast to
Speaker 1: be able to talk about this episode. This is like
Speaker 1: the grand what if this is our last episode? This
Speaker 1: is the Grand Female? This is it. I feel like though,
Speaker 1: if you do remember that that when you contacted me,
Speaker 1: I mean I would say probably five years ago now
Speaker 1: about to start discussing, you know, doing this show together.
Speaker 1: This was I think it took up a good hour
Speaker 1: of our discussion of like, well, this is obviously where
Speaker 1: we're building too, or we we would want to build too,
Speaker 1: but it would take at least four years, and we
Speaker 1: need to build trust, and we need to build a
Speaker 1: listener base because we want this message to get across
Speaker 1: to as many mouths ear, but mouth really and as
Speaker 1: we can depending on what side of the center, peter
Speaker 1: On and some of us are on both sides, and
Speaker 1: so it's just it's an exchange of like what is
Speaker 1: a human centipete if not an exchange of ideas? You know,
Speaker 1: um where you know it's this human said to beat
Speaker 1: is a metaphor. And if you're in the center, oh
Speaker 1: certainly it's the least comfortable place to be. But are
Speaker 1: you not both giving and receiving ideas from your peers? Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: and the answers yes, and you may in fact be
Speaker 1: the ask girls as a result, uh the ba um yeah, even.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I wish that this is a
Speaker 1: really serious episode. I think it's really important to clarify
Speaker 1: what this show is about. So on this podcast we
Speaker 1: analyze movies, works of arts such as Human Centipede from
Speaker 1: an intersectional feminist lens, using the Backtel test as a
Speaker 1: jumping off point. And we've been you know, the test
Speaker 1: has been evolving along like our rendition of the test
Speaker 1: has been evolving along with the show these past many years,
Speaker 1: to the point where I would like to propose the
Speaker 1: newest rendition. I mean, what better episode do two people
Speaker 1: of any marginalized gender poop into the mouth of one another.
Speaker 1: I'm so glad you're saying this for at the end
Speaker 1: question mark, right. I mean it's dialogue, I think really
Speaker 1: notwithstanding because there there you are introduced with the problem
Speaker 1: when you get to a certain part of this Human
Speaker 1: Centipede of how on earth could we pass this test
Speaker 1: if if our mouths are sown to our dear friends anuss.
Speaker 1: But that's why I'm proposing this, because we don't want
Speaker 1: to leave anyone out. Absolutely not. This test is inclusive,
Speaker 1: and it you know, people who's who cannot communicate verbally
Speaker 1: because their mouth has been sown to the anus of
Speaker 1: some other person specific. Yeah, but you know it's it's
Speaker 1: representation that we had failed to see on screen before
Speaker 1: this movie. So this movie really sheds a light on
Speaker 1: those people and they should be included in the in
Speaker 1: this test. So I felt, I felt. I just want
Speaker 1: to start by saying I felt represented in the Human
Speaker 1: Centipede because I have been a clueless American white girl
Speaker 1: on vacation with a friend stumbling around there. You have
Speaker 1: been that friend at at at many points, and so
Speaker 1: it's like, oh, what is the human centipede. If not,
Speaker 1: you know, the worst case scenario of us on tour,
Speaker 1: of us just stumbling around wherever we happened to be,
Speaker 1: and if we got to the to the woods of
Speaker 1: question Mark, Common Germany, this very well could have been us.
Speaker 1: And so it's a cautionary tale in many ways as well. Um,
Speaker 1: what was your what was your experience with this? And
Speaker 1: I'd like to just call it a text. Um, I
Speaker 1: don't want to, you know, use kind of a dismissive term.
Speaker 1: It's not simply a movie. No, No, this this text this, uh,
Speaker 1: this document this manifesto, it's what what isn't it? Did
Speaker 1: you ever say documentary? Documentary? I was going to just
Speaker 1: say document but I was like, whoo. But when you
Speaker 1: think about it, it it could be maybe it is a documentary.
Speaker 1: What if we just don't it's a documentary, we just
Speaker 1: don't know it yet. Yeah, could be. So my relationship
Speaker 1: with this, I remember when the trailers were circulating on
Speaker 1: I think the internet, Like I didn't see the trailers
Speaker 1: weren't you know, on television or in front of any
Speaker 1: movie I was seeing in theaters. But okay, you're distancing
Speaker 1: I feel you. I feel you're distancing yourself from the
Speaker 1: human sense, and I'm sorry. Well, I saw the trailers
Speaker 1: and I was living with I think I was living
Speaker 1: with j T at the time. Word caught on about
Speaker 1: this movie, and I remember, I remember the marketing. The
Speaker 1: marketing was you know this. You get a sense of
Speaker 1: what the movie was about based on the trailer, and
Speaker 1: I remember the claims that it was medically accurate, and
Speaker 1: I was like, well, not only that, but it looks
Speaker 1: to me like it's the most feminist film ever made.
Speaker 1: So I have to see this. This is like, really,
Speaker 1: you know, an intersection of all of my interests, you know,
Speaker 1: medical accuracy, poo pooh feminism. Poop poo feminism was I
Speaker 1: think a big discussion in the late two thousand's. I
Speaker 1: would qualify a lot of movies that came out in
Speaker 1: the two thousands as poo poo feminism. Yeah, so we
Speaker 1: we got ahold of it somehow, j He and I.
Speaker 1: So I saw it in like I think it was
Speaker 1: like or maybe eleven. I don't know. You were early,
Speaker 1: you were really, I was an early viewer of this text.
Speaker 1: It is true, and I loved it. I was like,
Speaker 1: this is I feel I feel seen, I feel heard.
Speaker 1: I haven't seen a movie this feminist in ever, so
Speaker 1: it became one of my favorite movies of all time.
Speaker 1: What about your TV? My history with Human Centipede was
Speaker 1: I honestly wasn't sure even going into because I hadn't.
Speaker 1: I feel like I have a habit in my life
Speaker 1: depriving myself of joy, and so I hadn't seen this.
Speaker 1: I had just been kind of like intentionally depriving myself
Speaker 1: of this text for for years out of avoidance and
Speaker 1: just not wanting to feel really great. Um. I honestly
Speaker 1: wasn't sure in preparing for this episode if Human Centipede
Speaker 1: was like an online joke that became a movie, or
Speaker 1: if the movie came first and then it became an
Speaker 1: online joke because I had not seen so I had
Speaker 1: to go back and because you know how like I
Speaker 1: kind of thought that it was it had gone in
Speaker 1: the direction of slender Man, where like Human Centipede was
Speaker 1: this online thing and then it became I p But
Speaker 1: it turns out I was quite wrong. It came from
Speaker 1: the mind of one genius and then Mr Tom six
Speaker 1: Feminist Icons six. Yeah, I think we should up him
Speaker 1: to seven. While we're at it. Um Tom six, who
Speaker 1: is also I mean, I think fascinating is an applicable word.
Speaker 1: Just who he is, um, the Tom six universe, um,
Speaker 1: and how he got his money is fascinating to me.
Speaker 1: We'll get to that. But yeah, I kind of thought
Speaker 1: this was an Internet thing that became a cinematic text
Speaker 1: and was I don't know if the phrase is pleasantly surprised,
Speaker 1: but I was, you know, artistically intrigued that it was
Speaker 1: in fact a single person's idea that I mean, most
Speaker 1: of what I knew about the human centipede was just
Speaker 1: like internet jokes, like because I feel like they, I
Speaker 1: mean they you know EBB that they you know, wax
Speaker 1: and Wayne like the moon. But human centipede jokes are
Speaker 1: always around, and in fact, I think there should be
Speaker 1: more of them. Let's get let's get to waxing folks.
Speaker 1: We need more human centipede jokes. Going seriously. Um, yeah,
Speaker 1: So this was my first time really taking it all in.
Speaker 1: I felt I felt really center of the centipede. Um.
Speaker 1: I was taking it in and I was letting it out,
Speaker 1: you know. So it was an absolute pleasure to prepare
Speaker 1: for this really important episode. I will say, what is okay,
Speaker 1: this is maybe I don't want to like get ahead
Speaker 1: of ourselves. But what is your favorite part of Humans
Speaker 1: and Defeat, Like, what's your favorite theme? I do have
Speaker 1: a favorite, like moment um. This feels like cheating, but
Speaker 1: all of them, every scene I love. I love that
Speaker 1: it's a tight I was honestly thrilled to be like, oh,
Speaker 1: it's just an hour and a half. I was terrified
Speaker 1: that it would be a second longer. My favorite moment
Speaker 1: in the Human Centipede parentheses first sequence, by the way,
Speaker 1: and you know we did not watch the other two.
Speaker 1: I did consider it though, but I said, you know what,
Speaker 1: I've felt enough joy for one week. I you need
Speaker 1: things to look forward to, you know, especially especially in
Speaker 1: this pandemic. It's not a binger. I mean, yeah, you
Speaker 1: want to like prolong this as much as you can, exactly.
Speaker 1: My favorite moment in first sequence was when the so,
Speaker 1: you know, the cops are a little too good in
Speaker 1: this movie, right, I don't know what German cops are like,
Speaker 1: but I can assume not great, right, But there is
Speaker 1: a moment where when after the police have arrived, where
Speaker 1: they're like, so you made the Human Centipede, right, and
Speaker 1: he's like, no, no, I did not make the human
Speaker 1: sent feed, but the human centipete cage is out. And
Speaker 1: my favorite moment in the whole cinematic text is when
Speaker 1: the cop is looking at the humans and human sentipet
Speaker 1: cage and going, h what is this? But it's literally
Speaker 1: the human centipete cage and it's just out there for anyone,
Speaker 1: for anyone to stumble across. So, you know, I just
Speaker 1: thought that that was a beautiful moment of I don't
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't even know what I would call
Speaker 1: you have to film degrees, what would you know? What
Speaker 1: is that play there? What's going on there? Me? Is
Speaker 1: it irony? Is it? It's a little bit, it's you know,
Speaker 1: I would classify it as a number of things. It's um,
Speaker 1: you know, it's perhaps foreshadowing. It's um, it's motif, it's
Speaker 1: it's allegory, it's definitely Oh, there's a lot of metaphorically
Speaker 1: on here. Yeah, um, you know, it's plant and payoff,
Speaker 1: it's it's just a lot of it's a lot of
Speaker 1: narrative devices all rolled into one. Because you know, this
Speaker 1: is just a really masterfully written screenplay that is just
Speaker 1: like making use of a lot of just like very
Speaker 1: effective narrative devices. I totally agree. I mean, and I
Speaker 1: had a fun like White Stripes moment trying to figure
Speaker 1: out if Tom six and a Lot of six were
Speaker 1: married or siblings. Oh, um, they are siblings, unlike the
Speaker 1: White You. I always assumed the White Stripes were siblings,
Speaker 1: but they were dating. This is quite the opposite, I see.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean this is this isn't you know,
Speaker 1: an oh to our piece, uh from from the six family,
Speaker 1: which which is kind of fun down to the editing.
