Everyone has a weak spot, and there's bound to be a film out there that pushes one or
two of your buttons.
These movies, on the other hand, push all of them.
They aren't just hard to watch.
They're deeply disturbing on almost every level, and some of them are downright vile.
In fact, many people couldn't even finish them, and for good reason.
Hold on, because these are some of the most disturbing movies ever made.
Veronica
Netflix's quick ascent to the top of the entertainment industry goes hand-in-hand with the rise of
binge-watching.
In fact, the company seems dedicated to trying its best to make sure that you never, ever
turn off your television.
That's what makes Veronica so surprising.
In March 2018, this Spanish-language horror film made headlines because people were so
scared that they couldn't make it through the entire thing, and Netflix couldn't be
happier.
Plot-wise, Veronica doesn't break any new ground.
The title character misses her deceased father, and her friend wants to talk to a deceased
boyfriend, and so the girls use a Ouija board and a solar eclipse to summon their spirits.
As tends to happen when Ouija boards are involved, things don't go according to plan.
You know what to expect.
Or, at least, you think you do.
Veronica succeeds where other films fall short through a mixture of real-life terror and
pitch-perfect filmmaking.
It knows how to push all the right buttons, and that elevates a standard horror flick
to what some people are calling the "scariest movie ever."
After watching Veronica, some viewers are plagued by nightmares for days.
Others can only go to sleep with the lights on after watching.
And those are just the people who finished the movie.
Many don't make it that far.
Life is short, after all.
Why spend the rest of it cowering in fear?
Teeth
Of course, Veronica isn't the only disturbing movie on Netflix that people keep bailing
on.
In Veronica's aftermath, the streaming service reached out to Forbes and provided a list
of ten movies that are so scary, people just won't watch them until the end.
Many of the entries on the list make sense.
The Human Centipede 2: Full Sequence?
So gross that it was banned in Britain and in Australia.
And if the violence in 2016's Cabin Fever doesn't get you, the rest of the production
probably will: it has a shockingly low rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
And yet, even among these shockers, Teeth stands out.
In the film, the main character is Dawn O'Keefe, a Christian abstinence advocate who suffers
from a condition that or, to put it as mildly as possible, has teeth where she shouldn't
have teeth.
As such, many of Teeth's scenes aren't just uncomfortable.
They're intentionally squirm-inducing, especially for the guys in the audience.
It's no wonder so few viewers last until the credits roll.
Mother!
Darren Aronofsky's mother! isn't a traditional horror movie.
It doesn't have any monsters or supernatural threats, but that doesn't make the film any
less troubling.
Love it or hate it, mother! is successfully disturbing, thanks largely to the brutal and
relentless abuse heaped on Jennifer Lawrence's character.
Taken all together, it's kind of a lot.
Too much, in fact.
Some critics found mother!'s graphic depictions supremely distasteful.
Audiences agreed.
People flocked to the exits during mother!'s theatrical screenings, and we can't say we
blame 'em.
Raw
Maybe you didn't complete a film because you decided to turn it off.
Maybe you're simply too grossed out to stay in the theater.
Sometimes, however, you don't have a choice.
People didn't just walk out of Raw.
They found the movie so disturbing that they passed out in the theater.
Try finishing a movie while you're unconscious.
As far as Raw is concerned, it only takes a single scene to get everyone's stomachs
heaving.
When Raw begins, veterinary student Justine is a lifelong vegetarian, but she's forced
to consume meat as part of a hazing ritual.
As a result, she's consumed by a very specific hunger.
A hamburger doesn't do the trick.
Neither does raw chicken.
It's only after Justine's sister accidentally cuts off her own finger and passes out that
Justine finds the answer.
Justine picks up the severed appendage and...you get the idea.
For a couple of viewers at the Toronto International Film Festival, that was enough.
At least two people passed out, forcing the festival to call an ambulance.
Others fled to prevent vomiting.
And that's just the beginning, too, Justine's cravings don't end with just a finger, and
it's probably best for everyone that the more sensitive members of the audience didn't stick
around to see just how depraved things get.
