20 Most Controversial Movies Since 2000

14. The Human Centipede (First Sequence)

Any film which takes Pier Paulo Pasolini's 120 Days of Sodom and the films of Japanese shock master Takeshi Miike as sources of inspiration is bound to ruffle a few feathers and cause a bit of a stir. Throw in some sadistic Nazi experimentation for good measure and The Human Centipede certainly delivers, even if in actual fact very little gore - or feces - is actually depicted on screen.

Writer-director Tom Six got the idea for the film while joking about punishing a child molester by stitching his mouth to the anus of an overweight truck driver, and as twisted as that is from a humour point of view, there's an undercurrent of sick comedy running throughout The Human Centipede, as Dr. Josef Heiter takes great pleasure in stitching unwitting tourists ass to mouth. More than a few squeamish reviewers lambasted the film, labeling it "disgusting" and "repellant" - it's hardly a masterpiece, but perhaps they should develop a better understanding of the objectives of the genre before reviewing horror in future.