Amazon.com: The idea of unleashing three of Asia's wildest directors in the same omnibus film is a terrific one, and putting the likes of Miike Takashi and Park Chan-wook to work in the Twilight Zone-style mini-feature is mouth-watering for fans. (Just look at what happened when Miike made an installment of Showtime's Masters of Horror series--it was deemed too crazy for broadcast.) Alas, the results are a letdown. First up, "Dumplings," is from Hong Kong's Fruit Chan, and it's the most cogent (and ickiest) of the bunch. Bai Ling plays a specialist in preparing dumplings that promise to restore youth and health for her customers; the weird part is she also runs a particular clinic on her premises. Ugh. The Korean offering from Park Chan-wook is "Cut," a warp on filmmaking about a self-centered director who gets trapped at his home (or is it the set of his new movie?) by a deranged former extra. The sadistic machinations here make Hannibal Lecter look reasonable, and the segment gets points for weirdness, but Park's take on revenge fantasies is much more exciting in Oldboy and Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance. Miike represents Japan with "Box," which really is in the spirit of an old Outer Limits episode, complete with a "gotcha" ending that doesn't seem worth the trouble. Sure, twins are always a good topic for horror, but this segment is a long way to travel for not much. All three segments look good--there's little hint of the grindhouse cheapie here--but overall it's a disappointment. --Robert Horton
3 masterpieces this title should be 3 masterpieces instead!!3 short films by 3 master film makers!i will particularly stand at the last film"box"by takashi miike.what you get here is film with very little dialogues,basing the most part of its narration in the sceneries the director creates..desolate scenes with minimal use of actors,that achieve thru lyrical photography,to create at some points,a phantom of abscence.a loss of what was..the key character is present in this film only by her abscence,while both halves are with thoughts of guilt,longing and salvation that originate from deam.two different minds united by fate and set as actors on the stages of their own dreaming,creating parallel stories that are bound to come across,at awakenings cold touch..salvation never comes,"when the actors stop acting,does the film become real?"
3 Extremes 3 Extremes - just terrible we turned it of about 1/4 of the way into the movie, really fake and phony nothing good to say about it.
MAJOR SUCK FEST I barely made it through this dvd and when it was over I rolled my eyes and shelved it. The trilogy of films on this dvd are just plain silly. "Dumplings" is ridiculous. It's a story about a fetus-munching woman. The slow, deliberate 'crunch, crunch, crunching' of fetal bone is over emphasized and almost comic. The second story has the usual twitchy Asian lunatic torturing and punishing. And the third story is forgettable.
Please do not waste your money or your time on this DVD. If you want to watch truly incredible Asian films, I recommend A Tale of Two Sisters, OldBoy, Dark Water and The Eye 1 and 2. If you want to watch a movie with truly vile moments in it, watch Audition. If the sight of a lovely young woman vomitting into a dog dish and feeding it to a starving man she keeps tied up in a burlap sack doesn't make you queasy, I don't know what will. And that's just ONE of the nauseating scenes in Audition. Don't watch it if you have a weak stomach. Seriously.
3 Extremes II and III are mostly boring with little or no shock value, with the exception of the story "Going Home" which is on 3 Extremes II. It stars the incredible Eugenia Yuan (Memoires of a Geisha, The Eye 2) and is a complex and bittersweet story. If you want to purchase one of the 3 Extremes movies, I recommend 3 Extremes II because of "Going Home". As for 3 Extremes III, I was not scared, disgusted, or moved in any way by this dvd. I am amazed at some of the other reviews that give this DVD a 5 star rating and comment on how horrible and frightening the 3 stories are. Guess those reviewers haven't watched OldBoy or Audition. Those two movies are NOT FOR CHILDREN.
Waste of time, waste of money These three movies are supposed to be like Asian "Twilight Zone" episodes but were just three very bloody disturbing movies. The first was Chinese and was about the extremes to which a woman would go to remain young and beautiful...(the secret's in the dumplings). It was actually well made but just plain gross. The second story was Korean and was about a young rich director (who happens to be a really nice guy) who is kidnapped by a man who tortures the director's wife in order to get the young man to confess to a sin. There must be some Korean philosophy here that doesn't really translate to the West ---that a rich man cannot be a good man...so if good man is rich, then he must be lying and hiding an awful secret. I didn't get it, but it was extremely violent and bloody and in my opinion had no point to it. The third story is Japanese and is about a woman who lives with the guilt that as a child she unintentionally caused the death of another little girl whom she was jealous of. It was a beautifully made movie and had a couple of eerie scenes in it, but there was absolutely no point to it. It was disturbing because the adult trainer of the girls (they were acrobats) seemed to be sleeping with the little girl he favored and gave her a necklace...but it seemed to imply that the other girl was jealous because she wanted the same 'attention' from the man (as well as a necklace). There was of course a twist at the end, but it made no sense. This DVD was a BIG waste of time and money! *Parental Note*: This Dvd contains graphic violence, sadism, blood, gore, sex and just plain 'yuck'. If you let your kids see this movie you are a really bad parent!
Dark, Disturbing Film One thing about the horror genre is that it is so difficult to define.
Viewers expecting supernatural ghost stories or vampires and werewolves might be disappointed with "Three...Extremes." What any good horror film does however, is hit (or sometimes pound) on a key that deeply disturbs us inside.
Three...Extremes is one such film and is comprised of three shorter films, the best of which being Dumplings (Fruit Chan). Though utterly disgusting and hard to watch, it is done right, for it does not rely on gore alone. Rather, it delves into the human psyche and exposes a darker side of humanity-- thoughts and perversions we'd rather not think about. To what length will one go to obtain what she thinks she wants?
The other two mini-films, although not as good as "Dumplings," are decent. "Cut" would draw comparisons to "Hard Candy," and perhaps "Saw." The third mini-film (Miike), entitled "Box," is somewhat unique, perhaps too abstract to be truly chilling.
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