Salo, or the 120 Days of Sodom

The director was reportedly in despair at the random violence of Italian society just before his death; that despair permeates his final work and gives it a posthumous significance.

There was a point to all this foulness; Pasolini was commenting on the dehumanising effect of fascism, with reference to Proust, Nietzsche and Dante's circles of Hell. You'll still want a shower afterwards, though.

This film is essential to have seen but impossible to watch: a viewer may find life itself defiled beyond redemption by the simple fact that such things can be shown or even imagined.

It's very hard to sit through and offers no insights whatsoever into power, politics, history or sexuality. Nasty stuff.

Fastidiously attuned to the denial of the comforting release of either eroticism or expulsion, Pasolini's boudoirs of perversion lack De Sade's scarlet hedonism. Quite the opposite, his boners reveal only the presence of spiritual rigor mortis.

Very hard to take, but in its own way an essential work.

Salo is a beautifully photographed and thoughtful film,

Disgusting, terrible, awful, no good...

The messaging here feels blunt and unsophisticated to modern eyes.

It makes its point about Fascism, and Pasolini's artistic sense is obvious in every frame, but the film becomes an endurance contest to see if you can make it to the bitter end without vomiting.