Audition, 1999 – ★★★½

Reminds me a lot of the French extreme movement, as it has moments of unrelenting and unapologetic horror. Unfortunately Audition spends too much time getting to the horror that we know is coming, and in that it becomes a bit of a tedious melodrama. Once we get there, though, boy is it horrifying and effective. My major complaint is that our lead has no idea what she has done in her past, so how is he dreaming about it? The dream sequences are superb, and reach for Lynchian levels, but there’s too much reality to the dreams. It will haunt me for a long time, but like many in that French extreme movement, the original Hostel, and others, I doubt I’ll feel any need to revisit it. Ultimately it’s nihilism cinema, and one can only spend so much time looking into that abyss.

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