I know that is kind of an odd think to ask but bear with me. Recently i went back to watching crime series, mostly re-watching the American ones, that i like and trying some of the Korean ones to see if they’ll be my thing and because i like to read other people comments, i naturally skimmed through them . I was surprised because there were a lot of people expressing opinions how the dramas were violent, brutal, bloody and stuff like that but after watching some episodes i found them to be normal, consisting nothing that excessively dark at least by my standards. So i started thinking and realized that i don’t find gruesome, body parts all over the place movies to be particularly disturbing in any way, i find them to be more often than not good entertainment. That led me to wonder what do people find to be disturbing, because i am sure that for a lot of others bloody movies are not a problem either. I thought long and hard about the things that have left me with a bad taste in my mouth after watching them and i kind of came up empty, maybe i am watching the wrong movies(actually i know i am watching the wrong movies, because i checked with google and some of the top 10 and even top 20 most disturbing movies i can totally pass on, they are kind of freaky). Anyway the only two things that remotely fit the bill are a movie that i watched when i was a teenager that left a deep albeit unpleasant impression on me and a tv series that were too twisted and not in a fun way. The movie was an estonian production called “Klass” that was dealing with teenagers, so i guess at the time it just hit close to home and of course it was quite nicely made, i liked it even though it made me want to shrink into myself, i think it was psychologically taxing. The series was Nip/Tuck and as i already mentioned that show was twisted beyond repair and not in an interesting way(and mind you i like Criminal Minds, find it insightful and fun). It started of good and then pretty quickly everything spiraled out of control an we were in la la land, but not the one full of candy and chocolate, no, the one full of axe wielding bunnies and bloodthirsty guinea pigs out to get you. In my opinion that show was twisted for the sake of being twisted, couldn’t realy go through all 6 seasons. There were others that came close but they couldn’t pass the test at the end. So what is the most disturbing, making your skin crawl, thing you’ve ever watched or read if you like, the genre or form(movie,drama,anime,series) doesn’t matter? And here so we can all get in the mood
Have you seen the Korean movie Oldboy? I didn’t really get disturbed by the violence I’ve seen so far on TV or movies, but that twist near the end of the movie really left a long-lasting impression on me. I mean I watched that movie a long time ago, but I can still remember clearly how disgusted I felt that night. I guess psychological twists just affect me a lot more than pure violence, because they go a lot deeper^^
No, i still haven’t watched Oldboy but it’s been on my watching list for quite a while, since i watched I saw the devil and decided that korean thrillers are definitely worth my while. And I think you are right that pshycologically charged movies often affect people more, because if you are not the squeamish type a little blood and gore is not that scary or freaky to anybody. The more interesting thing is that people have different triggers, for some one thing is disturbing but for others it might be something completely different.
If you ask me the more disturbing thing is that the serial killer(not Hannibal the other one) in Silence of the lambs had a real life prototype, as far as i can remember there were some things that were changed so the character could fit into the script, but it’s still based on an exsisting person. I actually like this movies quite a lot and have re watched them a couple of times, never found them disturbing, but then again The X-Files used to freak me out so…
The movie Seven. The serial killers treatment of the victims was psychologically terrible, and their “punishments” were based on the seven deadly sins. The plot twist at the end was really disturbing.
I recently watched Snowpiercer. Even if it wasn’t shown, some things that were said were really disturbing. And so was the mindset of the antagonist. Sometimes spoken things are way more scary, since they leave it up to your own imagination and involve yourself.
I’m not too disturbed by violence and gore. I will watch the goriest movies and totally be fine. The Romans and the gladiators prove that human have an age old fascination with violence, and that is maybe the reason why sometimes I laugh while watching horror movies.
The movie that disturbed me the most was Schindler’s List.The scene where the soldiers were rounding all the people in the camp for the gas chambers and some of the little kids were playing with the soldiers not knowing they were being carried off to their death was sick.
Oh yes that was a hard one to watch. That’s because it was real and you know it happened, seeing it depicted in the film in such a cold calculating way was so shocking. I’m sure if someone had the courage to make a film of the recent destruction of the Palestinian people and their plight we would equally be upset, shocked and sick that human beings can be so cruel to each other.
Well i’ve never felt disturbed by
“Schindler’s List” like @midnight2salem_149 did, maybe because the reality of what happened was simply much worse than anything a movie can come up with. And also some years ago i visited a museum of the French Resistance where there were authentic pictures of the concentration camps, uniforms, weapons, gas masks, etc. But honestly the black and white pictures left the deepest impression on me, especially the one that depicted the face of a person who has been in the camps, it was quite chilling. We also met with some survivors, that have spend between a year and two years in the camps and they told us a little about how things were at the time, sadly i couldn’t understand much, just some because they were speaking in french. I guess after seeing this and reading some historical sources about the time the movie didn’t seem nearly as disturbing.
