Welcome to the very first installment of Hare-brained Reviews, where your intrepid host offers his renownedly ignoble, gleefully nonsensical, and questionably coherent takes on the world of film. The second installment of the Hare-brained Cinematic Universe (Because I needed a fourth fucking writing project), in this blog, I will offer up my synopsis of a movie, in a way that will likely lead you to believe I am intoxicated, actually I have wrote everything on this substack while sober and this is just how my brain works (Crazy right), before ranking the film using a highly technical and very scientific rating scale. The criteria are Plot, Performances, Writing, Technical Craft, and It Factor. The first four are hopefully self-explanatory, while the last assesses whether the film captivated me, whether it resonated with me, and whether I am likely to watch it again. This will be combined into a final rating out of fifty, along with my recommendation on whether you should watch it or not. And as a note, I put a lot of work into Hare-brained History, and I work very hard on those other two projects. I hope you enjoy this, but I am doing this for shits and gigs.
Our first movie is one I have long heard about, a result of being a fat kid who watched too much YouTube and read too many Wikipedia pages. I have also always loved and been captivated by Horror, and this movie is exceptionally well-known in the horrorverse, with some listing it as one of the greatest of all time. Will I agree? Stay fucking tuned. Anyways, we (I) are watching Audition or オーディション by Takashi Miike.
Synopsis
So Aoyosoma is a businessman, and his wife is sick. His young child walks through a hospital with an arts and crafts DIY project he probably made at school, which says “Get well soon, Mom,” except it’s in Japanese, and I don’t speak that language. The kid walks in right as mom dies, and like wtf, did they just let this kid walk from school to the hospital while his Mom died? Anyways, Aoyosoma raises his kid as a single dad for the next seven years. I think his kid is supposed to be around 14, but he looks like he’s 18. He also loves dinosaurs and keeps going on about it throughout the movie. He also brings a girl back to the apartment, so his age is pretty ambiguous. They also have a dog which looks like a beagle, but isn’t a beagle, its legs are too stubby. His name is, like Gongju (I think that might be right), and don’t worry, nothing bad happens to him. One day, Aoyosoma’s kid says something like “Dad, you look like shit” and tells him to get remarried. I look like shit, and I sure as fuck don’t think getting married will help with that.
Aoyosoma is definitely lonely. He's so lonely that he doesn't catch one of his employees blatantly flirting with him. She goes up to him and says, “I am getting married,” and then she looks at him and gives him the fuck me eyes for like two minutes, basically like “You gonna do anything about this?” before motioning down to her body. Aoyosoma is probably in his late 40s, and a little chunky, but he's cute, has money, and isn't an asshole. However, Japan is full of very lonely people, that's what the movie says. I won’t make any broad, sweeping generalizations about another culture. He goes out drinking with his film producer buddy, idk his name, but he looked familiar, and the film producer makes fun of a bunch of women out drinking having a good time, he's like “ women today are empty-headed sluts.” Not misogynistic at all. Aoyosoma discusses how his son wants him to remarry, and he and his film producer buddy converse, with the latter coming up with an idea. Film producer says, I'm making a movie. You help me select girls for the audition, and you wine and dine whichever girl you like. Then, you'll have a hot wife! Not misogynistic at all. Aoyosoma has a penis, so he's like, “That's a great idea!”
He goes home, drinks from his decanter of whiskey, and looks at girls' applications and their essays. This one girl's essay strikes him, but it was in Japanese and they didn't translate it, so idk what it said. They have their audition, and some of the girls are boring, one of them talks about her trauma, the film producer asks them if they'd do porn, yk regular things. One of the girls gets naked. At this point in the movie, I was fucking shocked. It has been super light and rom comy, and then all of a sudden TITS. Aoyosoma hasn't asked any questions to this point, but then the girl whose essay he liked comes up. This is Asami, and this time I nailed the name. She is very, very skinny and looks very, very young. She is 24, but 24 going on 15. She is super intense, but Aoyosoma says, “Your essay about how you talked about the end of your ballet career being like death moved me so much,” except he said about 50 more words. The table they are sitting at moves a couple of inches, and his buddy is like, “ the fuck.” Asami, who is super intense, says, “Arigatō” and bows her head.
