The Human Centipede (First Sequence) (2009)

I’ve got a confession to make; I like this film. Yeah, I agree that it’s not the best film ever made, but I do actually like it.

In case you don’t know what the plot is, we follow two American girls (Ashlynn Yennie and Ashley Williams) who have gone sightseeing in Germany. On their way to a club, their car breaks down and they find refuge with Dr. Heiter (Dieter Laser). The girls however are then drugged and are told that they will be joined together, arse-to-mouth, with a third individual, originally a truck driver (Rene de Wit) before being changed to Japanese tourist Katsuro (Akihiro Kitamura); presumably because Katsuro was nearer the girls age.

There’s our plot. Is it a good plot? Maybe. Is it disturbing? Oh God yes. The plot will definitely put people off seeing it, but, to be honest, it’s what intrigued me. I’m pretty sure that was the intention, but it did just seem to be one of those films you have to watch just to say you have. And eventually, the SyFy channel showed it.

The main aspect is that the film is 100% medically accurate; though one guy, Dr. John Cameron, disputed that. I can also say that one film magazine (I can’t remember which, I think it was Empire) said that Tom Six had consulted a doctor who, once he finally put ethics aside, helped describe how he would actually do it and how he would strengthen it. So yeah, it is actually possible. And that’s actually the most disturbing part of this film, that it can actually be done. Dr. Cameron also stated how the centipede would quickly die. Did he not see the film? Because if he did, he would’ve seen that the third link in the both the human and dog centipede that Heiter puts together, do in fact die.

And yes, Heiter did do a dog centipede, a prototype to the human. Which died. So, yeah, the 100% medically accurate thing still holds up. Heiter even says to Lindsay, while she’s trying to escape, that she will be the middle piece, no, wait, sorry “the MIDDLE pieeeeece” as the middle dog (which also tried to escape) experienced the most pain; most likely because it had to have its mouth attached to another’s arse and then have its own arse sewn onto another mouth, whereas the end pieces would only have to suffer the one sewing operation.

 Most people’s criticisms about the 100% accurate thing seems to be about organ transplants and the characters being compatible. Which is odd because at no point is an organ transplanted, and, it’s just sewing them arse-to-mouth! What exactly do you need for them to be compatible for?

It’s difficult to talk about to say the least. The acting isn’t that bad but it isn’t great either. It wasn’t a bad debut for Ashley Williams (I am not including her part as ‘Nelwyn Villager’ in ‘Willow 1988’ when she was four) and while Dieter Laser was actually really good most of the time, he did tend to go over-the-top or underperformed.

I did not like Akihiro Kitamura though, I really didn’t, mainly due to the fact that he kept yelling. Well, it wasn’t because he kept yelling, should I say, because I think in reality I would yell at the guy, it was just he kept yelling. Nearly every single line of dialogue he had were at the top of his voice, I just wanted him to shut up. The character doesn’t know any English or German either, so how he planned to get around Germany is a mystery.

At least the girls knew when to lower the volume. Pretty much everyone else though was pretty bad. The truck driver at the beginning was so bland I forgot he was originally in the film and the two detectives were so incredibly dull. You’d expect them to be competent too.

The characters are stupid. Yes they are. The detectives don’t seem to notice that Heiter is active extremely suspicious, neither do the girls when they first meet him and he is talking with dialogue straight from ‘Villain 101’.

Hell, the girls are suppose to be driving to a night club to meet some randoms they just met, and weren’t concerned when they drove out of the city? Seriously?! Since when are night clubs based OUTSIDE THE CITY?! Let alone the city centre?! And, of course, we have the typical ‘there’s no signal’ cliché, the girls don’t know how to change a flat tyre, they decide to walk into the forest rather than the road in the pouring rain,

Oh and of course, Heiter’s house is in the middle of nowhere, but apparently neighbours heard an “American girl screaming”. Point 1, how do they know it was an American girl? Point 2, WHAT NEIGHOURS?! This was only put in so the two detectives can be introduced.

Put aside the sometimes dodgy acting, the stupidity of the characters and the disgusting effects, and you do have a pretty decent horror flick. The tension was created with great effect, even with the scenes set during the day.

Tom Six created, in its own way, a pretty decent film, it wasn’t great, but it wasn’t bad either. It is probably worth at least the one watch (unless you know you’ll definitely won’t like the premise), just to see if you like it, if not for Dieter Laser’s performance.

And then he brought out the sequel.