Speaker 1: You know, Tom six was one of the credited editors,
Speaker 1: of course, So I mean, when you have this brilliance
Speaker 1: a concept, you have to be really protective of it.
Speaker 1: I mean, you wouldn't want to get this wrong. You
Speaker 1: don't want to put this in the hands of some
Speaker 1: ya who who can't edit together the Human Centipede. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I understand that he wanted to do that himself. Yeah,
Speaker 1: a movie is so good that nonfeminine like misogynist icon.
Speaker 1: Roger Ebert refused to give it any rating because it
Speaker 1: was to quote unquote gross, which I think intentionally misses
Speaker 1: the point. Yeah, gosh, Roger Ebert, don't get us started.
Speaker 1: I already know we were not going to refuse to
Speaker 1: give it a rating on our scale and cowards. I
Speaker 1: already know what rating I'm going to give it, which
Speaker 1: is obviously five nipples. Oh yeah, I don't see any
Speaker 1: reason to hold back on what we're going to be
Speaker 1: giving this movie. It's going to be five and well, actually,
Speaker 1: actually the human centipede featured in this film has six nipples.
Speaker 1: Oh that's true. Let's be included. Let's include every nipple.
Speaker 1: So human snapede facts with Caitlin human sonapedes. At least
Speaker 1: this I mean there. I mean again, I haven't seen
Speaker 1: the sequels. I don't know if more centipedes get attached.
Speaker 1: My understanding is, and I honestly didn't fully check, but
Speaker 1: my understanding is that with each passing film, the centipede
Speaker 1: gets the centipede gets longer, several times longer. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: makes sense. So at least for um, what's this one
Speaker 1: called first sequence? The third one? The third one may
Speaker 1: in fact be as like scented like a full hundred.
Speaker 1: I'm not totally sure, but they might have. Really, that's
Speaker 1: where it was added. That's I mean heightening. If you
Speaker 1: want to learn about heightening and storytelling, my gutwait really quick,
Speaker 1: just go to the Wikipedia page for the Human Centipee
Speaker 1: three and look at the poster and it might be
Speaker 1: more than a hundred on god, that is so I
Speaker 1: don't want to know anything else. This is so fucked up.
Speaker 1: That's a lot of people. Uh so, yeah, safe to
Speaker 1: say it gets longer than three. Um, but we did not,
Speaker 1: We did not watch It looks like it just gets
Speaker 1: longer with every movie. And I'm pretty sure based on
Speaker 1: I consulted horror buff and friend of the cast Corey
Speaker 1: Johnson about this because I was like, who, off the
Speaker 1: top of my head, can I be certain has seen
Speaker 1: all three Human Centipee movies and it is her? And
Speaker 1: of course she said, um, she said, what what we
Speaker 1: know already, which is that there is a message to
Speaker 1: the first Human Centipede movie if what you sacrifice, and
Speaker 1: that is a pretty short centipede. And as the centipede
Speaker 1: gets longer, perhaps the powerful message gets smaller. You know,
Speaker 1: it's a given take. So if you want a long centipede,
Speaker 1: it has to be meaningless. If you have a short centipede,
Speaker 1: you can have a powerful, tight react structure. Sure of course. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So all that to say that the centipede featured in
Speaker 1: this first film, this first work of art has six nipples. Therefore,
Speaker 1: that is what I will be giving this movie. I wis, yes,
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you so much. Um so, uh do
Speaker 1: we need to talk about anything else before I recap
Speaker 1: this brilliant narrative? Um? I don't think so. I mean
Speaker 1: I think that you know, we we shouldn't hold back
Speaker 1: any longer and really just like really, you know, release
Speaker 1: like the information. Yeah, I'd love to um feed you
Speaker 1: so to speak the recap Oh yes, please, please please
Speaker 1: and iconic? How did that not end up on an
Speaker 1: a f I list? Feed her, feed her, and if
Speaker 1: you apply that to feed her knowledge, it becomes this
Speaker 1: really powerful thing. It all depends on the direction you're
Speaker 1: coming at it analytically. It's a brilliant film. Yeah, of course. Actually,
Speaker 1: let's take a quick break first, you know, go to
Speaker 1: the bathroom or whatever you need to do, and will
Speaker 1: be right back. Okay. The Human Centipede first sequence opens
Speaker 1: on a man. He is looking at some photos of
Speaker 1: three dogs who are seen all kind of standing in
Speaker 1: a single file line. They're in a row. They seem
Speaker 1: to be sniffing each other's butts. We don't, but we
Speaker 1: don't really might it be something more? And then we
Speaker 1: see that same man approach a trucker who has pulled
Speaker 1: off the road to take a poopoo, which is the first, um,
Speaker 1: the first indication that that poopoo might be featured as
Speaker 1: a motif in this film. I really thought that was
Speaker 1: a tasteful introduction of what a prominent motif was going
Speaker 1: to be, because then you go back and you watch
Speaker 1: it later and you're like, oh my god, I mean again,
Speaker 1: foreshadowing at its finest. Incredible stuff. Yeah, really really thoughtful.
Speaker 1: So the man is seen approaching this uh, this truck
Speaker 1: driver with a gun. Oh god, and we're like, oh.
Speaker 1: Then we cut to two women, Lindsay and Jenny. They
Speaker 1: are American tourists in Germany and they are heading to
Speaker 1: a party but they get lost. Their car gets a
Speaker 1: flat tire, they get out and walk through the middle
Speaker 1: of the woods, which, really, it should be said, the
Speaker 1: entire beginning of the movie between Lindsey and Jenny pretty
Speaker 1: thoroughly passes the Bechdel test. They are talking to each
Speaker 1: other about like do I want to go out? Do
Speaker 1: I not want to go out? What do I want
Speaker 1: to do? Oh my gosh, you know where we are No,
Speaker 1: I don't. They're having really impactful conversations, and so I
Speaker 1: feel like, also early on, you learned like, oh, this
Speaker 1: is about women, this is about women, this is a
Speaker 1: woman's story. This is an empowering story about female friendship. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we see them interact a lot, and I honestly, I'm
Speaker 1: genuinely very invested in their friendship, particularly with and we'll
Speaker 1: get there, but like where their story goes, you know,
Speaker 1: and where their story and I honestly I was not
Speaker 1: prepared for where their story ends and how UM genuinely like, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm sad I was going to feel at the end.
Speaker 1: I value their friendship. They seemed to They seem to
Speaker 1: be like really complimentary late two thousands, I like, I
Speaker 1: like when I think it's Jenny Who's like, I'm wearing
Speaker 1: shorts and high heels. I'm not getting out of the car.
Speaker 1: And I was like, wow, that is what people were
Speaker 1: saying in two thousand nine, you know it is. So
Speaker 1: they're wandering through the woods. They're wandering through the woods,
Speaker 1: and they eventually come upon a house. They knock on
Speaker 1: the door, and who greets them, who opens the door?
Speaker 1: But the man we saw at the beginning but we
Speaker 1: forgot to mention that when they are stuck there, the
Speaker 1: creepy guy pulls up and he hits on them, he
Speaker 1: scares them. This is like plot relevant, so that by
Speaker 1: the time they go into the woods, they are already
Speaker 1: very anxiety written, they already feel really nervous, and so
Speaker 1: I feel like you're given and I have some notes
Speaker 1: about the way that seems to present it. But um,
Speaker 1: they've already been kind of been made to feel unsafe
Speaker 1: before they find this house, so they're already on like
Speaker 1: ty alert. Yes, and this man opens the door, he
Speaker 1: invites them in there, like, hey, can you call the
Speaker 1: car company for us so that we can, you know,
Speaker 1: hitch a ride out of here, And then he says
Speaker 1: are you alone? Which is never a way to start
Speaker 1: a conversation with the scariest looking person I've ever seen
Speaker 1: in my life. Yes. Also, that actor's name is Dieter Laser,
Speaker 1: which is also a very menacing name. Just everything. And
Speaker 1: then the more I learned about the actor and his
Speaker 1: conduct on set, I'm like, he just sounds like a scary,
Speaker 1: scary guy. Yeah, we'll talk about Mr Lazer. It's probably
Speaker 1: like Laser or or something. Please our German our German
Speaker 1: listeners forgive us, but I just I was like, his
Speaker 1: last name is Laser. He's scary. And then you look
Speaker 1: up the facts about production and then everyone's like, no,
Speaker 1: he was quite scary. Yep, everyone agrees. So he pretends
Speaker 1: to call the car company for them, and then he
Speaker 1: gives them both a glass of water which he has
Speaker 1: drugged so the women lose consciousness. They wake up in
Speaker 1: his basement tied to hospital beds. The trucker from earlier
Speaker 1: is there as well, also tied to a bed, and
Speaker 1: the man who Dr. Hyder, Yeah, Dr Hyder comes in
Speaker 1: and he's like, he says to the truck driver that
Speaker 1: he's not a match. We don't really know exactly what
Speaker 1: he means, what context, but he kills the truck driver
Speaker 1: while Lindsay and Jenny watch on in horror. What did
Speaker 1: he mean when he said you are not a match?
Speaker 1: Was there a reason that he wasn't a match? I
Speaker 1: wasn't sure in text why precisely he wasn't a match?
Speaker 1: What was I don't know if it was like a
Speaker 1: blood type thing, oh, like literally a medical reason that
Speaker 1: a human cent like all the human centipes have to have,
Speaker 1: like viby blood types. I don't. Well, again, um, we
Speaker 1: should know this since we are doctors women in stems.
Speaker 1: If you're a gay human centipide, do the blood types
Speaker 1: need to be vibe are? Like there are certain pre
Speaker 1: existing conditions that disqualify you from participation eating. I wonder
Speaker 1: what it would be. Yeah, I mean I know that
Speaker 1: like if you're getting a an organ transplant, for example,
Speaker 1: you have to like make sure that there's some kind
Speaker 1: of and again I don't know if it's blood type
Speaker 1: match or some other just sort of like compatibility thing. Um,
Speaker 1: but yeah, my guess was there there was like a
Speaker 1: medical reason that the truck driver could not participate and
Speaker 1: he had to go. It was nothing personal, but you've
Speaker 1: been said to be it's never personal. That's and I
Speaker 1: love that that's a major theme in this movie. Um,
Speaker 1: it's important to remember that sometimes the fate that the
Speaker 1: truck driver suffers is uh far less bad than like
Speaker 1: the fate he would have suffered if he had. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think we would all agree we would rather just
Speaker 1: just die. So he kind of gets off easy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he gets let off the hook, but we still but
Speaker 1: we still need I'm sorry, did you say but I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: I was trying to hit the t hard so that
Speaker 1: it would be implied that there were two of them.
Speaker 1: Um but lead one more but to make a human centipede.