We get a flash cut at some point to this random dingy ass apartment with just a telephone and a giant sack in it, what is that about! Aoyosoma drinks his whiskey and calls Asami, and is all like “ hey, we’re looking at you for a part, wanna go out?” and Asami says “ Sup baby take me out to dinner.”Anyway, the two go out and it goes great, except the next day the film producer tells Aoyosoma that none of the girls' references check out. But Aoyosoma is like Mr. Wright and just wants a tight fit. His film producer buddy warns him to be careful, but Aoyosoma says, “I’m a grown man, I won't let this little girl drive me crazy,” to which his buddy makes him promise to let it chill for a couple of days, and he agrees.
Aoyosoma goes about his life, petting Gangju, listening to his son talk about dinosaurs, and drinking his whiskey. We get more random flash cuts to the random ass dingy apartment, and what is that all about! While at work, Ayo (as I've just decided to call him for the rest of this) contemplates calling Asami, and after deliberating, does so. Jump cut back to the scary apartment, and now we can see Samara from Ring sitting all creepy with her head down. It pans in, and a slow smile forms on Samara's face, and HOLY SHIT IT'S ASAMI. Jokes aside, this moment, after 50 minutes of rom-com-esque action, is jarring and creepy. Asami, who has been waiting DAYS by the phone to get this call, says, “Oh, I was getting worried you wouldn't call.” And the two go on another date where Asami opens up about her tragic backstory involving abuse and dead parents. Here they are at dinner.
Ayo’s son takes a break from dinosaurs and boning sloots to say, “Dad, who you fucking? You're all smiley, it's a dead giveaway.” And his Dad is like, “She’s 24, don't be weird.” His son says, and this is actually what he says, “She’s closer to my age than yours… she's probably cheating on you.” Ayo is like, “Ah son, you are such a scamp.” Ayo tells his son that he's inviting Asami on a beach getaway, and he plans to propose. After checking in, Asami and Ayo are in the room, and Ayo’s going on and on about how the hotel has a good chef, and there is a good little spot for tea, while Asami is stripping naked. I know that the Japanese have a sexually repressed society, but come on, dude, she's giving you a sign. She gets under the covers, and she says, “Look at my body,” and Ayo is all about that, except Asami actually means “look at my body,” and shows him burn scars her fucked up ballet coach stepfather gave her. And then she forces Ayo to swear her undying love for her, and Ayo has a penis, so he does, and then they bang.
Ayo wakes up all disoriented and confused and finds out Asami has ditched him. He goes back to his film producer friend, all upset because he fell in love with this teenage-looking girl he tricked into going out with him, and the film producer tells him to leave it, but Ayo says, “ fuck you, I'm finding her.” He goes looking for her at the ballet studio she trained at, and he meets her asshole paraplegic trainer stepfather, who calls Asami a “whore” and asks Ayo if he’s “smelled her yet,” and that’s not misogynistic at all. Then Ayo goes to the bar that Asami says she worked at, but finds it’s closed. The bar is underground because Japan. A neighbor comes by and cheerfully tells Ayo that it has been closed for a year after the owner was found, all hacked up, with an extra tongue and set of ears left behind. Weird!
At the same time, the camera sneaks into Ayo’s house, which I was sure was an apartment, but then I got confused. I mean, it’s Asami, you don’t see that, but it is. The camera finds a picture of Ayo’s dead wife, and the camera does not like that. I would hope Ayo brought up the fact he was a widower, but considering he tricked this girl into dating him, I doubt it. Ayo gets home, and, oh yeah, his son is at a friend's house. He sits down to engage in his favorite pastime: drinking a decanter of whiskey. By the time he's like three glasses deep, he gets up, realizing his drink is off, and then he passes out. Things are not on the up and up for Ayo.
