Barbecue If you think Category III means close-up vivisection of young naked women, then you'll probably be disappointed, because that's not what this movie is about.Based on a true story, this film effectively captures the banality of criminal evil. Emily Kwan plays the role of Grace, a drug addict and prostitute who steals money from a pimp, is pursued, beaten, held captive, and tortured and humiliated for weeks, before finally being killed in a manner that's as stupid and pointless as her life. Some reviewers complain that this movie is tedious, and the characters aren't interesting. Personally, I find it refreshing to see a film that accurately shows the stupidity and shallowness of human cruelty, rather than glamorizing it as some form of creative art. No, the characters aren't deep and subtle, with little background to explain their situations, but that's what makes the story believable. The characters are pretty much all unlikeable, dishonest, and shallow, which is as it should be, since they're a bunch of thugs.I found them to be remarkably realistic portrayals of sociopathic criminals. Casually sadistic, mundanely cruel. Not twisted maniacs with hidden laboratories full of elaborate torture technology, just a bunch of druggies incapable of compassion looking to alleviate their boredom. Their lives are dismal, and the chance to exert power over someone weaker than themselves serves as entertainment. Emily Kwan does a wonderful job of portraying Grace, the sly, manipulative prostitute and heroin addict who is willing to put up with terrible abuse in return for an opportunity to get high one more time. She is selfish but thoughtless, always trying to avoid responsibility, but never considering the long term consequences of her actions. She lives in a constant state of denial. Even after being tortured, she still looks for acceptance from her abusers, forgetting everything they do to her in the pathetic hope that they will accept her enough to give her another ride on the dragon. Grace isn't too dumb to understand her plight, she's too addicted to care. Her shrill voice grates and annoys, and her behavior will probably seem inexplicable to those who have never been exposed to the real effects of serious addiction. She captures the emotional poverty and desperation of addiction far more realistically than Hollywood's glamorized depictions. She's hopeless almost from the beginning, and while the specific incidents that led to her death could perhaps have gone differently, her ultimate fate seems inevitable. Most of the acting is not spectacular, though Yiu-Cheung Lai is effective as the husband/father/sociopathic pimp. But overall it's worthwhile if you're interested in the darker side of the human experience.

The Illuminated Lantern Based on the "Hello Kitty" murder, just like THERE IS A SECRET IN MY SOUP, and in fact in addition to sharing details about the crime in question, even share the same plot device of opening the film with the police investigation, then telling the story of the woman who steals money and cannot repay her loan in flashback. Eventually her skull gets stuck in an Hello Kitty doll, but to get there we first have to sit through a lot of sitting around in a dingy apartment taking drugs, eating instant noodle, and brutal beating until death and dismemberment. Although it seemed to have a better cast (no Michael Wong, for one thing), it isn't nearly as good as its competition.

BA_Harrison A drug-addled ho stupidly decides to steal money from a local criminal, but ends up regretting her decision when she is taken prisoner by his lackeys and subjected to three weeks of torture and degradation. Finally, after having been beaten, burnt, and forced to eat turds from a toilet bowl, the silly cow overdoses on some dodgy drugs, leaving her abusers the nasty task of dismembering and disposing of her body.Based on a true life crime known as the Hello Kitty Murder, Human Pork Chop is a relentlessly bleak, mean-spirited tale that features non-stop scenes of torture and violence, and yet somehow manages to be extremely tedious and not at all deserving of its reputation as a gruelling shocker.The problem is that, although the subject matter is perfect for exploitation, it is treated in a very dreary and lifeless fashion: there is next to no gore (bar a few dodgy prosthetic limbs at the end); no nudity (what's a Cat III film without the nudity?); and the scenes of suffering are so long, drawn out, and monotonous that they completely negate the film's ability to shock.Very occasionally, director Benny Chan throws in something capable of raising an eyebrow (or a smile)—the severed head stored alongside the beers in the fridge is quite chilling, and the dog-bashing scene is fairly amusing—but for the most part, the film is nowhere near as hard-to-handle as I had heard.For a genuinely unsettling Category III experience, check out The Untold Story; it is everything that Human Pork Chop would dearly love to be.

rundbauchdodo This grim crime thriller is one of the better Category-3-shockers from Hong Kong in recent years - but it's also extremely hard to watch sometimes. The film tells the story of a young woman whose body is found dismembered. After that opening, it tells the story how the poor woman ended up that way. And it's really not easy to get through the pain she has to suffer. Reminding that it's not really her fault to be in a never ending nightmare makes the whole thing even harder to endure for the audience. The woman gets humiliated by thugs in the most despicable ways, and nobody is around to help her out of her misery.Even though the torture of the girl is shown in a graphic, barely watchable manner, it never really exploits the maltreatments, which saves the film from being just misogynist piece of junk. Because the film manages to make the viewer care for the woman, it even becomes a tragic story. All in all, the movie is an extremely unpleasant experience - people who are easily offended should not watch this film - but it surely is a startling, catching and in a subvert way even touching experience. Rating: 7 out of 10.