48.Whither Catharsis?

The  entry  on Audition (Odishon) Japan, South Korea, 1999,  in the Handbook of the 18^th International Film Festival  of Kerala 2013, reads:

Takashi Mike provides the viewers a paradoxical movie experience that leaves one  grasping for superlatives while simultaneously grasping for  breath...The film portrays the changing role of women in a society that remains gender- regressive and packed with male protagonist.

Unlike in previous years, this year,  twice  I failed to find  a seat in unexpectedly over crowded theatres. So I was forced to choose  the late 8.45 PM show on a Sunday. Half way through the film, Audition, when the gory scenes of mutilation flashed on the screen,  couples in their late fifties started leaving the theatre. I stayed   on  abstaining  from  looking at the screen for minutes together even as the groaning pain of the tortured victim reverberated in the theatre. Then  in a  horrendous scene, the ‘heroine’ a  retired young ballet  artist, paralyses the person who has expressed his affection for her and  mounts his body. Next,  she begins   piercing his face and body with needles  each time with   the sound a love bird makes ‘ku,ku,ku,ku,ku.’ To my utter shock, the  vast majority of male audience,  mimicked the ‘ku,ku,ku,ku,ku’ sound, relishing  the performance even as she  dismembers the feet of the  victim  using a  metal string!

In  the dark,  I managed to jot down in a piece of paper, the words of the  ‘heroine’ :

Prior to the mutilation, she tells the person who is all  adoration for her “...When I dance, it purifies...” and when the mutilation commences “...words create lies, pain can be trusted...”

The film over, I left the theatre asking myself “Whither Catharsis?”

Won’t  you dear reader, enlighten me....