We get a flashback to an Asami traumasposition which can be summed up in the line “that’s why I didn’t kill myself, though my life was terrible.” Ayo is having visions of his dead wife telling him not to marry Asami, of Asami sucking his dick, or other women sucking his dick AND OH SHIT ONE OF THEM WAS THAT RANDOM SECRETARY. Turns out he used her, and she wanted more. Ayo feels bad about this. Then he pictures the girl his son brought home! What ew gross! But he pushes her away. Ayo is suddenly in Asami’s apartment with the big fucking sack. He decides to open it, like an idiot, and you’ll never believe it, there’s a dude in there! His legs have been severed, and his tongue removed. It’s nasty. OMG AND THEN ASAMI PUKES IN A BOWL AND FEEDS IT TO HIM. I don’t know what’s going on at this point, then her stepfather/ballet teacher shows up, and Asami cuts his fucking head off! I took this with my phone.
Ayo has been in and out of dreams, hallucinations, and nightmares, so idk what’s happening anymore. And then suddenly he’s back on his floor after drinking whiskey. Turns out, Asami drugged it, if you can believe it. It’s a paralyzing agent that will allow Ayo to feel everything but not be able to move. Asami shows up in leather, and poor Gongju is dead. THAT BITCH. She’s got a leather bag of tools, and yk what, I don’t think this is good. OMG NEEDLES IN THE EYES AND TONGUE, Jesus. We are in full-on torture porn. Though it probably says a lot about me that seeing Asami in leather and boots is the hottest she’s been in the whole movie. She starts with the delusional jealousy of a mentally ill person, saying something like “ you said you’d love only me, not your fucking son.” Oh, but she does give Ayo some nice acupuncture! I don’t think it’s supposed to go “deeper, deeper, deeper. Words lie, but pain doesn’t. Deeper, deeper, this is the most sensitive spot on the stomach,” says Asami. Yk, what guys? I think she’s the bad guy. Here she is putting needles in Ayo’s eyes.
See, Asami threatens dinosaur boy too; she is upset that Ayo loves other people, and she wants to be someone’s one and only. She says about men, “You men are all the same,” while she is in the middle of severing Ayo’s foot with her garrote wire. Poor Ayo pleads and pleads, but she doesn’t seem to be the merciful type. And all of a sudden, this just became my left foot, because it’s gone, and she’s going for the right! DINO BOY SHOWS UP. And wait a second, another dream. Ayo is back in the hotel with Asami, and she’s all cozy, and Ayo has his feet. It was all a dream. He washes his face, like you do in the movies, and he says, “What’s going on?” I don’t know Ayo! The two have sex again, and Asami says she agrees to Ayo’s proposal to marry him. She says, “I can’t believe it, am I allowed to be happy. Out of all those girls at the audition, I am the luckiest.” That’s nice. Why did I watch 10 minutes of torture porn? Oh, wait, never mind. That was all real. Asami chases Dino boy upstairs, and then he kicks her down the stairs. She breaks her neck and dies. Ayo tells his son to call for an ambulance. THE END
Plot: 7 needles in the eye out of ten
I knew what was coming when I went into the movie. Still, those first fifty minutes of melodrama, romantic comedy, and low-stakes tension lulled me into a false sense of security, until that scene in Asami’s apartment. That’s the moment you feel it: oh, shit! One of the creepiest scenes I’ve ever seen, especially in context. From there, the film shifts into Ayo’s investigation, which doubles as an exploration of the enigma that is Asami. Even if parts of her backstory feel uneven, it’s compelling enough to explain how she became the monster we finally see.
I’m a masochist, but the visceral torture-porn of the Saw or Hostel franchises has never worked for me. Violence for the sake of violence feels hollow, especially when it is so extreme. But this is different. Here, the brutality isn’t gratuitous; it’s the culmination of everything in Asami’s life. Her history of abuse and neglect stripped her of control and twisted her longing for love into something dark and warped. So when she feels betrayed, her instinct is to make someone else feel the very pain that shaped her.
Not everything worked for me. The opening scene was so fucking cheesy and dumb. Why was that little kid left unattended walking through, and presumably to a hospital! The dream sequence didn’t work for me either; it came across as clumsy exposition. Ayo sees what’s going on in Asami’s apartment, and maybe it’s all imagined, but I took it literally. Sure, it explains why the characters feel and act the way they do, but there are more effective ways to convey that kind of backstory. Dream sequences almost always feel like a shortcut, and this one was no exception. And then there’s the pacing. The first fifty minutes drag painfully, so. I get that it’s meant to lull you into a false sense of security, but it didn’t need to be that dull. Honestly, the only time I perked up was when that one girl showed her tits.
