[Movie] Audition (Spoilers)

[Kyle]

Who's seen Audition? If you haven't and you don't want it spoiled, then don't read this.

I'm so very confused about the end of this movie and want to discuss it with someone.

For a movie that's supposed to be a horror "staple"-- I didn't find it compelling or that horrifying. Sure- the scenes at the end were gross-- and maybe more shocking when this movie was released-- but it wasn't over the top.

But I have specific questions about the trippy end sequence, if anyone else has seen it.

[Bluedevyl]

I've seen it... I didn't particularly enjoy it, but I've seen it.

Having said that, give me Takeshi Miike over Eli Roth any day.

[Kyle]

I don't know that's a fair comparison. They're two totally different filmmakers. And no matter how much everyone hates Eli Roth and his "bro" sensibilities- Cabin Fever is great and Green Inferno is downright brilliant. But 13 Samurai is freaking classic.

Okay- but back to audition. What was the deal with the weird sub-reality to everything? Was he in such tortured pain that he was essentially hallucinating?

And in any event, did they explain through these hallucinations that he raped his own daughter?

What the fuck was going on?

[Bluedevyl]

It's not that I hate his sensibilities... I just don't enjoy the tone he strikes in some of his later films... Hostel felt like gore for gore's sake, and I don't enjoy those sorts of films as much. I've seen them compared in film study texts, and I don't feel like it's a fair comparison either, but it's understandable that Roth has listed Miike as one of his biggest influences. I did like Cabin Fever.

I always thought of the ending as a confluence of the two of them, but through a drug haze... I think that they never actually slept together. I think that she drugged him in the hotel, and during the stupor that the drug induces, he's reliving her past experiences. I always thought that Asami was raped when she was younger, and is recounting the story to Aoyama, and the way Miike shot it, it seems as though he is experiencing her pain.

It's a really perplexing ending, in any case.