Red Carpet Massacre

Required Watchings For The Psychopath In You:

Three...Extremes
Also known to anyone who's not an American as Saam Gaang Yi, Three Extremes is what happens when you get three of the best damn directors Asia has to offer and tell them to raise hell in 125 minutes. Composed of three mini-flicks, Dumplings, Cut, and Box, Three Extremes explores different interpretations of mind-bending horror and finds more than one way to terrify an audience.

Dumplings, directed by Fruit Chan of Hong Kong, winds through the freakish measures that women will take to stay young. Lee, a former actress and high-society broad, wrestles with her age, watching as wrinkles form and as she slowly fades from the spotlight. Fed up and distressed, she voyages into the heart of urban Hong Kong to visit Mei, a woman who is renowned for her age-defying dumplings. Reluctant but headstrong, Lee indulges and quickly becomes addicted as the dumplings' powers take hold, slowly restoring her to her former glory. It's only when she discovers their bizarre and grotesque ingredient that she starts to question whether it's worth it.

Cut, by Park Chan-wook of South Korea, is a little on the lighter side but heavier on the gore. A successful director in Korea's booming film industry seems to have it all; a loving wife, a stable career, and a house that would put European castles to shame. Yet, he seems to remain modest and retain his pre-fame demeanor, despite all of the glitz and glamor circulating around him. It's only when a disgruntled extra kidnaps him and his wife that he's forced to re-examine how he's lived. This extra, deprived of the glory he feels he deserves, steals the spotlight by forcing the forespoken director into a sadistic game of catch-up, chopping off his wife's fingers every five minutes.

And finally we have Box, from Japanese horror superstar Takashi Miike. In my opinion, Box is the most successful of Miike's films because of its time constraints. It quite simply doesn't have enough time to drag on like the rest of his films do, and so all of the action ties in quite nicely. In it, we watch on as the recurring nightmares of a quiet young woman, Kyoko, slowly elevate into hallucinations. Constantly plagued by the feeling and vivid visualizations of being buried alive in a small box, Kyoko begins a tireless search for her long-lost twin to help alleviate the nightmares. When her searching takes her to an abandoned circus, she finds herself staring down her past and, quite literally, the very box she was "buried" in. Inside of this box is something no one expects, and Kyoko soon finds out that there's a lot about her & her sister that she chose to forget.

The best part about Three Extremes as a whole is that no single featurette will stick out to you any more than the rest. Some will rave about the lunacy of Cut, but others will find the grim and sorrowful tone of Box far more uncomfortable. Any way you look at it, this is one devilishly scary film.


The Cell
For some strange reason, this movie seems to be constantly passed over when it comes to mind-bending movies and repeatedly sent to the bargain bin without a second glance. I've yet to understand why because despite the fact that it stars Jennifer Lopez and Vince Vaughn, the movie absolutely rocks.

Catherine Deane, a child psychologist, mingles in an experimental virtual reality used to communicate with comatose patients. Inside of this program, doctors can visually experience the depths of someone's mind and through this scrutinize exactly what's going wrong. The main hope, as Catherine attempts repeatedly, is to coax such patients out of comas.

Enter: Carl Stargher, a murdering psychopath whose main shindig is to trap women in an underground cell, slowly fill it with water until they drown, bleach their bodies completely white, and then hang himself from the ceiling by hooks and masturbate.

As per usual.

Catherine is contacted by the FBI who says that they know Carl is currently holding another young woman hostage in this cell of his. Conveniently, due to his schitzophrenia, Carl collapses as his house is being raided, leaving him incapable of talking. The clock ticks down before this woman's death, and so it's up to Catherine to find the location of the cell by entering Carl's mind.

It's only when she finally steps into his mind that the movie really picks up. Everything about the inside of Carl Stargher is strange, twisted, and disturbing beyond belief. Catherine is faced with a tidal wave of his memories, most of which explain his strange tendencies and murderous binges, but some things simply can't be explained. Like a carnival gone wrong, Carl's mind is a merry-go-round of terror that doesn't just spin around but up and down and any other direction that it pleases to go in.

Everything about The Cell is stunning, from the frightening visuals to the concepts lurking inside both child and killer's minds. It's a giant work of art, with so many references and inspirations that it's so difficult to put your finger on all of them. Nevertheless, The Cell is a must-see for the American McGee's Alice breed of society who's dying for something bittersweet.

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