10 Movies That Hated Their Own Audience

Pier Paolo Pasolini's 1975 "horror-art film" is one of the most controversial films ever made, a loose adaptation of the Marquis de Sade's novel in which a group of corrupt Italian libertines kidnap eighteen teenagers, who are then subjected to months of sexual abuse, torture and murder.

It's also one of Michael Haneke's favourite films, to the surprise of no-one.

Pasolini's film refuses to shy away from the depravity that ensues, particularly prolonged rape and a nauseating sequence where the teenagers are forced to eat a meal of feces.

Context is relatively spare throughout the film and the victims are lent precious little characterisation, as is likely to infuriate audiences even more.

And though Pasolini's film is ferociously effective in depicting the relationship between politics, power, sex and violence, it's also a film many will understandably deem unfit for human consumption.

For most, watching it once will be enough, if at all.