Audition: She Wasn't Even That Hot.

Many people refer to Audition, as a movie that grosses them out more than anything. It took a while to work up the courage to watch this and I was on edge for most of it but only because of the anticipation of what I knew came at the end. Japanese horror films are not afraid to push boundaries and go places other don't. This movie definitely does that but really only towards the end.

The film is about a man who's son urges him to find love. His friend convinces him to "audition" women to be next wife, with the front that the women think they are auditioning for a role in a movie. The man becomes strangely drawn to Asami, a soft spoken shy woman. He is entranced by her story of once being a ballerina but was forced to give it up due to an injury. The man's friend warns him that he has a bad feeling about Asami, telling him that not one of the references from her resume could be reached. The man refuses to listen.

The scene switches to Asami, who is fond of sitting around her apartment on the floor next to the telephone waiting. A burlap sack sits closely beside her. When the phone rings the bag suddenly lurches. That is one of the many famous scenes that people talk about with this film. It sets up Asami's craziness quite perfectly. The man's friend was right but of course he doesn't listen which will turn out all the worse for him.

So the scene that I was referring to at the beginning may not be the one most people think of. In a flashback, Asami is finishing her dinner. She then promptly vomits into a bowl and then the contents in the burlap sack are revealed. A badly disfigured man crawls out as she lays the vomit bowl down and the man greedily laps it up. I who have an acute fear of vomit did not find this scene very pleasing. What's more is that in the trivia section on IMDB, it reveals that the actress who played Asami is a method actor. She insisted she actually vomit in the bowl. Of course I don't think the man really drank actual vomit but still......gross.

What most people refer to when they talk about this movie is the ending torture scene. The piano wire cutting off the man's feet, the needles stuck into his eyes, it's all very graphic and all very evident. Also a dog gets killed which once again ends up being the most disturbing thing to me...damn my sensitivity with animals.

But anyways what I find with this movie is that it is just a whole lot of anticipation. We know what the movie is leading up to, or if you don't, you do now. Everything that comes before it however is pretty much just snooze city. Sure we get a strong idea of Asami's character but even that takes a while to really become clear. If you want to be grossed out I would suggest using the fast forward button. Sure what comes at the end is quite brutal and disgusting but it still takes a long time to get there. Still a great source of shocking horror.

Here is a clip from Bravo's Scariest Movie Moments, and now that I think about it, it is pretty impressive that Rob Zombie gets creeped out by this as much as he does.