Faces of Death (1978)

Faces Of Death is a film that doesn't really follow any storyline. It really doesn't, so you must be asking yourself, "How does this movie go on then without a story?"A false rumour spread that the violence in this was unsimulated, so this film immediately caused controversy. That false rumour is how this film got all of these viewers, people were flocking to see it just to see how graphic and disturbing the violence was. Most audiences were repulsed by the violence, calling it "graphic" and "disgusting," and the false rumour spread even more.Let me get this clear: this does not have unsimulated violence. If some silly friend of yours came over to you and said, "Hey, there's this film called Faces Of Death with unsimulated violence," then he/she's lying without knowing it. But, the violence in this looks very real, which may be why so many people were led to believe the rumour. Of course, we all know it's false now, but back then, Faces Of Death was one of the most disturbing and graphic films of all time, along with I Spit On Your Grave, Cannibal Holocaust and Mondo cane.Despite being simulated, I can guarantee that the film lives up to the hype, violence-wise. It's graphic, shocking, disturbing and downright tasteless, with no coherent storyline at all. The film was made just to shock viewers out their lunch.I won't call this film downright bad, but I won't call it a masterpiece either. It's an interesting film with very realistic violence that makes you stand and marvel at how the filmmakers were able to create such realistic looking violence. But remember, the violence in this film is completely tasteless, and doesn't really serve apart from shocking.Overall, it's disturbing, but I wouldn't call it a film to go put on your watchlist. If you get the chance, maybe watch it if you have a strong stomach, but otherwise, just steer clear from it. 5.2/10.

Currently, I've never given a movie a 1 star rating before. I've given out a 3 star rating before to a movie but never a rating this low. This is mainly because even some of the worst movies I've ever seen had at least a few things good about them. But I have always wondered when I'll be able to find a movie that is so bad that regardless of how hard I try, I would not be able to find anything in it which is even somewhat good or entertaining.I think that I've found one.This awful disaster of a movie is distractingly violent, super offensive, and full of shock value. I can safely say that this is one of the worst movies ever made.This documentary really has no plot. It's just a montage of people and animals dying gruesome and bloody deaths and the narrator also gives disturbing commentary detailing how they died.The only point to this film is to shock and disturb the viewer. It's a hard movie to watch because the movie featured gruesome deaths just for the sake of it. There was not a single moment in this movie that contained any power and I didn't feel engaged at all throughout its entirety. I enjoyed Come and See because it had power with its massacre scenes and it had intelligent violence which stayed with me long after viewing it. Faces of Death on the other hand is nothing more than just 105 minutes of endless and tiring shock value.Also, there is one thing that really infuriates me about this movie more than anything else. It is that the movie often plays goofy and uplifting music while it shows footage of people being brutally murdered (also, most of the deaths displayed here are in fact real). Most of those people died brutal deaths here and it downright disgusted me how the movie uses the goofy music to make them sound like some kind of a sick joke. However, the movie actually offended me in this case. It proves that the directors clearly don't care at all for any of the people or animals who brutally died in this movie. This clearly has some of the worst, unfitting music ever in cinema history.I've actually seen some people give this movie a 5/5 rating. I've read many of the reviews by them but none of them have been able to justify this movie's flaws at all and none of them have been able to convince me that this movie isn't complete garbage yet. For the entirely of this one guy's review, he rambled on for how much of this movie was fake and how much it diminishes the movie's impact because of it. Yet, that idiot gave this movie a perfect rating. I have no idea know what those people see in this movie and I don't know why they think that this movie is a masterpiece. If you think that this is a masterpiece then go watch Come and See. Then tell me that this is a masterpiece.So in conclusion, this is an awful movie. It's just a montage of shock value and the movie handles them very poorly by throwing in super unfitting music which I found to be highly offensive. There was not a single moment in this movie that even somewhat interested me and I was extremely glad after this movie ended. This is the worst documentary I've seen and this is also the worst movie I've ever seen as well.

This is one of the few Video Nasties that fully deserved its place on the final DPP list. As an individual who ideologically opposes censorship, I found myself surprisingly shocked by the BBFC's decision to pass this (albeit with minor cuts) for DVD, and even today it is one of the few Video Nasties that I cannot watch without needing to turn it off. While I agree that adults should have the right to view whatever they wish (as long as the work in question does not break the law), I do find myself wondering what kind of person enjoys watching this sort of material. (Even as I write I cannot help but shake my head at my own hypocrisy...) This grisly, macabre compilation of both real-life and faked death footage belongs to a subgenre of the documentary film known as 'mondo', initiated in 1966 by the Italian exploitation film Mondo Cane (although the recording of actual human death goes right back to the dawn of cinema). Along with the video Executions, Faces of Death represents the most extreme and disgusting end of this subgenre (that I'm aware of at any rate), and presents a string of death-themed scenes including suicide, accidents and execution. The fact that some scenes (most famously a death row electrocution and the eating of 'live' monkey brains) are faked does little to reduce the impact of this film, which from start to finish reeks of both death and exploitation. What surprises me is not so much that Faces of Death presents itself as a serious documentary (complete with a bogus doctor narrating in serious tones), but that the BBFC's regulations allow for the use of real-life death footage in this clearly exploitative context. And yet they ban video documentaries such as Hooligans and Terrorists, Sickos and Other Wackos for having no discernible educational context. At least such material has the courage (stupidity?) to present itself for what it is: sick morons stringing together repugnant images for the entertainment of other sick morons. Indeed, such a distinction marks hard-core pornography and the Lovers' Guide style of 'sex education' videos that emerged during the late 1980s, when 'documentarians' realised they could make '18' rated sex tapes as long as the action was interspersed by some 'expert' providing an academic commentary. Unsurprisingly, Faces of Death does not illuminate the subject of its title; rather than revealing historical, cultural and spiritual truths about mortality, it merely serves to emphasise the ugly faces of humanity.Film: * (out of 5) Nastiness: ***** (out of 5)

OK so what do we have here? A man getting cooked in the electric chair till blood comes out of his eyes, people eating monkey brains, a woman jumping to her death from a building, some poor soul who gets run over by a truck, a man getting beat to death and the list goes on and on. This so called film or documentary hosted by a Dr. Gross (Now I know it's fake) tries to make it some deep study into the nature of death and dying. Instead all we have here is a film that plays on our morbid sense of curiosity. I did a little research on this film before writing this review and it stated that 40% or more of this film is fake. An example is the man that is sent to the electric chair. It was explained that the director filmed that scene in his basement with cheap special affects. But despite these facts the film made about 35 million worldwide and has become a cult classic that spawned several sequels, which were just as fake. Save your money....trust me.