This was a whim buy. I was recently on Unearthed's store site and had seen this movie floating around for some time now. Advertised as "From the director of Blood Feast" was never a huge glowing endorsement for me as I never saw Waltz's remake of that film. After doing some minor research on the film, it was brought to my attention that Ittenbach was responsible for the SFX. Being a huge fan of Premutos, Black Past, and, of course, The Burning Moon, I knew that La Petite Mort would at least have some redeeming qualities to it, even if I pretty much knew what to expect before I even purchased the film.
The films plot is about as hollow as they come. Three vacationers, one of which is blind for seemingly no reason, find themselves stupidly in a fetish club owned by women who create snuff films for profit. From there the three are kidnapped and tortured to death. That's pretty much it.
I have to say I was really quite disappointed with this film. The rating on this site is quite bad, but several of the reviewers have at least explained that the film is worth seeing for fans of Ittenbach and gore fans alike. But I disagree. There is nothing here that I haven't seen many many times before. Perhaps it is the 42 years of watching these sorts of movies that have jaded me. But La Petite Mort did a lot wrong in numerous departments.
Aside from Manoush as Maman, and Thomas Kercmar as The Kobold, the acting in this movie is pretty awful. The three leads are given ample time to make the audience give a crap about them. Matter of fact, the first 25 minutes of the movie is just those three wandering around. If there were ever an opportunity to have us connect with these characters, now would be that time. Instead the characters come across as annoying. And the blind character still has me scratching my head. Why include a character like this if there isn't going to be more to connect her to the audience? As well, during her inevitable torture and death, none of her blindness is even once used in her torture. As awful as that sounds, it feels to me like there was a huge lost opportunity there to really drive home the cruelty of the film. This is just one of several areas that ruin what could have been something really grisly.
And again, the acting from the three leads really ruin the extreme moments of the film. A movie like this is meant to really bother the viewer watching it. And the acting from those being tortured needs to be as realistic as possible. It creates empathy for the victims, making it a lot harder to watch and endure. This movie makes some small attempts at that basic idea, such as the male victim pleading with Maman not to cut his genitals off. But it falls shockingly flat. And then when the horrific act comes, it doesn't feel as impactful as it should. Because it is acted so poorly. It's a shame really because I really liked the performance from Manoush. Manoush is pretty much the only actor worth much of anything until Kercmar shows up.
So a lot of the viewers of this sort of stuff usually don't give a crap about acting and what have you. It's the red stuff. Acts of immeasurable torture and pain. Indescribable evil and torment. Well, I suppose this movie has a lot of that. But is it really worth it? If this is your first time viewing a movie like this, then sure, it would probably rock your socks off. But when you have grown up watching film such as the original Blood Feast (or any HG Lewis gore film for that matter) Mark of the Devil, Last House on Dead End St, Cannibal Holocaust, etc, the actual acts of violence one sees in La Petite Mort are absolutely old hat. And coming from Ittenbach, I expected way more creativity. Now that may not be his fault as he is not the director here.
Let me just outright tell you what to expect. A mouse trap to a tongue, which should mess your tongue up pretty bad, but the victim winds up talking like nothing is wrong. Numerous needles in a girls arm, only for the next scene for all those needles to be gone and with no visible scars. A man has his eyeball cut out from his head with a butcher knife. Then his manhood is cut off. The scene ends with one of the killers bathing in the mans intestines as they fall from his body. The blind woman is scalped revealing her brains for the world to see. Apparently the skin from her head must have been holding her brains in because she has absolutely no skull. She is scalped and the brain is just there, right under the skin. And she remains alive long enough to simply have her throat slashed. The final girl who got the disappearing needles in her arm is beaten mercilessly with a hammer to the head, until her brains fall out. And then in the next scene she appears to be perfectly intact. She actually is killed when she is stabbed in the gut.
I thought the torture and the kills lacked any sort of creativity to make it stand out from the rest of the genre. As well as the fact that they were not handled as well as they could have been. Again, this is a genre that relies on its ability to be realistic. And this movie does a lot to take the viewer out of that equation. The hammer to the head scene was poorly, poorly handled. The scalping scene was even more poorly handled. So much was so poorly handled that I found myself mostly bored and frustrated.
When I bought this movie I was really expecting to walk away feeling sick to my stomach. And I was also not looking forward to the experience as torture films are not exactly my favorite from the horror genre. But I really just found this film to be boring, poorly made, and disappointing in the areas in needs to shine the most. Torture films are not rocket science. The plots are always the same. However, what makes the good ones stand out are the films that find a good balance of empathy and gore. Without those elements films like these fall apart at the seams.
