Movie Review: THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE III (FINAL SEQUENCE)

Synopsis of “The Human Centipede III (Final Sequence)” via IMDb: Taking inspiration from The Human Centipede films, the warden of a notorious and troubled prison looks to create a 500-person human centipede as a solution to his problems.

Cindy’s Review: When the movie finished and the credits started rolling, my initial thought was: “I never thought I’d say it, but the movie needed less Dieter and more centipede.” The third installment in The Human Centipede trilogy begins much like the second, with the protagonist taking cues from the previous film. Dieter Laser (formally “Dr. Heiter” in the first film) plays “Bill Boss”, the warden of a prison with Laurence R. Harvey (formally “Martin” in the second film) as “Dwight Butler”, his trusty right-hand man. The movie also stars Bree Olsen (of porn and Charlie Sheen fame) as secretary “Daisy”.

Bill is having issues with his inmates and just can’t seem to keep them in line. With inmate-on-inmate violence, prank calls to his office and general disobedience, he’s taken to punishing them in increasingly brutal ways. Dwight presents Bill with the previous films in the hopes that they will help him, in some way, figure out the best solution to keep the prisoners under some semblance of control. The ultimate decision is to create a 500-person human centipede (ridiculous, right?).

Dieter Laser not only chews the scenery, he claws at it, gnaws on it, gargles with it and makes papier-mâché woodland creatures with the leftovers. Every line is needlessly shouted at top volume, with wide-eyes and bulging veins galore. When his character took to using a megaphone my eyes almost rolled back inside of my skull. His red-faced delivery had me convinced that he may eventually fall over and perish from a myocardial infarction. It’s as though director Tom Six threw his hands up and said “Give me over-the-top”. When an actor outshines a cameo from Eric Roberts (“Governor Hughes”), “over-the-top” is an understatement.

I thought that the first movie was good and the character of Dr. Heiter had a solid place in the world of horror movie villains. I found the second movie to be the most disturbing of the trilogy, with Laurence R. Harvey highly contributing, a fact that unfortunately does not bode well in relation to my thoughts on the current film. This was supposed to be “100% Politically Incorrect”, and while some scenes definitely pushed the boundaries of political correctness, they could have and should have gone much further. If the ultimate goal was to shock and horrify, consider me bemused.

I slogged through 80 minutes of sometimes incoherent shouting nonsense to finally get to the money shot. That said, I would have to recommend watching the film if only as a finale to the trilogy. It had its moments, one involving a kidney violation, another a stoma, even a “Just One of the Guys” throwback (Clayton Rohner as “Dr. Jones”) and of course the unveiling of the 500-person human centipede. But, that was pretty much it. I can’t hate Tom Six. I can’t hate this movie – I just felt like this was a squandered opportunity. In conclusion, I stand by my statement that this movie needed less Dieter and more centipede.

TOTAL: 4/10

Nightmarish Conjurings’ rating system just doesn’t apply to a movie like “The Human Centipede III (Final Sequence)”