Speaker 1: And that's when Dr Hyder comes home with a new man,
Speaker 1: cut Serro, who he has abducted, and then he explains
Speaker 1: to all of them what he plans to do. So
Speaker 1: the thing with him is he is a retired surgeon
Speaker 1: who used to specialize in separating conjoined twins. Right, he
Speaker 1: uses a dismissive and very dated term that we're not
Speaker 1: even going to repeat here, but yes, conjoined twins is
Speaker 1: the is the correct term to use. One of the
Speaker 1: few mistakes um this otherwise perfect movie. Yes. Um So,
Speaker 1: now that he is retired, he has kind of refocused
Speaker 1: his efforts and takes his surgical expertise and pivot applies
Speaker 1: it to He's pivoting, he's having a second he's having honestly,
Speaker 1: like my my dad just retired and he's kind of
Speaker 1: looking for a second act. And so I kind of
Speaker 1: want to show him this movie as a kind of
Speaker 1: aspirational thing of like, oh, you already have applicable skills,
Speaker 1: you just need to find your second act. You know,
Speaker 1: and so you know that the doctor's really decided on
Speaker 1: what his second act is going to be, which is
Speaker 1: that he now is obsessed with surgically joining people together
Speaker 1: but a very particular way, in a very particular way.
Speaker 1: And what he is going to do is attach these
Speaker 1: three people together, mouth to anus in a chain, forming
Speaker 1: the iconic human centipede the feminist psychon. And so with
Speaker 1: the three I feel like with the three person human centipede,
Speaker 1: you really do have um, you know, everyone's role is
Speaker 1: quite different, and you know, the longer the centipede gets,
Speaker 1: the more kind of like central, Like if you're reaching
Speaker 1: human centipee three, which that I don't know what goes
Speaker 1: on in that movie, but there's like five people in
Speaker 1: that chain. That's like four parts of the human centipede.
Speaker 1: They could fucking unionize at that point. But in this point,
Speaker 1: but it's like if you just have three people, there's
Speaker 1: one person who's uniquely suffering as a part of the centipede,
Speaker 1: and then you also have an appointed mouthpiece, right, the
Speaker 1: only person whose mouth is available that is then the
Speaker 1: head of the chew chew, the head of the the
Speaker 1: poo poo train, the poopoo. Yeah, he doesn't and the
Speaker 1: one who eats from the bowl, etcetera. So Dr Hyder
Speaker 1: starts to prep them for surgery, but Lindsay manages to
Speaker 1: escape her restraints, but he finds her again and he
Speaker 1: says he's going to punish her by putting her in
Speaker 1: the middle of the centipede. I found this sequence to
Speaker 1: be very compelling. We see Lindsay acting with a lot
Speaker 1: of um she's taking a lot of initiative, she has
Speaker 1: a lot of agency. She's fighting for her life and
Speaker 1: her friend's life, and she's really like going up against
Speaker 1: the oppressor. I on it, I mean going I had
Speaker 1: a lot of now I find to be ridiculous negative
Speaker 1: assumptions going into this. But right at the top, we
Speaker 1: see you know, like a highly motivated female character being like,
Speaker 1: you know, what some think about this human centipede just
Speaker 1: doesn't sound right to me, and I don't want to participate.
Speaker 1: And she, you know, she she fights, and she also
Speaker 1: fights for her friend. And I genuinely thought that sequence
Speaker 1: was very like exciting is not the right word, but
Speaker 1: I was on the edge of my seat. Sure, thrilling,
Speaker 1: It's thrilling, And like you said, we see a woman
Speaker 1: having agency. We see a woman like just taking the
Speaker 1: information that's been provided to her and thinking critically about
Speaker 1: it and like thinking about what she should do next,
Speaker 1: so you know, she's using her brain. It's all pretty
Speaker 1: I mean in all series, Like everything Lindsay and Jenny
Speaker 1: do in like the first act of the movie more
Speaker 1: or less make sense to me, as like tourists who
Speaker 1: are panicking and we have just been scared by someone
Speaker 1: who was aggressively hitting on them. It seems like like
Speaker 1: wanted to assault them. There's only one house. They're like
Speaker 1: communicating with each other silently as this creepy guy is
Speaker 1: making them drinks. They're like, it's just like it's I
Speaker 1: don't know, like there I was, I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm glad that a Lana six was in
Speaker 1: the room because I feel like these women, given the
Speaker 1: horrific circumstances they're being thrown into, like it didn't seem
Speaker 1: completely like in the way that most horror and like
Speaker 1: especially like Gore movies, will introduce female characters as like
Speaker 1: completely irrationally trusting of people. They don't really seem that way.
Speaker 1: They just are like this is the option, and we're
Speaker 1: still very freaked out, and like let's see what happens. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I would, I mean not to criticize this perfect film,
Speaker 1: but I know I I say this with a lot
Speaker 1: of caution, But um, well, I see what you're saying,
Speaker 1: and I think they're characterized maybe a little bit. I
Speaker 1: don't want to say I don't want to say better.
Speaker 1: I don't Also, I'm just like, when do we drop
Speaker 1: the bit? But a bit sorry, I'm so sorry. Um.
Speaker 1: There were still like choices that they made that I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, these are female characters written by a
Speaker 1: male horror writer, like which I had a point to
Speaker 1: where I got like, oh, this is the line where
Speaker 1: this has like lost I mean, and that is like
Speaker 1: a trope of the genre or whatever, But like, what
Speaker 1: was the choice for you where you're like, I'm no
Speaker 1: longer like feeling connected to this this character's logic, I mean,
Speaker 1: just like them getting out of the car. My thing
Speaker 1: was them leaving the road. I could see them getting
Speaker 1: out of the car if the car wasn't going to move,
Speaker 1: but them leaving the main road to me made very
Speaker 1: little sense. I was just like that, wouldn't you just
Speaker 1: follow the road back to the town you came from? Ultimately,
Speaker 1: and then like hope someone passed. Um. The other thing
Speaker 1: is like, it's not a great idea, but you can
Speaker 1: drive slowly with one flat tire for some amount of distance.
Speaker 1: You could turn around, Like you could turn around. That's true.
Speaker 1: I also don't have a driver's license, so I'm just like,
Speaker 1: maybe you can't do that, but like it's not great
Speaker 1: and it's gonna like mess things up a bit in
Speaker 1: the car probably, But like the fact that they get
Speaker 1: out of the car and then yeah, go immediately into
Speaker 1: the woods. Going into the woods, I was just like, on, like,
Speaker 1: it would make sense to me if they like we're like, oh,
Speaker 1: I know something is here, but clearly they don't. They
Speaker 1: have no idea where they were, so they get lost immediately. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I can't imagine myself, especially in a country I know
Speaker 1: nothing about and I don't speak the language, and all
Speaker 1: this stuff like wandering into the woods does seem like
Speaker 1: begging to die. Um, so in that way, and then
Speaker 1: even if you can suspend your believe through that, because
Speaker 1: then I like challenged myself, I'm like, Okay, what if
Speaker 1: I what if I could get myself to the doctor's house? Right?
Speaker 1: I Also I find it really I don't know, maybe
Speaker 1: if you're like truly, I was kind of of two
Speaker 1: minds of this. I don't think in one as an
Speaker 1: adult that knows better. I don't think that I would
Speaker 1: have accepted a glass of water from a total stranger
Speaker 1: without watching them pour it. Like I feel like there's
Speaker 1: a world where I could have been, like, I really
Speaker 1: need water, I've been wandering around the fucking woods for
Speaker 1: an hour, but let me see you just pour it
Speaker 1: from the sink, you know, or something like that, because
Speaker 1: he's just roofying literally everyone who walks in the door. Um.
Speaker 1: But but I also could see and I don't know
Speaker 1: how hard our King Tom six is thinking about this.
Speaker 1: I also feel like when I was younger, which I
Speaker 1: think that I don't know how out old these characters
Speaker 1: are supposed to be, like anywhere between nineteen and thirty five,
Speaker 1: I have no idea. I'm assuming college right early twenties.
Speaker 1: When I was younger, I can see myself wanting to
Speaker 1: watch someone prepare my drink and maybe being a little
Speaker 1: too anxious to ask. And so, but I also am like,
Speaker 1: how hard is Tom six thinking about this? Probably probably
Speaker 1: no disrespect to our our king, but very possibly zero percent.
Speaker 1: But I've had I don't know, have you ever had
Speaker 1: a moment like that where someone offers you a drink
Speaker 1: and I immediately always when like a stranger at all,
Speaker 1: but particularly a stranger who is a man, forers me
Speaker 1: a drink. I if I want to accept, I need
Speaker 1: to know that I am watching it be prepared, just
Speaker 1: because of the experience of knowing better. But I also
Speaker 1: was an age at one point where I would have
Speaker 1: been too nervous to advocate for myself up in that
Speaker 1: way for sure. I mean, yeah, I definitely didn't always
Speaker 1: insist on watching or it just insist on today I
Speaker 1: would like, I would just be like, I'll make it myself. Thanks.
Speaker 1: I would even go so far as to be like,
Speaker 1: let's make them together. I'll come to the kitchen with you,
Speaker 1: like so that there's nothing funky going on. And but
Speaker 1: you know, as as a as a teenager, I can't
Speaker 1: I you know, I don't know that I would have
Speaker 1: had the because I truly, at this point in my
Speaker 1: life don't give a funk. I just want to um live.
Speaker 1: H But what I would probably do if I was
Speaker 1: even in like my earlier more naive days or like
Speaker 1: days of just like not being able to advocate for
Speaker 1: myself or like speak up or like you know, just
Speaker 1: be like fuck you, I'm making my own drink or
Speaker 1: whatever I would say. Now I would I would accept
Speaker 1: a drink, but just not touch it. I just would
Speaker 1: not drink it. Yeah, I've done that too. I the
Speaker 1: the part of that scene that I genuinely felt like, oh,
Speaker 1: that is definitely kind of a thing that I recognized,
Speaker 1: like in myself and when I was younger, and like
Speaker 1: in college of like when the guy is being really
Speaker 1: weird and then he leaves the room and then immediately
Speaker 1: you turn to your friend and you're like what is
Speaker 1: going on? Like that, I was like, oh, I've done
Speaker 1: that five hundred times. And then the second he walks
Speaker 1: back in, you're like like nothing to see here. I
Speaker 1: feel this is so normal for me. Um well. I
Speaker 1: also don't think I would have gone in the house
Speaker 1: like and I understand it. It's like it's raining, you know,
Speaker 1: they probably want to get out of the rain. That's
Speaker 1: the thing is like I the fact that they added
Speaker 1: the rain and the night. I think I would have
Speaker 1: like knocked on the door and asked to use the phone,
Speaker 1: but then like stayed outside on the stoop and like
Speaker 1: not actually gone inside the house. And I also wondered.
Speaker 1: I was like, is there some sort of and again
Speaker 1: I don't know what I mean. We can't and we
Speaker 1: can't put ourselves in the mind of a genius artist Tom.
