Faces Of Gore Part 2

Well, if FACES OF GORE was your up your alley, this will surely satiate your taste for sick voyeurism and cack-handed narration that adds insults to injury ...!

Again sourced from medical/police videos documenting road accidents, suicides and murders (mainly Asian) this is a depressing foray into the aftermath of such horrific events. It opens with a typically OTT warning regarding the real-life horrors about to assault your senses. What we ultimately receive (if you've seen Part 1) is ... more of the same.

Dr Vincent Van Gore opens proceedings (he's had a haircut, and his acting has developed into really bad over-performing. Oh dear, you may cringe uncontrollably during his [mercifully short] links ...). He still reads from cue-cards. And that overly-familiar X-Files-esque tune returns once more.

So we get the same tried-and-tested formula. Van Gore introduces the first segment: CRASH. First up is 3 Japanese girls who, on their way to a party, were victims of a hit-&-run drunk driver. We see lingering close-up shots of their smashed faces, and director/narrator Todd Tjersland remarks upon upon the medical recovery team as they remove jewellery/clothing from one of the girls. It's predictably sick and twisted - much in the vein of it's predecessor.

We also get to see someone who's brains have been squashed under the wheels of an articulated lorry. This is deemed fitting enough to repeat in slow-motion 'instant replay'. Of course, Mr Tjersland practically orgasms while commenting upon the slo-mo replay.

SUICIDE follows - and this is much bloodier than the first FACES installment. Okay, it's still restricted - thankfully - to aftermath footage, but their is a lot of close-up grue on display. The opening gambit is a victim still clutching their handgun, leaning over a bathtub filled with the crimson results of their mind-blowing exit from existence.

Todd expresses his disgust for one suicide corpse that is riddled with cancer - he begs the viewer to imagine having to live / be married to / sleep with this woman.

Shortly after this episode, Van Gore is back on the screen hamming his way through another badly scripted link. He invites to watch a scene of a man who evades death - Phillipino footage of someone whose hand is trapped in some heavy factory machinery. Very gory.

The final segment of the film concentrates on MURDER. We see extremely bloody footage of a corpse slain after having been " fucked in the ass by friends who gave him AIDS" !

Oh, and there's the matter of a delightful expose on the man who ate his partner's foetus - only to be found out,when he vomitted it up in a public restaurant. You get to see the foetus in all it's glory ... of course you do - this FACES OF GORE!!!

FACES OF GORE is ultimately boring. Who knows if it's genuine footage or not? It could well be, and if that's the case this is truly unflinching and repulsive. Again, the movie concentrates it's efforts on post-death footage. So anyone expecting actual death footage may be disappointed, But this is sick stuff by anyone's standards.

The footage on offer here is arguably gorier than that present in the first FACES feature. The narration is definitely more offensive and OTT. Van Gore's performance and script are ridiculously exaggerated. But while the excesses more than match it's predecessor, it's this 'out-do all others' approach that pulls this film apart.

For a start, the scenes with Van Gore are no longer just comedic. They're crap. Tjersland's narration is overly stupid in delivery and quickly becomes dull. If it illicits any laughs from you at all, these are sure to be in the first 10 minutes. The overall effect is that of a cheap opportune-seeking production looking to expand on what was initially popular - and being found guilty of total overkill.

Admittedly, the final 10 minutes do hit home with striking impact as they show more recent (undeniably genuine) footage of actual death, famine and suffering - probably derived from US TV news broadcasts. It's horribly disturbing footage that is ill-fitting with the rest of the sensation-seeking commentary on this film. (As with the first film, it's interesting to note that Tjersland's crass narration disappears during these sombre, more blatantly real scenes).

A lot of what the FACES OF GORE series spews forth looks genuine and harrowing. The narration and overall packaging cheapens the notion of real-death footage to an offensively low level. It's this factor that will ultimately sell this film to some, and repel others. Whether what you see on screen is real or not - who knows? I am cynic, but that's a fault of mine rather than the film-makers ... I still think Elvis Presley is nestled away somewhere shafting the arse off a reclusive Diana Spencer! This film certainly looks genuine, and apart from my neurotic cynicism there's nothing to suggest this isn't the REAL DEAL.

It's an ugly film, that's for sure. Poorly scripted, badly acted (by Van Gore) and consisting almost exclusivey of video footage of bloody death aftermaths. The misanthropic humour of the narration probably lifts the tone of the film - unintentionally. Try watching this film on mute: you'll soon see what I mean. It soon becomes a catalogue of unbearably bleak images, and nothing more.

Picture quality is adequate and the mono sound is reliably consistent. A slightly better presentation than it's predecessor. No extras.

Review by Stuart Willis