As it stands, La Petite Mort is not a good torture film. It is too frustrating to be among the better films in the genre and it does not do enough creatively to make it stand out among its endless peers. I can't recommend the film to any hardened gore fan. Maybe a beginner. But no serious gore fan is going to find any of this movie acceptable.
The films plot is about as hollow as they come. Three vacationers, one of which is blind for seemingly no reason, find themselves stupidly in a fetish club owned by women who create snuff films for profit. From there the three are kidnapped and tortured to death. That's pretty much it.
I have to say I was really quite disappointed with this film. The rating on this site is quite bad, but several of the reviewers have at least explained that the film is worth seeing for fans of Ittenbach and gore fans alike. But I disagree. There is nothing here that I haven't seen many many times before. Perhaps it is the 42 years of watching these sorts of movies that have jaded me. But La Petite Mort did a lot wrong in numerous departments.
Aside from Manoush as Maman, and Thomas Kercmar as The Kobold, the acting in this movie is pretty awful. The three leads are given ample time to make the audience give a crap about them. Matter of fact, the first 25 minutes of the movie is just those three wandering around. If there were ever an opportunity to have us connect with these characters, now would be that time. Instead the characters come across as annoying. And the blind character still has me scratching my head. Why include a character like this if there isn't going to be more to connect her to the audience? As well, during her inevitable torture and death, none of her blindness is even once used in her torture. As awful as that sounds, it feels to me like there was a huge lost opportunity there to really drive home the cruelty of the film. This is just one of several areas that ruin what could have been something really grisly.
And again, the acting from the three leads really ruin the extreme moments of the film. A movie like this is meant to really bother the viewer watching it. And the acting from those being tortured needs to be as realistic as possible. It creates empathy for the victims, making it a lot harder to watch and endure. This movie makes some small attempts at that basic idea, such as the male victim pleading with Maman not to cut his genitals off. But it falls shockingly flat. And then when the horrific act comes, it doesn't feel as impactful as it should. Because it is acted so poorly. It's a shame really because I really liked the performance from Manoush. Manoush is pretty much the only actor worth much of anything until Kercmar shows up.
So a lot of the viewers of this sort of stuff usually don't give a crap about acting and what have you. It's the red stuff. Acts of immeasurable torture and pain. Indescribable evil and torment. Well, I suppose this movie has a lot of that. But is it really worth it? If this is your first time viewing a movie like this, then sure, it would probably rock your socks off. But when you have grown up watching film such as the original Blood Feast (or any HG Lewis gore film for that matter) Mark of the Devil, Last House on Dead End St, Cannibal Holocaust, etc, the actual acts of violence one sees in La Petite Mort are absolutely old hat. And coming from Ittenbach, I expected way more creativity. Now that may not be his fault as he is not the director here.
Let me just outright tell you what to expect. A mouse trap to a tongue, which should mess your tongue up pretty bad, but the victim winds up talking like nothing is wrong. Numerous needles in a girls arm, only for the next scene for all those needles to be gone and with no visible scars. A man has his eyeball cut out from his head with a butcher knife. Then his manhood is cut off. The scene ends with one of the killers bathing in the mans intestines as they fall from his body. The blind woman is scalped revealing her brains for the world to see. Apparently the skin from her head must have been holding her brains in because she has absolutely no skull. She is scalped and the brain is just there, right under the skin. And she remains alive long enough to simply have her throat slashed. The final girl who got the disappearing needles in her arm is beaten mercilessly with a hammer to the head, until her brains fall out. And then in the next scene she appears to be perfectly intact. She actually is killed when she is stabbed in the gut.
I thought the torture and the kills lacked any sort of creativity to make it stand out from the rest of the genre. As well as the fact that they were not handled as well as they could have been. Again, this is a genre that relies on its ability to be realistic. And this movie does a lot to take the viewer out of that equation. The hammer to the head scene was poorly, poorly handled. The scalping scene was even more poorly handled. So much was so poorly handled that I found myself mostly bored and frustrated.
When I bought this movie I was really expecting to walk away feeling sick to my stomach. And I was also not looking forward to the experience as torture films are not exactly my favorite from the horror genre. But I really just found this film to be boring, poorly made, and disappointing in the areas in needs to shine the most. Torture films are not rocket science. The plots are always the same. However, what makes the good ones stand out are the films that find a good balance of empathy and gore. Without those elements films like these fall apart at the seams.
As it stands, La Petite Mort is not a good torture film. It is too frustrating to be among the better films in the genre and it does not do enough creatively to make it stand out among its endless peers. I can't recommend the film to any hardened gore fan. Maybe a beginner. But no serious gore fan is going to find any of this movie acceptable.