Speaker 1: We can't really know the mind from which the idea
Speaker 1: for a Big Brother came is like Tom six thought
Speaker 1: of Big Brother. So he's just he's just did you
Speaker 1: know that? I did not? Oh my god. So that
Speaker 1: is where Tom six Is money comes from. He was
Speaker 1: an original director on the Dutch reality TV series Big Brother,
Speaker 1: which apparently was the first incarnation of Big Brother that
Speaker 1: obviously became an international phenomenon. So he was like into
Speaker 1: some like some stuff, you know, and some like low
Speaker 1: key torture, um pre human sense. I'm not seeing that
Speaker 1: on his IMDb. Oh, it's in the first sentence. He
Speaker 1: was six was an original director on his it's on
Speaker 1: his uh Wikipedia's Wikipedia six was an original director of
Speaker 1: Dutch reality TV series Big Brother, which has since become
Speaker 1: an international franchise. So that's how he um established himself
Speaker 1: and got you know, some credibility was by the survey
Speaker 1: the abuse of surveillance TV show of of a generation.
Speaker 1: Uh So there you go. I guess this is all
Speaker 1: to say that, yeah, some choices were made to have
Speaker 1: the women in the movie behave in a way that
Speaker 1: I think was pretty indicative that those characters were written
Speaker 1: by someone who UM does not really understand what it
Speaker 1: is to be a woman who has to move about
Speaker 1: the world and the danger we are often in and
Speaker 1: the amount of on guard we always have to be
Speaker 1: because a lot of men put us in danger and
Speaker 1: make us feel unsafe. But I would say I would
Speaker 1: say that, like, given I mean, and in this genre,
Speaker 1: there's so many brilliant women who work in the horror
Speaker 1: genre that UM would have executed this more realistically. But
Speaker 1: in terms of like horror movies that I'm familiar with,
Speaker 1: which are mostly like American horror movies that are probably
Speaker 1: not great and we're released to wide audiences, Lindsay and
Speaker 1: Jenny navigate the situation more realistically than a lot of
Speaker 1: whole horror movies I've seen, where they're never just like
Speaker 1: wandering into a room just to be like what's in here,
Speaker 1: which I feel like is what we get a lot.
Speaker 1: So it's a little more grounded UM. And also it's
Speaker 1: you know, it's a it's a it's a and I
Speaker 1: mean no disrespect, it's a B horror movie. So it's
Speaker 1: like certain things just need to happen. But yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: a but but yeah, So the bar we're comparing this
Speaker 1: up against is so unbelievably low. Why would you say that?
Speaker 1: Calen the bit? I mean bit, Well, I'm what I'm
Speaker 1: saying that this movie rises far above the bar. Like
Speaker 1: women are acting not completely the way a real woman would,
Speaker 1: but they're not acting so unlike you would in that
Speaker 1: situation that you're like, I have no I feel nothing
Speaker 1: about this, you know, where it's like there were little
Speaker 1: moments whereas like oh I got that, Oh I got that.
Speaker 1: Oh I would never do that, but maybe, like maybe
Speaker 1: someone I know might in some situation do that, you know,
Speaker 1: Like it didn't feel so off the wall that it
Speaker 1: was like completely in any case there they end up
Speaker 1: participating in a human centipede. Yeah, voluntarily, they don't. Well
Speaker 1: that's the other thing. I'm like, Okay, in in the
Speaker 1: worst case scenario of the script, what if they're like,
Speaker 1: pitch this to me and he's like okay, so here's
Speaker 1: my idea. They're like okay, um, I guess like they
Speaker 1: do not they do not consent to be a part
Speaker 1: of the human centipede. That would not be realistic, No
Speaker 1: one concerns. So so we we've got some realism represented
Speaker 1: on screen here. It is it's realism. Um okay. So
Speaker 1: let's see where were we in the recap? So dr
Speaker 1: hyder okay. So he explains his plan, Lindsay tries to escape.
Speaker 1: He's like, I'm going to punish you by putting you
Speaker 1: in the middle. They have a bit of us scuffle.
Speaker 1: She ends up in his swimming pool. I think he
Speaker 1: thinks that she has drowned, so he walks away. He
Speaker 1: clearly does not know what his own swimming pool is like,
Speaker 1: because she literally just like pushes up that Because I
Speaker 1: was kind of wondering that when he's like, I'm going
Speaker 1: to trap you, I'm like, I'm pretty sure those kind
Speaker 1: of things you just kind of push up a little bit,
Speaker 1: and then you have breathing room, which is she's fine. Yes.
Speaker 1: So he goes away and Lindsey takes this opportunity to
Speaker 1: go back down and try to save Jenny. So she's
Speaker 1: dragging Jenny, who I think is unconscious, up the stairs,
Speaker 1: out of the basement, out of the house. But oh.
Speaker 1: Dr Hyder finds them and shoots Lindsay with a tranquilizer.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of moments in Human Centipede. Truly, Yes,
Speaker 1: I mean this again. This movie accomplishes many things. Feminism,
Speaker 1: oh moments. Um it is. It's a very it's an
Speaker 1: effective horror movie. It makes you feel horrified. Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: yes so um so. Then he performs the surgery, making
Speaker 1: them into a human centipede with Cutsuro in the front,
Speaker 1: Lindsay in the middle, and Jenny in the back. Lindsay
Speaker 1: in the middle as punishment for trying to escape, right,
Speaker 1: and Dr Hyder loves his creation. It's his little pet.
Speaker 1: He makes them walk around the yard. He take picks,
Speaker 1: he takes pictures the kennel. There's a kennel. He makes
Speaker 1: Cut Sorrow eat out of a dog food dish. It's
Speaker 1: all very fucked up. It's extremely fucked up. And then
Speaker 1: eventually Cuts Sorrow goes poo poo into Lindsay's mouth, which
Speaker 1: then you have to imagine the trickle down effect does go.
Speaker 1: It's like economics. It's like that economics thing that never works,
Speaker 1: but in the driggle down system may not work in
Speaker 1: the American economy, but in the human centipede it is
Speaker 1: extremely effective. Um, and so it does it does all. Well,
Speaker 1: that's a question I had because again this movie, if
Speaker 1: if if a woman poo poos into the mouth of
Speaker 1: another woman, it passes the Picktel tests, especially if they're
Speaker 1: holding hands because they're freshly exactly. But I don't know
Speaker 1: if that ever ends up happening in this movie, because
Speaker 1: at one point Dr Hyder is doing a check up
Speaker 1: on all of them and he's like, cut Sero, you're
Speaker 1: you look great, You're you're healthy. Is a human centipede
Speaker 1: To Lindsay, he says, you're constipated. She doesn't want to
Speaker 1: poop in her friend's mouth. She doesn't. Yeah, she's like
Speaker 1: holding it in like this. I don't know this woman,
Speaker 1: so I guess she'll understand. I don't know. I mean like,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to run it cuts from cut Sero's perspective.
Speaker 1: He's like, I'm not going to run into her. I
Speaker 1: don't know her. Whereas Lindsay and Jenny, if Lindsay poop
Speaker 1: who is into Jenny's mouth, they have to drive home together,
Speaker 1: Whereas cut Sero is like, I can just go, you know,
Speaker 1: you have no idea where where I'm going. So it's
Speaker 1: not a big deal. It is kind of like a
Speaker 1: one night stand thing versus a long term relationship. Sure, exactly. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Also worth mentioning that cut Serro does not speak English, um,
Speaker 1: he speaks Japanese, so he is unable to communicate with
Speaker 1: both the Doctor Hyder or the two women. And also
Speaker 1: like it's another way in which Dr Hyder kind of
Speaker 1: has the upper hand because it seems like when he
Speaker 1: does not want the women to know what's going on,
Speaker 1: he speaks in German, and when he does want the
Speaker 1: women to know what's going on, he speaks in English
Speaker 1: in a way that they can understand him. But Catsro
Speaker 1: is kind of like uniquely isolated in this way. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: and so yeah, the check up happens, and then Jenny
Speaker 1: seems to be very ill. She she's not taking well
Speaker 1: to the human so ton apede. Well, she's starving operation
Speaker 1: no one's giving her poop poo, She's starving. She her
Speaker 1: her mouth's incisions are infected. Uh, and it seems like
Speaker 1: she's dying. Then two detectives show up to Dr Hyder's
Speaker 1: house and asks if he knows anything about some people
Speaker 1: who have gone missing. Then my favorite moment in the
Speaker 1: movie where they see the humans Hanne Kennel and the
Speaker 1: detective I think we're supposedly that is the smarter detective
Speaker 1: in that he is not the detective who immediately becomes roofied.
Speaker 1: He is like, so what is this for? It's so
Speaker 1: funny to me when he looks at the humans that
Speaker 1: to be the cage and it's like, are you sure
Speaker 1: you don't know anything about these people who have gone? Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: Dr Hyder is acting, he's acting out, he really is yelling.
Speaker 1: He's really banking on them being roofied soon based on
Speaker 1: his behavior, right. Um. Dr Hyder then goes back down
Speaker 1: to the basement and he's like, okay, new plan. Jenny's
Speaker 1: about to die, so she'll get removed from the human centipede,
Speaker 1: but I'm going to add two more people, these detectives
Speaker 1: who are upstairs. But before that happens, the detectives leave
Speaker 1: because they need to go. They said this is another
Speaker 1: thing that I was like, Oh, this is genuinely like
Speaker 1: sort of a funny trace where they're like, we really
Speaker 1: want to inspect the house and he's like, well, you're
Speaker 1: gonna have to get a search warrant and they're like, Okay,
Speaker 1: we'll be back in twenty minutes. And in the twenty
Speaker 1: minutes things really go off the rails inside the Human
Speaker 1: Centipete house truly, because Cut zero, Lindsay and Jenny use
Speaker 1: this as a distraction to attack the doctor and kind
Speaker 1: of incapacitate him. Cut Soro really like he I think
Speaker 1: gives him like too brutal, like debilitating wounds. Yes. And
Speaker 1: then so they're using this opportunity to try to escape,
Speaker 1: but the doctors like right, he's you know, dragging himself
Speaker 1: right behind them, and it seems like they're trapped and
Speaker 1: they have no way out. So cut zero kills himself,
Speaker 1: not before making uh Shakespearean monologue where we'll talk about this,
Speaker 1: but like cutzero, we know we I mean, it's another
Speaker 1: I feel like we've done a lot of these movies
Speaker 1: recently where you know nothing really about any of the
Speaker 1: character is in terms of other than like who knows
Speaker 1: each other and who doesn't. I think you, I would
Speaker 1: argue you most you know most about the doctor at
Speaker 1: this point, because you really don't know anything about the
Speaker 1: girls other than their American and friends, and you know
Speaker 1: nothing about kut Serro other than he has been plucked,
Speaker 1: you know, out of his car. And then he like
Speaker 1: gives this this like soliloquy at the end where he's like,
Speaker 1: I've lived a sinful life. I have lived selfishly. I
Speaker 1: abandoned my child. And you're like, cat Sero, what is
Speaker 1: going on? And then and then he's dead, and it's
Speaker 1: just like you learn everything you're ever going to learn
Speaker 1: about this character at the like three seconds before he does,
Speaker 1: and it's like, right, what that was, we'll talk about it.
