| The Human Centipede 3 (Final Sequence) | |
| Director: | Tom Six |
| Music: | Misha Segal |
| Cinematography: | David Meadows |
| Editing: | Tom Six |
| Studio: | Six Entertainment Company |
| Distributor: | IFC Midnight |
| Runtime: | 102 minutes |
| Language: | English |
| Gross: | $18,976[1] [2] |
The Human Centipede 3 (Final Sequence) is a 2015 black comedy body horror film written and directed by Tom Six and starring Dieter Laser and Laurence R. Harvey, the leading actors from the first two films in new roles, Robert LaSardo, Tommy "Tiny" Lister, Jay Tavare, Eric Roberts, Bree Olson, Clayton Rohner, and Bill Hutchens as well as a cameo by Six. The film tells the story of a psychopathic prison warden and his accountant who create their own "human centipede" from the inmates. It is the conclusion to Six's The Human Centipede trilogy.[3] The Human Centipede 3 was released both theatrically and on video on demand on 22 May 2015. The film was poorly reviewed from critics due to its overwhelming gore and repetitive plot to its predecessors.
At George H. W. Bush State Prison somewhere in the Southwestern United States, William "Bill" Boss, a cannibalistic, psychopathic warden, watches the end of The Human Centipede 2 (Full Sequence) with his accountant, Dwight Butler.
Bill receives a threatening prank phone call from an inmate. He then has a medical checkup with Dr. Jones in which Bill believes there is nothing wrong with himself. Bill then waterboards the inmate who prank called him with three buckets of boiling water as punishment, horribly disfiguring him. Governor Hughes arrives, ordering Bill and Dwight to put a stop to the violence and promising that they will both be fired otherwise. In anger and retaliation, Bill orders a mass castration of the inmates, and brutally castrates one of the prisoners himself, then cooks and eats the testicles for "energy food."
Dwight pitches an idea to fix the prison's horrible retention and violence rates to Bill: suture all of the inmates together mouth-to-anus, forming a giant human centipede, which would be the ultimate deterrent to crime. Bill is skeptical and opposed to the idea. Bill then has a nightmare about being attacked by inmates, and raped by the inmate he castrated. Bill then summons the director of The Human Centipede 2, Tom Six, to the prison. Bill is assured that the films are "100% medically accurate." Six gives the prison permission to use his Centipede idea, provided that he is permitted to witness the operation. The first two films are then shown to the inmates as a display of their future, which causes a riot. Inmates chase Bill and Dwight to the warden's office where they beat his assistant Daisy unconscious.
Bill goes around each cell and shoots every inmate with tranquilizers, readying them for the operation. Incompatible inmates are shot and killed. They discover an inmate with Crohn's disease, who suffers from severe diarrhea. Bill orders the man who raped him in the dream to be attached to him as an added punishment. Daisy is in a coma, where she is raped by Bill. Six returns to the prison, where he is met by Bill and Dwight. After touring the cells, they discover a mentally unstable inmate eating his own feces wanting to be sewn to the centipede. Bill shoots and kills the inmate as he does not want anyone to enjoy the punishment.
Upon the centipede's completion, Governor Hughes arrives greatly disgusted at what he sees. In addition to the centipede, a "Human Caterpillar" has been created by suturing together death row inmates, along with those who were given a life sentence, and amputating their limbs. Daisy has been sewn into the Centipede while one inmate from the Centipede is in the infirmary, having been disconnected because he served his time. Hughes leaves the prison, telling Dwight and Bill they should receive the death penalty. In anger, Bill shoots Dr. Jones dead. However, Hughes returns to prison with a sudden change of heart, stating that the Centipede punishment is "exactly what America needs." After Hughes leaves, Dwight and Bill celebrate their success. Dwight is then shot and killed by Bill for trying to take credit for the idea.
In the final scene, a naked Bill screams with joy in the lookout tower overlooking the Centipede.
In an alternate ending, Doctor Josef Heiter lays in his bed, implying that the previous events were part of a dream. He finds his three rottweilers, his first centipede creation, deceased. The camera pans over his house and the film transitions into the beginning of The Human Centipede (First Sequence).