A Serbian Film
Even if you've got an unnaturally high tolerance for grotesque scenes in movies, you've probably
got some kind of limit.
Chances are, A Serbian Film will find it, and then blow right past it.
Of course, A Serbian Film isn't just shocking for shock's sake.
It's got social and political messages.
That's what the director says, anyway.
He told Electric Sheep Magazine:
"It's a struggle against all the corrupt authorities that govern our lives for their own purposes."
When it comes to Serbia specifically, the director said the movie represents a metaphor
for
"The monolithic power of leaders who hypnotize you to do things you don't want to do."
Whether it's successful is up for debate.
What we do know is that A Serbian Film is intensely disturbing.
Even some employees at the distribution company responsible for its U.S. release couldn't
finish it.
Unless you're desensitized to, well, everything, there's no reason to think that you'll do
any better.
Caligula
According to legend, the Roman emperor Caligula wasn't a nice guy, and the movie Caligula
is as depraved as its subject matter.
There's also just way too much of it.
With a runtime that borders on three hours, Caligula requires a major time investment,
and all of that debauchery gets exhausting fast.
Even acclaimed film critic Roger Ebert couldn't sit through it, saying: "Disgusted and unspeakably
depressed, I walked out of the film after two hours of its 170-minute length."
The Great Ecstasy of Robert Carmichael
You could watch The Great Ecstasy of Robert Carmichael all the way through, but why?
By all accounts, the film is thoroughly unpleasant.
According to Variety, a few of its scenes, quote, "make A Clockwork Orange look like
a Britney Spears video."
When the film screened at Cannes, one scene prompted a mass walkout.
Given that one critic called The Great Ecstasy of Robert Carmichael's climax "a sequence
excruciating beyond any in memory," we're going to bet that the Cannes showing wasn't
the only time everyone bailed.
Not that the rest of The Great Ecstasy of Robert Carmichael is particularly easy to
watch, of course.
By the time Robert becomes an ecstasy dealer, he's more or less beyond redemption...and
the audience is more or less done with it all.
Hereditary
In Hereditary, Toni Collette plays an artist, Annie, who just lost her borderline-abusive
mother to cancer.
Meanwhile, her relationships with her husband, her son, and her daughter are slowly deteriorating.
That's enough to make Hereditary uncomfortable from the start.
When the scares start dropping, it becomes unbearable.
Writer-director Ari Aster describes his critically acclaimed haunted house film as a personal
project, saying,
"I had gone through some stuff with my family.
I took my sickness and now put it inside all of you."
Aster didn't elaborate further, but whatever the issue was, it must've been messed up.
Hereditary isn't just the strongest debut from a horror director since Get Out, it's
one of the most terrifying films to come along in years, if you can manage to sit through
the whole thing.
Not everyone can.
While Hereditary received rave reviews when it screened at Sundance, it was also scary
enough to drive many viewers from the theater.
Even people who stayed for the whole thing didn't really want to.
By all accounts, the film isn't unsettling because of its jump scares; It's hard to watch
because the characters' pain is so real.
Meet the Feebles
If you're bored, try this: invite some friends over, make sure they're relaxed, and then
put on Meet the Feebles.
Don't tell them what's coming.
Don't reveal that what starts as a low-budget Muppet knockoff quickly transforms into something
much, much worse.
Let your buddies discover that for themselves, and see how long it takes before you don't
have any friends left.
Anyone who grew up with the Muppets will either find Meet the Feebles darkly hilarious or
deeply disturbing.
Watching off-brand versions of Jim Henson's classic characters dropped into the seedy
underbelly of a crime-ridden city is nearly unbearable.
Oh, and did we mention that Meet the Feebles was directed by Peter Jackson, the man who
brought Middle-earth to the big screen?
Yup, that's right.
At some point, someone saw Meet the Feebles and thought Peter Jackson should be given
nearly $300 million dollars and the freedom to make a few of the most ambitious films
of all time.
Sure, Meet the Feebles may be too disturbing for many viewers to finish, but for Peter
Jackson, it worked out very well indeed.