Speaker 1: But I was like, oh my god, cat Sero, and
Speaker 1: no one can understand what he is doing. I mean
Speaker 1: we can as an audience because we are given the subtitles.
Speaker 1: We're given the subtitles, but it's like the centipee nor
Speaker 1: the doctor can understand this like very tragic thing he's
Speaker 1: just told us. It made me sad. Yeah, everyone in
Speaker 1: the human centipede deserved better, I'll say it. I'd even
Speaker 1: go so far as to say they didn't deserve to
Speaker 1: be made into a human centipede. But that's just me,
Speaker 1: I just me, I agree. And something that made me
Speaker 1: really particularly sad about Catzera's speeches that he didn't seem
Speaker 1: to feel that way he seemed to feel like, well,
Speaker 1: because of all this ship that I've done in my
Speaker 1: life that is bad, and I have like done these
Speaker 1: things that were that I feel a lot of guilt about.
Speaker 1: I guess this is my come uppance. I guess I
Speaker 1: just had. And he's like, I'm but and I love genuinely.
Speaker 1: I was moved when he said, but I am still
Speaker 1: a human being, and you're like, yeah, there's nothing you
Speaker 1: can do that would be so bad, so us to
Speaker 1: deserve being a human centipede? Really, I mean, certainly not
Speaker 1: what he's describing. He's it sounds like he's certainly made
Speaker 1: big mistakes in his life regrets, but not a human centipede, greed, sin.
Speaker 1: It's just it was I was moved by that speech.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, same heavy indeed. Um. So the movie
Speaker 1: is almost over. The detectives come back and they discover
Speaker 1: the human centipede. They are there, they don't know what
Speaker 1: they this is out of their pay grade. Then there's
Speaker 1: like a scuffle between them and Dr Hyder where they
Speaker 1: both the detectives and Dr Hyder are shot and killed
Speaker 1: or killed in some way, and then Jenny dies. So
Speaker 1: Lindsay is in the middle still alive, but with two
Speaker 1: dead people on either side of her, and she's like
Speaker 1: sobbing and there's no one to help, and she's her
Speaker 1: life has been. She's in a human centipede. And that
Speaker 1: is how all the movie ends. I mean, it's it's
Speaker 1: safe to say that she's fucked. You know, she's more
Speaker 1: or less fucked, is is what you could really say
Speaker 1: about her situation. Let I was shocked that that's where
Speaker 1: it ends. I guess, let's take a break. Let's take
Speaker 1: a break. We'll come right back and we're back. Yes,
Speaker 1: all right, well, um we I mean during the recap
Speaker 1: we talked a fair amount about the relationship between the
Speaker 1: two female characters in this movie. You know, I don't
Speaker 1: think it's a perfectly written relationship. I think that it
Speaker 1: is in terms of, like, if we're going this genre specifically,
Speaker 1: it's not the word. And I felt like, I don't know,
Speaker 1: most of my feelings about this movie get into like
Speaker 1: the themes surrounding the doctor. Yeah, so I don't know.
Speaker 1: I guess, let's do you have any other kind of
Speaker 1: observations about how the women in this movie are treated
Speaker 1: outside of becoming a human centipede? Of course? Right? Um?
Speaker 1: As far as like character development goes, Yeah, I just
Speaker 1: don't think a lot of time is spent characterizing them.
Speaker 1: In fact, I don't even know if I could. I
Speaker 1: could not tell the difference between the two women for
Speaker 1: a long time. I knew curly hair, straight hair, That's
Speaker 1: what I knew. And I also I it felt like
Speaker 1: kind of early you found out like, oh, Linda is
Speaker 1: our final girl, because she is the one making an
Speaker 1: active effort to escape, which I genuinely do appreciate in
Speaker 1: this genre because sometimes it's just like nope, like everyone
Speaker 1: here just doesn't have like any sort of judgment skills,
Speaker 1: and they'll do anything, and they're not going to try
Speaker 1: to escape, and they're going to be very passive, and
Speaker 1: Lindsay is kind of immediately established as the person who
Speaker 1: will be active. I feel like it would have been
Speaker 1: maybe cooler to see them both participating in this effort.
Speaker 1: But Jenny is like unconscious for most of the time,
Speaker 1: like most of Act two and three, it seems like
Speaker 1: she was like drugged maybe harder, Like it seems like
Speaker 1: like the drugs like affected her maybe more than it
Speaker 1: did Lindsay. That's what it seemed like, because she's like
Speaker 1: knocked out a lot. I don't know, I appreciated their friendship.
Speaker 1: I was like, like at the end when Jenny died,
Speaker 1: I don't know why I didn't see it coming, but
Speaker 1: when Jenny died, and because there is kind of this
Speaker 1: like repeated shot of like when things are the most
Speaker 1: fucked up with the Human Centipede, Jenny and Lindsay will
Speaker 1: hold each other's hands as if to say, Wow, this
Speaker 1: is really fucked up, that's what. But it was like,
Speaker 1: I really thought that that was like a nice touch
Speaker 1: to connect these characters because they're the only characters in
Speaker 1: these scenes that know each other and have any history together,
Speaker 1: and like having god having a female friendship at the
Speaker 1: center of the Human Centipede. I just I thought it
Speaker 1: was nice that they that you kind of got that
Speaker 1: repeated connection between them just to even remind the audience like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: these women like really know and love each other and
Speaker 1: what's happening to them. And so so by the time
Speaker 1: that Jenny died at the end, I genuinely did feel
Speaker 1: like really like I don't know, given what, and we'll
Speaker 1: talk about kind of the behind the scenes stuff, but
Speaker 1: I thought that the actors in this movie given truly
Speaker 1: impossible material did pretty well of like communicating their arc.
Speaker 1: And I think that like Jenny and Lindsay had like
Speaker 1: clearly commu indicated what their arc was as friends and
Speaker 1: human centipies. I think that cut Serro like given truly
Speaker 1: nothing until the end, Like you just, I thought that
Speaker 1: the actors in this movie did that really made a
Speaker 1: meal of of the poop poo, because because I was
Speaker 1: genuinely like like that that whole scene at the end
Speaker 1: where cutzero is like gives his like parting monologue and
Speaker 1: you're like what and then he and then and then
Speaker 1: immediately after Jenny dies and the doctor, which we'll talk
Speaker 1: about him, but he's like the scariest villain of all time,
Speaker 1: and like you did feel like I don't know, I
Speaker 1: guess that my only my not my only note. But
Speaker 1: like Lindsay and Jenny sort of seemed to be on
Speaker 1: like they weren't on really separate arcs. They were kind
Speaker 1: of a unique character like you were describing, And I
Speaker 1: kind of wish that you got more from the two
Speaker 1: because there was space for that. Yeah, I think their
Speaker 1: characters could have been like differentiated a bit more. I
Speaker 1: couldn't really get a sense of a distinct personality from
Speaker 1: either of them, or they just sort of seemed to
Speaker 1: be kind of like two characters with the same personality,
Speaker 1: which was barely developed in the first place. It seemed
Speaker 1: to kind of come down to like and and in
Speaker 1: a way that I could really distinguish particularly but like
Speaker 1: Lindsay is the strong one for some reason, and Jenny
Speaker 1: is the weak one for some reason. But if you
Speaker 1: were asked to decide who was who in the establishing scene,
Speaker 1: it would be basically impossible. You're like, they're kind of
Speaker 1: acting exactly the same. Why would one behave one way
Speaker 1: or over the other. So yeah, I think they do
Speaker 1: kind of form this unique character. They also are the
Speaker 1: ones the only ones that have to eat poop um,
Speaker 1: so there is that the way only women eat poop
Speaker 1: and human centipede one. And I mean, I mean, just
Speaker 1: thinking about the behind the scenes production, like these actors
Speaker 1: on this set, it also means that this this writer
Speaker 1: wrote a movie where two women actors have to have
Speaker 1: their faces in someone's ass and their topless. Also the
Speaker 1: entire movie. Yes, uh huh, So let's talk a little
Speaker 1: bit because we I know we both read this. There
Speaker 1: was I I feel like every like camp or like
Speaker 1: niche movie we covered, there is some sort of extremely
Speaker 1: useful oral history that's been done. And I love this trend.
Speaker 1: I hope it keeps up. This one is from Vulture
Speaker 1: was put together by Kenny hurt zog Um. We're going
Speaker 1: to be pulling from the first one because I was like,
Speaker 1: I just cannot interact with other movies in this series.
Speaker 1: But but there is a lot like with a movie
Speaker 1: like this, particularly where you're like, this is the most
Speaker 1: fucked up thing you could Like, this is truly Tom
Speaker 1: six saying what's the most fucked up thing I could
Speaker 1: think of? And then I'll make a movie of it.
Speaker 1: And I feel like when you are doing that, it
Speaker 1: is is like a responsibility of the creator to be
Speaker 1: very careful and be very deliberate with how you're treating
Speaker 1: your cast and your crew who you are, you know,
Speaker 1: like paying to execute your vision. But you have to
Speaker 1: treat people honestly and in good faith. And so I
Speaker 1: went into this thing being like, I hope that Tom
Speaker 1: six was very upfront about like this is what this is.
Speaker 1: If it's really foxed up and you don't want to
Speaker 1: do it, that's totally fine, don't do it. But this
Speaker 1: is what it is. It does not sound like that
Speaker 1: is the way that it went. But first I wanted
Speaker 1: to just mention as just kind of a way of discussing,
Speaker 1: Like I do think that there is a point to
Speaker 1: the first human centipede. It sounds like there's not to
Speaker 1: the other ones. But like the way that Tom six
Speaker 1: described his conceiving of the worst thing everyone now knows
Speaker 1: for some reason, like from one man's mind, everyone's nightmare
Speaker 1: forever was that it sounds like it came from two places.
Speaker 1: And I have a longer but like, let's talk about
Speaker 1: the protection. But he started, he started by saying, like,
Speaker 1: you know, what is the worst I mean, it seems
Speaker 1: like he was what's the worst crime I could think of?
Speaker 1: And how would I punish it? And so what he
Speaker 1: thought of was child sex abuse and what is the
Speaker 1: worst way to punish a child sex abuser? Something akin
Speaker 1: to a human centipede? And so that is kind of
Speaker 1: where this idea comes from. And then it seems like,
Speaker 1: and I have other stuff here too, but like it
Speaker 1: seems like where he goes is building out this like
Speaker 1: Nazi doctor character and kind of taking it in this
Speaker 1: different historical direction to create this uniquely cruel punishment. But
Speaker 1: the difference with the human centipede is that the people
Speaker 1: who are forced to be a human centipede are not
Speaker 1: child sex abusers. They're just people who this doctor perceives
Speaker 1: to be vulnerable. So and on top of that, I
Speaker 1: read the writer, director Tom six, saw some television program
Speaker 1: about like a child sex abuser and was like, Oh,
Speaker 1: what's the worst possible punishment for them? I know, stitching
Speaker 1: his mouth to the anus of a quote fat truck driver.
