Director Tom Six is the brains behind the “Human Centipede” trilogy. His latest film, “The Onania Club,” which is said to be a very uncomfortable watch, is having problems finding a distributor.
The black-and-white film wrapped production in 2019, but nobody wants to touch it. It’s not like Six doesn’t have a following either, many horror movie fans have been itching for “The Onania Club” to finally get released.
The film follows Hanna (Jessica Morris), a married mother who learns she can only get sexually excited by the suffering of others. This leads her to the Onania club, where other women find sexual stimulation from tragedy, including footage from the 9/11 attacks. They watch pain, torture and death for their sexual pleasures.
‘Onania’ was selectively screened, via online links, at the start of the pandemic, five reviews were filed on RottenTomatoes, all fresh. One of the lucky few who got a chance to see it was maverick filmmaker John Waters who declared it one of 2021’s best films.
The Human Centipede director tops himself with a story of rich Los Angeles women who gather together to masturbate while watching news footage of the world’s misery. Often wrongheaded but sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, it has been rejected by film distributors worldwide. All I can say is that the movie sure as hell delivers. You will probably never be able to see it. Maybe that’s a good thing…
Meanwhile, Six has been uploading statements on YouTube about the film industry and what he considers to be censorship. “I believe that The Onania Club is my best work yet,” he says in a video.”
Six claims that political correctness is to blame for his film not getting distribution. In a Vice interview, he admitted that “The Onania Club” was rejected by all major film festivals. One of them even told him that they loved the film but that they “could never show this”.
Society has become very over-sensitive, and film distributors respond to that. They have such a huge fear of being cancelled or critiqued that they take the road of least resistance. I don’t think cinema, or art in general, can ever go too far; it is all make-believe. The ever-growing political correctness is suffocating creativity. It is impossible to adjust cinema to all that sensitivity.
Six’s breakout cult hit “The Human Centipede” rattled many in 2009. Cinematic violence for the sake of violence, at least that’s the opinion held by the film’s detractors, who believed the imagery in ‘Centipede’ was grounds for both censorship and outright banning.
“The Human Centipede” gained attention in the mainstream due to its outrageous premise: a mad scientist sews kidnapped victims, mouth-to-anus, to create a perverse new being. The film itself is actually quite tame compared to its two sequels, however, both of which make the OG “Human Centipede” appear positively neutered.
The first ‘Centipede’ movie in the trilogy left Roger Ebert unable to review it —
The star rating system is unsuited to this film. Is the movie good? Is it bad? Does it matter? It is what it is and occupies a world where the stars don’t shine.
“The Onania Club” is Six’s first film since completing the ‘Centipede’ trilogy, he says he’s been working the film circuit for more than four years without securing a single distributor. Most ignored his queries. Others told him “the market has changed.”
Six says his film skewers the “elites” in Hollywood, conspiracy theories, racism, Big Pharma and more (via Christian Toto). I would love to get my hands on a copy. I’ve just messaged Six with the hopes of watching his still-unreleased film.
Paul Greengrass’ "The Uprising," starring Andrew Garfield, opened to $3.2M from 2,068 theaters this weekend. Yikes. The budget hasn’t been disclosed, but is said to be in the $20-$30M range.