Six noted that casting for the third film was much easier than the first, as more people were familiar with the concept and wanted to appear in the film.[4] To this end, Eric Roberts was easier to attract to the film, because according to Six, he was a fan of the original. Six decided to cast porn actress Bree Olson because he wanted a female character, even though the movie was set in an all-male prison, and wanted "the ultimate American female," which he believed to be a porn actress.[5] Both Laser and Harvey had starred in previous entries as the main antagonists, Dr. Josef Heiter and Martin, respectively.[5]
Six chose a prison setting to bring back the theme of "punishment" that generated the idea for the series, although Six admits that "I totally ignored [it] in the first two films."[5] Six filmed the movie in the style of "a Hollywood film," which according to him meant shooting "everything widescreen with over-the-top color grading and big Hollywood music," after receiving encouragement to do so from film festival audiences[5] Six noted that this helped bring out how "ridiculous" the concept was.[5]
Six has stated that some of the crew members did not agree to put their full names in the credits, and adding these same members did not have such reservations about the second part.[6] In order to promote the film, Six distributed 250 hand-signed prints of the film in March 2015.[7]
On 7 April 2015, Entertainment Weekly announced the film's theatrical and video on demand release date to be 22 May 2015.[8]
The film passed uncut in Australia on 6 May, with an R18+ rating, and screened in a national tour throughout June, with Harvey appearing as a special guest. The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray in Australia on 22 July 2015.[9] [10]
Despite controversy over the second film in the franchise,[11] the film passed uncut in the UK with an 18 certificate and in New Zealand with an R18 certificate. It was released in the UK on 20 July.[12]
The Human Centipede 3 was poorly reviewed from critics. On review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a 20% rating based on 46 reviews with an average rating of 2.2/10. The site's critical consensus states that "Human Centipede fans may find enough extreme body horror in the third installment to satisfy, but filmgoers of every other persuasion are strongly advised to stay far, far away from Final Sequence."[13] Metacritic reports an average score of 5 out of 100, indicating "overwhelming dislike" from 15 critics.[14]
Entertainment Weekly ranked the film as the second worst movie of 2015, specifying, "sleazy sadism served with a wink and a smile, Six’s anus-to-mouth trilogy is a satire without any clue of what it’s satirizing."[15] Additionally, The A.V. Club also ranked the film as the second worst of 2015, declaring, "Writer-director Tom Six lives for disapproval, and he’s finally made a movie that basically no one—not even those amused or unnerved by the past two installments—could possibly enjoy."[16]
In his review for Variety, Dennis Harvey noted, "As with earlier chapters, the packaging is as competent (if not particularly inspired) as the content is remedial. Indeed, perhaps the series' only really good joke has been the inherent absurdism of seeing an ever-rising level of expense, polish, and now "name" actors applied to something so fundamentally dumb."[17] Eddie Goldberger of New York Daily News concluded his review with, "The movie passes time until it can get to the centipeding. Even the big namesake event, when it finally arrives, is ho-hum. Turns out, whether it’s three people stuck together or 500, if you’ve seen one human centipede, you’ve seen them all."[18]
The New York Times critic Jeannette Catsoulis said of the film, "An ugly, claustrophobic celebration of sexual violence that’s anchored by one of the most repellent characters ever to appear on screen: the prison warden Bill Boss. Portrayed by Dieter Laser, Boss is a capering obscenity whose oft-protruding tongue deserves its own agent."[19]
Greg Cwik of Indiewire gave the film a C− and said: "Final Sequence is too self-serious to be camp, but too silly to be scary, so Six just settles for gross."[20]
The Human Centipede 3 (Final Sequence) was released on DVD and Blu-ray on 27 October 2015 in the United States. Additionally, a Blu-ray box set containing all of the films was released on the same day.[21]
At the 36th Golden Raspberry Awards, Final Sequence was nominated for Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-off or Sequel with Six being nominated for Worst Director.[22] [23]