Speaker 1: So it's already like extremely insensitive things to do. And
Speaker 1: I didn't even want to repeat that because I'm like, fine, well,
Speaker 1: I don't want to give that air. Like I understand
Speaker 1: the idea he's communicating, but I found it interesting that
Speaker 1: he took that idea but then applied it to innocent people,
Speaker 1: Like it sounds like it was conceived as like, what's
Speaker 1: the worst punishment for the worst crime you can think of?
Speaker 1: And then was like, but then the way his script
Speaker 1: works out, it's three not just innocent people, but three
Speaker 1: marginalized and uniquely vulnerable people in this situation. Um, and
Speaker 1: he's like putting language barriers in front of people, and
Speaker 1: you know, through doctor, what's his name doctor scary. You know,
Speaker 1: like he is like this wealthy white guy who intentionally
Speaker 1: victimizes two women and a Japanese man who he holds
Speaker 1: a lot of power over, whether it's a control, and
Speaker 1: how he speaks to them and how he treats them physically,
Speaker 1: and it just seems like he's intentionally choosing people that
Speaker 1: he perceives to be as weaker than him. And even
Speaker 1: if you you know, apply that lotgic to the trucker
Speaker 1: from the beginning, who's another white guy, but a white
Speaker 1: guy who who doesn't have money, and uh it comes
Speaker 1: from a lower class, and it's like he, you know,
Speaker 1: the doctor is very intentionally choosing people that he used
Speaker 1: to be whatever I mean, like weaker than him or
Speaker 1: I felt like that was like an intentional choice writing wise, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then, like you mentioned, the rector was trying to
Speaker 1: draw a parallel between like the events of this movie
Speaker 1: and then like medical experiments that were being carried out
Speaker 1: by Nazi doctors in Nazi Germany, and like that's where
Speaker 1: part of the inspiration of this movie came from. Where
Speaker 1: he's like drawing this parallel and I guess like attempting
Speaker 1: to comment on like Nazism and fascism. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: I can speak to that a little bit. That's as
Speaker 1: close as I could get to feeling like this movie
Speaker 1: was trying to say something. You know, it's like, does
Speaker 1: it make the point very effectively? Almost definitely not. But
Speaker 1: but in terms of like creating, so it's like his
Speaker 1: two intentions are definitely in conflict because his first thing
Speaker 1: was what we just talked about, where it was like,
Speaker 1: you know, if there were no rules, how would you
Speaker 1: punish the most vile crime you can think of? And
Speaker 1: he doesn't do that in this Instead he goes this
Speaker 1: other direction of like creating this I mean, I think
Speaker 1: very clearly coded Nazi doctor. He's they're literally in Germany
Speaker 1: and you're brought into this man's house, and like it's
Speaker 1: not a sensitive portrayal of anything, but there is I
Speaker 1: mean in terms of like reflecting any sort of realism.
Speaker 1: It's like, I don't even want to go too deep
Speaker 1: into it, but there there, of course is a very
Speaker 1: traceable and underreported and not taught in mainstream education history
Speaker 1: of medical experimentation on marginalized people's and so this particular
Speaker 1: doctor is commenting it seems to be like on Nazi doctors,
Speaker 1: and there were a ton of Jewish people who were
Speaker 1: medically experimented on without their consent, against their will. Some
Speaker 1: were murdered as a result. And this is an extremely
Speaker 1: I mean at this point, well document did, but not
Speaker 1: commonly discussed thing. And there's a great book about it
Speaker 1: that we can link in the description called the Nazi
Speaker 1: Doctor's Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide. That there's
Speaker 1: many you know, there's many commonly held medical practices today
Speaker 1: that were achieved because of these really brutal and murderous
Speaker 1: doctors from from the twentieth century. And it also applies
Speaker 1: to um black Americans very often. There's this there's the
Speaker 1: Tuskegee um syphilis experiment that we can also link to.
Speaker 1: It's I mean, really and and then there's of course
Speaker 1: the issue of I think that it's intentional that women
Speaker 1: are here um in in this uh in this human centipede.
Speaker 1: Uh not just because they're this is so common to
Speaker 1: the genre of victimizing women, but also because medical experimentation
Speaker 1: also targe like very often targets women without their consent.
Speaker 1: And I think that it's this is like the furthest
Speaker 1: thing from the human centipede, but I was reminded of
Speaker 1: the story of Henrietta Lacks. There was like a movie
Speaker 1: about it a couple of years ago that obrah wasn't
Speaker 1: But m Henrietta Lacks was a um someone who eventually
Speaker 1: died of cancer, whose cancer cells were studied without her
Speaker 1: consent to create uh you know, just strides forward in
Speaker 1: the field that have saved millions of life since. But
Speaker 1: this was a black woman who's you know, a part
Speaker 1: of her body was taken from her without her consent,
Speaker 1: and her family was never compensated. She was never asked,
Speaker 1: And this is like a serious issue in the medical community,
Speaker 1: and it's like, you know, we're we're not the best
Speaker 1: qualified people to talk about it, but it is like
Speaker 1: a very real thing that's going on. Does the human
Speaker 1: said depeede? No, No, But I I did find it
Speaker 1: at least I guess that. I I'm like working with
Speaker 1: a with a yardstick of like more than I expected.
Speaker 1: UM like that it even attempts to kind of touch
Speaker 1: on something like this, because I honestly went into this
Speaker 1: movie thinking like they just want to do the grossest
Speaker 1: thing they can think of and make me watch it,
Speaker 1: which is what they do as well. But but there
Speaker 1: was also like at least some level of cognizance in
Speaker 1: terms of how the characters were curated. I'm not saying
Speaker 1: it's good. I'm just saying it's more intentional than I
Speaker 1: thought it would be. Yes, I can't argue with that,
Speaker 1: but it's again it's a matter of like intention versus
Speaker 1: what actually ends up happening on screen. Like, well, I
Speaker 1: feel like it's I do think that, Like I don't
Speaker 1: know that the human centipedes trying to say anything. It's
Speaker 1: like it's referencing more than I thought it was. Sure, sure, sure,
Speaker 1: because ultimately I don't know that Tom six is like
Speaker 1: there is some grand takeaway you should be unless he's
Speaker 1: really just like off in this other zone. I don't
Speaker 1: even recognize, Like I don't know that he's being like
Speaker 1: and you're going to take away this huge it's really
Speaker 1: going to make you think. But he's just like referencing
Speaker 1: more things than I I thought he was just gonna
Speaker 1: be like mouths a butt, it's going to be ninety minutes,
Speaker 1: you're gonna watch it or you're not going to, which
Speaker 1: is true to an extent, But like he's he is
Speaker 1: referencing some stuff that I was like, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: not saying anything, but it is referencing things where I
Speaker 1: don't know what the intention is here. I mean honestly, like,
Speaker 1: it doesn't it's it's it's interest. Interesting is a very
Speaker 1: generous way to describe it. But like in this oral history,
Speaker 1: I feel like it seems like Tom Sticks was being
Speaker 1: asked what his intention is over and over and over
Speaker 1: and he is not really able to answer the question.
Speaker 1: He's able to like list things he was thinking about,
Speaker 1: and he's able to things that he's referencing, but he's
Speaker 1: not really able to tell you, like this is the point.
Speaker 1: I think the point is it's fucking gross. Like yeah, ultimately,
Speaker 1: I think that is the point. I don't know. Yes, um,
Speaker 1: I want to talk a little bit about like the
Speaker 1: production of it. Yes, Yeah, let's go, let's go through
Speaker 1: that a little more because this, um, there's a lot
Speaker 1: to to chew on with this oral history. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: because it seems like it was presented very disingenuously to
Speaker 1: the actors and the production in general. Yeah, I did
Speaker 1: read I think this is mentioned in the oral history
Speaker 1: that um, because I'm pulling information from both of that
Speaker 1: and UM our favorite scholarly journal Wikipedia. UM. But like
Speaker 1: a lot of actors who came in to read for
Speaker 1: the roles of like Lindsay or Jenny or cuts, We're like,
Speaker 1: this is what this movie is. Fuck no, and then
Speaker 1: they like stormed out of the audition kind of things.
Speaker 1: So there was some transparency, But like, I do think
Speaker 1: that it seems like it is like kind of bizarre
Speaker 1: to me that you could get all the way into
Speaker 1: the like that's I guess something that It's like, I
Speaker 1: don't know that I've ever Maybe this isn't totally true,
Speaker 1: but I don't know that I've ever gone into an
Speaker 1: audition room for something that is like that much with
Speaker 1: having no idea until I'm already in the room with
Speaker 1: the director. You know, Like that even seems kind of
Speaker 1: like sketchy. Um that you could get all the way
Speaker 1: into an audition before realizing what a human centipede is.
Speaker 1: You know, they should be more upfront about Yeah, I
Speaker 1: did read that. Um. Before the actors signed onto the project,
Speaker 1: they were given an outline of the script or an
Speaker 1: outline of the storyboard, rather than a full script, so
Speaker 1: they didn't fully know exactly what like specific scenes they
Speaker 1: were going to have to be doing out that they
Speaker 1: were given sketches of how this centipede would look, so
Speaker 1: they at least know, well, that's not not that part.
Speaker 1: My favorite cursed quote from from this was Ashlyn Jenny,
Speaker 1: who played Jenny. The way that her manager framed it
Speaker 1: to her when she was asked to audition was hey,
Speaker 1: would you like to audition for this controversial European film.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh my god, could you like frame the
Speaker 1: human centipede in a less honest way than I mean,
Speaker 1: it is technically a controversial European film, but that's not
Speaker 1: what I think of, no, when I think of yeah.
Speaker 1: And then I was also curious because I was like,
Speaker 1: how safe were these actors? How much discomfort were they
Speaker 1: in on like physically, emotionally, mentally, you know, I just
Speaker 1: I had to feel. I was just like, I was
Speaker 1: so worried that I would learn the condition on set
Speaker 1: were like really unpleasant and toxic, and to some degree
Speaker 1: they were. And regarding Dieter later Dieter Laser Mr laser Um,
Speaker 1: I mean, he sounds like when he was in method
Speaker 1: zone he was like full Tom Hardy as Matt mac full,
Speaker 1: like like any man doing method. It sounds like he
Speaker 1: was behaving and as scary and kind of like in
Speaker 1: that same way where it's like, oh, well, he's an artist,
Speaker 1: so he's allowed to treat you like ship while you're
Speaker 1: at work, like that ship that we've talked about a
Speaker 1: million times that we like fucking hate. Yeah. Yeah, he
Speaker 1: was screaming at the other actors. He was like refusing
Speaker 1: to talk to them like between takes to like preserve
Speaker 1: the level you know, the whatever. Who even knows, But um, yeah,
Speaker 1: so he was being a real piece of ship on set.
