6. Audition (1999)
Shigeharu Aoyama is a lonely middle aged man on the hunt for a lady companion. He gets involved with a mysterious young woman called Asami. Aoyama is enchanted by her but his friend Yoshikawa is concerned about Asami, she has no references. Anyway Aoyama begins to date Asami. On an occasion together Asami tells him she was abused as a child. She later disappears only to turn up in Aoyama's apartment. Seeing a photo of his dead wife, she goes into a rage and puts pills in Aoyama's tipple of choice. Aoyama passes out. This is where we get into puking territory. Aoyama wakes up to find he is paralysed but still has the capacity to feel pain. Asami tortures him with needles and then slowly dismembers Aoyama's lower limbs with a wire saw, giggling all the way. Luckily Aoyama's son comes home and chucks Asami down the stairs, thus breaking her neck and killing her. The scene where Asami cuts off Aoyama's leg will make you cringe and squirm in your seat as you watch the movie. It is a very different sort of nasty event than what we are used to in horror films (slashing and stabbing) and it is therefore very unnerving - especially as the psycho is a woman and derives such pleasure from her sadistic acts. The leg sawing is a total gross out moment in a very intelligent film. But even very intelligent films can have barfish moments