SLOW TORTURE PUKE CHAMBER : FILM GUTTER REVIEWS

28/5/2015

FILM GUTTER

Come on in, the water's chronic...

SLOW TORTURE PUKE CHAMBER (2010)

Dir. Lucifer Valentine, USA

HORROR FILM REVIEWS SLOW TORTURE OUKE CHANBER Picture

CLICK TO PURCHASE IF YOU DARE

Man alive...

Well, it's that time of the week again, where we don our trunks, stick a pound in the locker and cannonball into the disgusting waters of extreme cinema. And today we're a long way from the kiddie pool as we step into the third and final part of Lucifer Valentine's infamous Vomit Gore Trilogy. Yes, this is the delightfully-named Slow Torture Puke Chamber.

If you're any kind of extreme horror afficionado, you'll no doubt be familiar with the name Lucifer Valentine, who as well as bringing the Vomit Gore movies to our screens was also behind the notorious documentary Black Metal Veins. It's practically impossible to go through any 'top ten' shocking/disturbing film list without one – or all – of these films featuring somewhere.

And, let's not kid ourselves, these movies are singularly worth their place on those lists. I'd even argue that this one tops the previous entries – I reviewed the absolute bludgeon of a film that was Slaughtered Vomit Dolls some weeks back here, and this is distinctly thematically similar but also pretty different to the first in the series.

First of all, we're introduced to a new actress here in Hope Likens, who begins the film with a disclaimer that she took part willingly in everything and had a 'safe word' that would stop filming at any time. There's also a second disclaimer from the director, saying that the film will offend anyone who watches it and you enter at your own risk. So there's no mistaking what you're about to get into, and both warnings are pretty well deserved.

Hope Likens plays what I think is one side of bulimic porn actress Angela Aberdeen – who was played in the two previous movies by Ameara LaVey, who still features here as another part of Angela's personality. I'd argue this is a far more complete film than Slaughtered Vomit Dolls – it's still shocking and disgusting in absolute droves, but doesn't go so far out of its way to assault the viewer from every angle. The slow-motion and white noise of SVD is largely lost here, thankfully. It also has something of a storyline, exploring the abusive past of Angela Aberdeen and her incestuous relationship with her father – and in turn stepfather – and how it has prompted her bulimia and the behaviour she exhibits so graphically in this movie.

With that said, this film will be well off-limits for the faint of heart, and probably a sore test for even regular viewers of the kind of movies we cover at Film Gutter. We have puke, bile and blood by the bucketload – particularly in a horrendous scene featuring the truly disturbing Hank Skinny – and no shortage of piss used in various perverse sexual scenarios. Throw into that mix some truly upsetting sexual violence and what you have is probably one of the most incendiary films ever committed to celluloid.

The debate on the merits of these movies will no doubt run and run – after all, we're five years on from the trilogy's conclusion and the discussion still seems as lively as ever. You could take the view that these are pieces of art, constructed for maximum impact on the viewer, an effort to push the envelope as far as possible. You could equally easily take the view these movies are absolute trash, created to satiate an individual fetish and so deplorable and repellent as to be unwatchable. What is for sure is that there doesn't seem to be much middle ground – there are a lot of people love them, and probably even more hate them. It's hard to get to the closing credits and say 'Well, that was OK I guess...' There's no way anyone should be feeling 'meh' about what they've just witnessed.

For me, this film still does have some kind of intangible quality to it that makes it watchable, even though at times you may be watching through your fingers. For that reason, I'm going to award it 8.5/10. I felt this was a better movie than the first in the trilogy, as it bore more resemblance to narrative and storytelling as we know it. The contrast between Hope Likens' and Ameara LaVey's depictions of Angela Aberdeen was an interesting part of the movie, and while the content presented is truly, truly graphic it is presented more on its own merits rather than being distorted with the hideous sound effects that marked Slaughtered Vomit Dolls. You can bet your bottom dollar this movie won't be for everybody, but it has undoubtedly made its mark on the world of extreme cinema and probably