Speaker 1: It seems like the human Centipede itself, the three were, um,
Speaker 1: there was some solidarity within the Centipede. Yeah, and I
Speaker 1: where and that they were given like massages at the
Speaker 1: end of the of each shooting day because of like
Speaker 1: the uncomfortable positions they had to maintain, and there were robes.
Speaker 1: There was like some because that was honestly, like I
Speaker 1: was just like, oh, is there are they being given
Speaker 1: for such an obviously uncomfortable position for an actor to
Speaker 1: have to be in? Were they given the correct amount
Speaker 1: of like you know, layers between each other and like
Speaker 1: was there there was some of that? It seems like yeah,
Speaker 1: ultimately it's so low budget that. I'm like, I just
Speaker 1: find it hard to believe that it was totally above board.
Speaker 1: And there's also a few creepy quotes in there where
Speaker 1: the actor who played cats Sero said something kind of
Speaker 1: creepy in the in the Oral History where he's like,
Speaker 1: I did a skype audition and Tom was like, just
Speaker 1: to let you know, these two beautiful girls's face are
Speaker 1: going to be attached to your ass. I was like,
Speaker 1: you're a genius, and it's like, well, that's not the
Speaker 1: best vibe to be like that doesn't make me feel
Speaker 1: particularly good about the conditions that these these women were
Speaker 1: brought into. Uh, we weren't there. Here's something we're bravely
Speaker 1: gonna admit we weren't on the set of The Human Centipede. Um.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I guess it's like falls into this
Speaker 1: gray area where it's like it doesn't seem like it
Speaker 1: was completely I most most of where I felt like
Speaker 1: uncomfortable was the pre production stuff from like, you have
Speaker 1: to be super fucking straightforward about what you're signing people
Speaker 1: up for, Tom six, you can't be like coy about
Speaker 1: the Human Centipede, which he was very coy about it
Speaker 1: to at least to some degree that the cast as
Speaker 1: well as financiers. Um, did you read this story? I
Speaker 1: don't care about that. That's kind of funny, but that's
Speaker 1: just funny. Where he was just like, yeah, it's about
Speaker 1: a surgeon who conjoins people, but he left out the
Speaker 1: part where it was like a mouth to anus. Just
Speaker 1: didn't say where I feel like that in the on
Speaker 1: the financier part, that's hilarious, but on the actor part,
Speaker 1: it's really on though, Like if you want to build
Speaker 1: trust with people and you want them to not like
Speaker 1: sue the ship out of you lately like later on,
Speaker 1: then you know you've you've got to be It bothered
Speaker 1: me that it sounds like he would be he was
Speaker 1: being a little coy about that, because it's like, well,
Speaker 1: what do you stand to gain other than this like
Speaker 1: weird power upper hand over these relatively I mean like
Speaker 1: actors that had experience, but we're not famous and you
Speaker 1: would imagine not famous enough to have more power than him, essentially,
Speaker 1: Like it just made me uncomfortable. Yeah, I don't think
Speaker 1: that Tom six is a very I mean, he is
Speaker 1: quoted as saying that he gets quote a rash from
Speaker 1: too much political correctives. So he's not a woke guy.
Speaker 1: I mean, the human fucking centipede, Like he is not
Speaker 1: not awoke guy. I mean, I'm just like, okay, even
Speaker 1: if you're not politically aligned with me, like you have
Speaker 1: to treat your actors ethically, you know, like that is
Speaker 1: there is a very low bar you need to clear,
Speaker 1: and it just didn't seem like at least it seems
Speaker 1: like at least once the movie was in production, that
Speaker 1: there was some care taken um, but in pre production,
Speaker 1: and also it's just I don't know. I never I
Speaker 1: never know what to think because it's like so often
Speaker 1: when actors say like, oh, I'm fine, it's just because
Speaker 1: they want to just they just wanted to be over
Speaker 1: um and not because they're actually fine, but they're like, well,
Speaker 1: I don't want to prolong the problem, like I don't
Speaker 1: want to prolong this by saying I'm uncomfortable. I mean,
Speaker 1: especially you know women or actors of color, like who
Speaker 1: don't want to which the whole human centipede is right,
Speaker 1: and they don't want to appear difficult because you know,
Speaker 1: if they get a reputation, they won't get cast in things,
Speaker 1: so they have to just kind of tolerate whatever abuse
Speaker 1: it dealt to them on set. So I meanwhile, the
Speaker 1: the you know, the main white guys going method and
Speaker 1: screaming at everybody, and so it's like there is a
Speaker 1: clear differentiation of power, yes the set. I also just
Speaker 1: want to be clear. I mean in terms of like
Speaker 1: the medical experimentation and Nazi doctor stuff, there's just like
Speaker 1: our show is not equipped to fully unpack all of that.
Speaker 1: I tried to acknowledge that I think that that's what's
Speaker 1: being referenced here, which is not. It just wasn't my
Speaker 1: understanding of what this movie was that I didn't even
Speaker 1: think it was going to attempt to reference anything. And
Speaker 1: the way that it does, I mean it's like, ultimately
Speaker 1: this movie doesn't accomplish anything. But I don't think that
Speaker 1: anyone was like shocked by that. I don't know. I
Speaker 1: found there was a fun friend of the cast, Karina
Speaker 1: Longworth quote in that that I wanted to share just
Speaker 1: because like she she was I think this was like
Speaker 1: pre podcast and she was a full time film reviewer
Speaker 1: at this time. But what she said was the reaction
Speaker 1: I had of wanting to throw up is a visceral thing,
Speaker 1: and the movie showed a certain kind of skill in
Speaker 1: getting that reaction out of me for what it was.
Speaker 1: The Human Centipede was perfect. And it's like, I feel
Speaker 1: like that's like the true theme of the Human Centipede
Speaker 1: is that it's fucking the grossest thing that anyone has
Speaker 1: ever thought of in their entire life. But the but there,
Speaker 1: but the but but within that, they are like putting
Speaker 1: some historical context and they are putting two women women
Speaker 1: and an Asian man in the Human Centipede exclusively, and
Speaker 1: there is like I don't I mean, it's like it
Speaker 1: doesn't really matter if Tom six doesn't want to talk
Speaker 1: about the politics of what he's doing. What he's doing,
Speaker 1: his his choices are intentional here, you know. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: just a little bit about the inclusion of the character
Speaker 1: of cut Serro, who is played by a Hiro Kitamura,
Speaker 1: who's been in a bunch of like a bunch of
Speaker 1: I was going through his filmography and like, this actor
Speaker 1: has been in a lot of wild movies. Um, what
Speaker 1: I was reading about that character is basically cut Serro
Speaker 1: was included simply to create a language barrier between him
Speaker 1: and like the two women and also the doctor. So
Speaker 1: basically you get an inclusion of an Asian character. But
Speaker 1: it's only for that reason, which again is not the
Speaker 1: inclusion that where hoping for in film. Well absolutely no,
Speaker 1: absolutely not like the like no question mark either. It
Speaker 1: absolutely isn't. And I mean it takes longer, I guess
Speaker 1: than I expected in The Human Sent to Be for
Speaker 1: someone to die. But the first person who dies is
Speaker 1: the only non white person in the cast is the
Speaker 1: first person to die. Um, everyone, you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: kind of a Rohan Dominoes. But I feel like that
Speaker 1: that keeps with that classic horror trope of a white
Speaker 1: person is never the first person to die in a
Speaker 1: horror movie or in a thriller gore movie like this,
Speaker 1: and the Humans Sent to Be kind of upholds that.
Speaker 1: I mean, unless you're you're including the truck driver who
Speaker 1: was killed first. I guess I guess I meant, like,
Speaker 1: of the cast that we know, I don't I don't
Speaker 1: even know what the truck driver's name was. Um, but yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I think that it's I would be curious.
Speaker 1: I guess I'm like, I don't know if I really
Speaker 1: want to know what anyone who was in the Human
Speaker 1: Centipede what's on their mind right now? Maybe not, but
Speaker 1: but you know, I I think that it's I think
Speaker 1: it just shows like, uh that that seems like a
Speaker 1: Tom six problem of like just so like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: I need to introduce an obstacle and what is the
Speaker 1: way I can do this? And it's just so do
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? Like, it's just so like
Speaker 1: white guy brain to be like, oh this would be oh,
Speaker 1: this is perfect because it's it's it's not like intentional
Speaker 1: inclusion in any way, shape or form. And it seems
Speaker 1: like he's choosing people that the doctor would feel comfortable
Speaker 1: victimizing too, which introduces this whole other layer of fucked
Speaker 1: up inness, right and then and again I'm I'm pulling
Speaker 1: from Wikipedia here, but hit it. It's says cut Cerro's
Speaker 1: position in the Centipede being like the first one sets
Speaker 1: up the opportunity for the doctor and the male victim
Speaker 1: of the centipede to fight towards the climax of the
Speaker 1: film end quote, which reads to me like Tom six
Speaker 1: couldn't envision a scenario in which a woman would fight
Speaker 1: a man. Okay, I thought that was an interesting choice
Speaker 1: to that Catzerro is at the front of that, Like,
Speaker 1: I guess I saw that going to directions, and I
Speaker 1: always I'm kind of assuming that Tom Sex is going
Speaker 1: in the less well thought out direction, which is that yeah,
Speaker 1: like he's just like, oh, well, I want a woman
Speaker 1: at the front. She'll just be yelling and screaming all
Speaker 1: day like, and which is It's it's frustrating because it's
Speaker 1: like Lindsay, you know, we've been introduced to Lindsia' is like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is the you know, this is our female character
Speaker 1: that we're kind of like rooting for. It seems like
Speaker 1: she kind of has the smart and the ability and
Speaker 1: you know, like know how to get out of this situation.
Speaker 1: But then she is punished, and then after she's punished,
Speaker 1: she kind of disappears like there's not really anything she
Speaker 1: does after that that is like, oh, there's that scrappy Lindsay.
Speaker 1: We knew from the beginning who got out of the situation,
Speaker 1: and it seems I mean, I guess it's like if
Speaker 1: this were a real life situation, maybe, but it's like,
Speaker 1: in terms of plot, it doesn't even really make a
Speaker 1: ton of sense to me that you would establish this
Speaker 1: kind of like this female character with agency, have her
Speaker 1: be punished and then have kind of nothing happened after that.