Performances: 9 needles in the eyes out of 10
The two leads deliver phenomenal performances, giving their characters depth and weight that make them feel like real people. I found myself genuinely sympathizing with Ayo, a lonely man who falls for someone he shouldn’t. Yes, he’s complicit in the skeevy audition process and objectifies women, but beneath that, he comes across as well-meaning and, for the most part, good-hearted. Asami, on the other hand, is terrifying, and yet the actress makes her more than a monster. She conveys Asami’s numbness to the world and her desperate need for love so convincingly that you can’t help but feel for her, even as she drifts toward violence. The fact that the actress was primarily a model, with little acting experience before or after, makes her performance all the more impressive, especially the gleeful menace she brings to the torture sequence. The rest of the cast? Serviceable but unremarkable. No one else left a lasting impression.
Writing: 8 needles in the eye out of 10
One might assume this category overlaps heavily with performance, and to some extent, it does. Excellent writing can be undermined by poor acting, and brilliant performances can’t always save weak dialogue. But to me, writing is about more than just lines; it’s about the overall message and what the story is trying to say. This film has a lot to say about how men commodify women, how relationships can be shaped by entitlement, and how, at times, we as men (and yes, I include myself here) use women for our own emotional needs. Some have even called it a feminist film. I’m not sure I’m equipped to unpack that entirely, but I can say this much: it’s not a “yes, queen” empowerment story. Some movies, like I Spit on Your Grave, where the protagonist is raped and seeks brutal revenge on the men who did this, are certainly empowering while being extremely violent. I don't think Audition is like that.
Asami is terrifying, her violence extreme, but it’s born of a deeply tragic past. Still, I can’t frame needles to the eye, dismemberment, and feeding a man vomit as empowering. The dialogue, for the most part, felt natural and grounded, though the dream sequence still stands out as the weakest link, a clumsy detour in an otherwise thoughtful script.
Technical Craft: 6 needles in the eye out of 10
This category encompasses cinematography, score, and effects, all areas in which I am an expert. Right away, I can tell this film was made in 1999. The overall look shows its age, there were moments where I caught myself thinking, “Wow, this feels dated.” That does not always happen to me, even with films that are much older. The camera work had a few wacky and zany shots, which I love if they make sense in context; these did not. Here, they felt more distracting than purposeful. As for the score, I honestly couldn’t recall a single note after the credits rolled, which says all you need to know about its impact. But the effects, especially during the torture scene, were fantastic. Practical, visceral, and paired with tight, deliberate camerawork, they sold the moment in a way that felt chillingly real.
It Factor: 8 needles in the eye out of 10
“Kiri-kiri-kiri-kiri.” That means deeper, and hearing that in Asami’s singsong high voice as she sticks needles in Ayo's eyes will stick with me. As a man, and as a man who has engaged in some equally morally questionable relationships with women, this movie will stick with me. It really did make me think about my own conduct in relationships, and the consequences of them, which thankfully have not had a foot sawn off. I was captivated watching the movie, the tonal shifts in the film worked for me, each leaving me even more intrigued, with the final shift into torture porn a horribly disgusting train wreck I couldn’t look away from. But it was not perfect as I have laid out above, and I am not itching for a second watch anytime soon.
Verdict: 38 needles in the eye out of 50
I may well have spoiled Audition for you, but given my dumbass synopsis is a dumbass synopsis, you can still watch it and enjoy. And I think it is worth it! But it is not one of the best horror movie of all time; but it is definitely the best I’ve seen in which a man has needles placed in his eyes.
Hey, give me a movie to watch! And let me know if you enjoyed this! Thanks all!
I kinda want to throw up… but I think I’ll watch this. Godfather part 1 needs a review.
you should watch ‘i’m thinking of ending things’. it’s not what it sounds like