Guinea Pig 3: Shudder! The Man Who Doesn't Die (Ginī Piggu 3: Senritsu! Shinanai Otoko, a.k.a. "He Never Dies")

I've talked about the worst two parts of the controversial "Guinea Pig" series, but that is pretty much where most of the controversy ends. "The Devil's Experiment" and "Flower Of Flesh And Blood" were pseudo-snuff movies with very little to no plot, and pretty much made to disgust the audience and leave a bad taste in their mouth.

"He Never Dies" (may as well use the short title) is a more silly and bizarre title. After the controversy of the first two films, made to feel real and were quite serious and mean spirited in nature, the series took a very surprising turn. It had a script, a full cast, opening and closing credits, and was made as a horror comedy!

"He Never Dies" is a 1986 film directed by Masayuki Kusumi, who doesn't seem to have directed anything since. The film is about a man who lives alone in a small apartment. He is experiencing problems with his life and with his work. Not only has he lost his girlfriend, but he is bored and always in trouble with his boss at work, who wants nothing to do with him. He attempts to cut his wrist at home, but the pain makes him reconsider his attempt at suicide.

Instead of suicide, he decides not to go back to work. After 4 days of sitting about bored, and with not a single phone call from anyone to see if he's OK, including his boss, he assumes he has just been forgotten. He finally gets the courage to cut his wrist and does it properly this time. He panics and sits on the floor, waiting for death, when he realises that the pain is gone and the blood has stopped.

He then stabs through his arm with a pen, which also does nothing to him. Frustrated, he chops his hand off which also doesn't have the desired effect of killing him! He comes to the conclusion that he can't die and even tries calling the emergency services to tell them this fact, but even they don't care. After some more attempts at killing himself to no avail, he decides to get revenge on his ex-girlfriend and a co-worker who is going out with her.

He calls his co-worker (who is also in the company of his ex-firlfriend) and asks him to come over under the pretence that he needs gardening utensils for some reason, and also a hatchet! When the co-worker comes to his house (also with the ex-girlfriend who waits in the car) he proceeds to terrify him by cutting open his stomach with a knife and throwing his internal organs over the co-worker.

The ex-girlfriend comes up to see what's taking so long with her boyfriend. When she goes into the apartment she finds her boyfriend unconscious on the floor and the man's severed head (which is still alive) on the table. Instead of being scared, she berates the man for making such a mess of his apartment, and starts to clean up all the blood.

All very bizarre. The end credits are of gory scenes from the movie played backwards and of an outtake of everyone goofing around and laughing. Also there's an American guy who presents the film at the start, and also closes the film saying there could be more immortal people in the world like the man in the film who don't realise it yet!

Besides the extreme violence, this is a very lighthearted and fun film. The main character is very likeable and quite funny, and at just over 40 minutes in length, it doesn't outstay it's welcome. It's also one of the strangest films in the "Guinea Pig" series, especially when placed beside the previous two films in the series. I bet no one was expecting a sequel like this after a film like "Flower Of Flesh And Blood". That's probably why I like it so much!

After the realism of the first two films and the way they were probably taken so seriously by the press at the time, I think this is the series way of telling people to lighten up a bit. You can tell they had a lot of fun making this film. As unsettling as "Flower And Flesh And Blood" was (which is a credit to the director Hideshi Hino for making an effective film), when you see the making of the film, all you see is the makers of the film and the actors having a good laugh and goofing around. It's weird to see the contrast between the making of a film, and the film itself!

I couldn't find a trailer for this film but I found a best of video. Enjoy!

Thanks to everyone for reading!

Michael.