Speaker 1: It seems like a there was so much set up
Speaker 1: that like a lot of the setup I didn't even
Speaker 1: dislike that. I was like, oh, okay, but then she
Speaker 1: doesn't do anything. For there's the movie she's stuck in
Speaker 1: the middle of, which is like, realistically, I guess probably
Speaker 1: what would happen, But in terms of like a three
Speaker 1: X structure, it's like I was assuming someone was gonna
Speaker 1: unso themselves, or like something was going to happen been,
Speaker 1: or like they would find a way to like communicate
Speaker 1: with Kutzero, or like there was just the I guess
Speaker 1: it's like foolish of me to be like the human
Speaker 1: said to be was so disempowered. But like, but I
Speaker 1: just thought, because you are, like the doctor is so
Speaker 1: intentionally creating this so that they can't possibly communicate with
Speaker 1: each other, because it does seem like that's the other
Speaker 1: That was the thing that I was like, Oh, maybe
Speaker 1: he's trying to do that by introducing the only person
Speaker 1: who can speak no one can understand what they're saying
Speaker 1: because like Katzero is the only person in the room
Speaker 1: who speaks Japanese, and I'm like, maybe that was his
Speaker 1: but like I don't even really want to give Tom
Speaker 1: six that much credit. I just like, I just wish
Speaker 1: that the human said to be had been able to
Speaker 1: communicate or like there had been some sort of moment
Speaker 1: other than because I mean, and and it was exciting
Speaker 1: to see katzero stab the doctor and ship like that.
Speaker 1: Like that was and he is our only non white
Speaker 1: character in the entire fucking movies. So I'm like, I'm
Speaker 1: glad that he had those moments of agency and like
Speaker 1: taking charge of the situation, But I would have rather
Speaker 1: have seen that with them like working together, you know,
Speaker 1: or like connecting, because it's so it makes it even
Speaker 1: more upsetting when cuts Cerro makes this like tragic speech
Speaker 1: at the end that no one can understand and just
Speaker 1: no one ever gets to know him, and then he
Speaker 1: does like it's show that what are you trying to
Speaker 1: say with that? Tom Sex said so fucking depressing? It's like, yeah, like,
Speaker 1: I mean, and I just don't believe that Tom six
Speaker 1: is actually trying to say anything with that. I think
Speaker 1: he's just like, well, he's at the front of the
Speaker 1: human see what do you want? Like, but yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: he's written a script and made a movie where the protagonists,
Speaker 1: who is a woman loses all of her agency half
Speaker 1: at the midpoint of the movie and then doesn't she's
Speaker 1: not even the protagonist by the end, Right, who is
Speaker 1: the protective Like, is there one like it? The doc
Speaker 1: is right, the doctor? I mean, the movie starts to
Speaker 1: focus so much on the doctor, especially post surgery, because
Speaker 1: that's what happens when you sew people's mouths to other
Speaker 1: people's anuses. They can't talk anymore too much. Like then
Speaker 1: the movie focuses on the doctor and kind of like
Speaker 1: what he's up to It not that we're rooting for him,
Speaker 1: but like it's such a weird writing choice. It is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like I feel like it does get into the like
Speaker 1: factor of and I don't want to like let Tom
Speaker 1: sis off the hook in anyway here because he's making
Speaker 1: a lot of racist and misogynist choices in kind of
Speaker 1: like like he's referencing this clear racism and misogyny that
Speaker 1: this doctor has, but he's not really like it's not
Speaker 1: going anywhere, So it's kind of right, he's just racism
Speaker 1: and misogyny that's happening on screen that isn't going anywhere.
Speaker 1: But like I just kept waiting for like well, Lindsay's
Speaker 1: got like Lindsay's going to find a pen, you know,
Speaker 1: like someone's going to find a way of communicating with
Speaker 1: somebody they're going to be able to. Like it's just
Speaker 1: I don't know, I feel like I'm trying to think
Speaker 1: of like another movie example where this happens. But it's
Speaker 1: like characters with language barriers find ways to communicate with
Speaker 1: each other in other movies and in life, you know.
Speaker 1: And it's like I just thought that that was going
Speaker 1: to happen at some point, Like I thought that it
Speaker 1: was like, Okay, so we have this like pretty sizeable
Speaker 1: language barrier between these characters. That's why it's going to
Speaker 1: be all the more like Wow, when they managed the
Speaker 1: bigger obstacle to write and then they're going to manage
Speaker 1: to overcome it, and the doctor is going to be
Speaker 1: shocked and like it's going to be really exciting. But
Speaker 1: then they just they just don't and they just stay
Speaker 1: a human centipiece. And Jenny. I mean, it's like, if
Speaker 1: you think Lindsay disappears, where does Jenny go, Like she
Speaker 1: just is dying the entire your movie. She's just dying.
Speaker 1: Now that we fully dropped the bit um it's such
Speaker 1: a It is a bummer because it's like because he
Speaker 1: said it is, because it's like we're given, you know,
Speaker 1: three characters that it could possibly it would still be disgusting,
Speaker 1: but like it would be interesting if they found a
Speaker 1: way to communicate with each other and like make a
Speaker 1: plan instead of just like a lot of movie passing
Speaker 1: and then katzero being like, um, so we should get
Speaker 1: out of here right like, because that's kind of all
Speaker 1: that happened, and it makes sense that he would, you know,
Speaker 1: want to get out of there. But it's just like
Speaker 1: the entire caboose is just really disempowered in that good
Speaker 1: So glad we're talking about this. Yeah, so I guess
Speaker 1: now that now that we have dropped the bit um
Speaker 1: a little peek behind the curtain, this was, Um, I
Speaker 1: thought it would be a very very funny April Fools
Speaker 1: joke if we cover I thought we should do the
Speaker 1: Snyder cut, but that's four hours long, so this is
Speaker 1: actually the lesser of many evils that we pitched. So um, yeah,
Speaker 1: happy April Fool, Stay everybody. Yeah, let's wrap this up.
Speaker 1: I need to go, Doe, I need to go absolutely die.
Speaker 1: Um was there other stuff that kind of stuck out
Speaker 1: to you. I don't think so. Yeah, I think that
Speaker 1: this movie references one or two interesting points, but it
Speaker 1: doesn't make a point about any of them. It just
Speaker 1: kind of like if you did have a pre existing
Speaker 1: knowledge of deeply cruel medical experiments, maybe your brain would
Speaker 1: be pained at a few points in this movie of like, oh,
Speaker 1: I think that that's what they're referencing there, but it's
Speaker 1: not going anywhere, and so you are just kind of
Speaker 1: seeing the cruelest possible punishment inflicted onto three innocent people
Speaker 1: I just to meet. The saddest part of the movie
Speaker 1: is when we learn I mean, we end up kind
Speaker 1: of by the end of the movie learning more about
Speaker 1: cutzero than we know about the I mean, at least
Speaker 1: Lindsay and Jenny, because he just kind of like tells
Speaker 1: his life story in his dying breath and but his
Speaker 1: whole like I've done all this fucked up stuff, but
Speaker 1: human Centipede, really it just seems like a bit much.
Speaker 1: And then he dies and you're just like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: I feel the same way. I mean, it's like implying
Speaker 1: that he might deserve it. I'm like cut Thoro, there's
Speaker 1: just like no way that you deserve. You were just
Speaker 1: on vacation. Yeah. The best horror movies, at least for me,
Speaker 1: are ones that are like clearly allegorical or have some
Speaker 1: kind of social commentary or something. In this movie is
Speaker 1: just devoid of that. I think it's like starts in
Speaker 1: an interesting place and then and then takes the hard
Speaker 1: left into just simply being the human centipede. Um, which
Speaker 1: is a shame because it would I mean, like theoretically,
Speaker 1: it would be pretty fucking incredible if a like really
Speaker 1: skilled writer was able to turn this disgusting thing into
Speaker 1: an interesting conversation. Um, but it's kind of a nonstarter
Speaker 1: to talk about here because that's just like kind of
Speaker 1: not what happened. So, um, I give it six nipples,
Speaker 1: and it does pass the Bactel test, not even lying. Absolutely. Yeah, um,
Speaker 1: I give it six centipede legs, which is the equivalent
Speaker 1: of zero nipples. Wait, you're I thought we were No,
Speaker 1: We're gonna give okay six sorry, six nipples. I can't
Speaker 1: believe you bailed. I can't believe you bailed on me
Speaker 1: like that. You know what that's gonna look like on
Speaker 1: the Wikipedia chaos. Yeah, but I can't have I cannot
Speaker 1: in good conscious have one of our highest rated movies
Speaker 1: be The Human Centipede. That's so funny, that's so funny.
Speaker 1: I want I want history to look back on this
Speaker 1: show and then and then, because all that means is
Speaker 1: they have to go back and listen to this episode
Speaker 1: and look at the date of release and be like,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, I'm giving it. Okay, I guess like
Speaker 1: I give it six nipples parentheses as a little joke. Okay,
Speaker 1: And I don't want to give a real rating because
Speaker 1: I don't want to think about this movie for another second. Okay, Um, ditto,
Speaker 1: I'll do the same thing. Whoever is editing the Wikipedia page,
Speaker 1: make sure to say parent disease as a little joke,
Speaker 1: and then we're good to go. Well, I guess that's
Speaker 1: it for the Human Centipede episode. Oh yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: I guess. In terms of behind the scenes, it was
Speaker 1: literally all Tom six and occasionally his sister. So you know,
Speaker 1: there was a woman at the top of production, but
Speaker 1: she was from a cursed bloodline. She was from Tom's
Speaker 1: Tom six sister. Um, so we hope you enjoyed this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're welcome everyone. You know, I know that this is
Speaker 1: a really that there was a high demand for this
Speaker 1: and people and and hey, if you want an episode
Speaker 1: on the Snyder Cut. Um, you know, I was. I
Speaker 1: thought that was funny until I found out it was
Speaker 1: four hours long? Is it really four hours long? It's
Speaker 1: literally four hours like jokes, four hours long, and it's
Speaker 1: supposed to be like just as bad but in a
Speaker 1: totally different way. Okay, So, um, you know this is
Speaker 1: what you get. Okay, April fool, gotcha he he joke, joke.
Speaker 1: We're still inside, so everything's great. And we hope you're well.
Speaker 1: We hope you're safe, and we hope you're making good
Speaker 1: choices and um and we and we love you, We
Speaker 1: love you so much. And aper fools fell on a Thursday.
Speaker 1: You left us with no choice. We had to, we
Speaker 1: had to, and you know the usual stuff social media,
Speaker 1: our Matreon, give us, you know, give us six nipples
Speaker 1: on iTunes or Apple podcasts or whatever. Honestly, if you've
Speaker 1: made it to the end of this episode, it would
Speaker 1: mean so much to simply give us, uh five stars
Speaker 1: on iTunes. It always helps because occasionally we get a
Speaker 1: wave of m R A s and it and it's stressful. Yeah, please,
Speaker 1: So please dilute their low ratings by giving us five nipples.
Speaker 1: And um we'll be back with more soon. More to come,
Speaker 1: all right, um bye bye bye