Men Behind The Sun (1988)

(AKA: Man Behind The Sun - Unit 731)

My rating 7/10

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Troops of Unit 731 hunt down and capture Chinese and Russian people so the scientists can perform horrific experiments on them to test new biological weapons.

Based on true events surrounding Unit 731 during the second world war this movie is most definitely up there as one of the most disturbing films ever made. The experiments are brutal and are based on actual ones performed. A woman has her hands frozen in ice then plunged into hot water, a doctor then cuts the skin and pulls the flesh off the bones, an effect created by using the real arms of a dead person that the actress held inside the coat arms. A man is placed into a decompression chamber and the pressure is turned up until his body expands and his intesines squirt out through his anus and snake across the floor. People are blown up, put to death in a gas chamber, there's an autopsy of a child, again, using the corpse of an actual child, and the infamous scene of a cat being eaten alive by rats which are later set of fire. The cat scene may or may not have been real, depends on what interview you read, but the rats on fire definitely are.

The acting is pretty good and the film is well made which really helps to make this a very tough watch even for hardened horror fans. Despite all that I do really like this one and it easily makes my top 10 "disturbing" movies list. It's also worth reading up on the atrocities that were commited by them during this time, it's both very interesting and gut wrenching at the same time.

I'd definitely recommend this movie but know what you're getting into before watching it. Casual horror fans should steer well clear of this one.

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