10 Swingers
Doug Liman, 1996

The tail-chasing blokishness makes you want to punch the nearest man in the throat.
WENDY IDE

9 How the West Was Won
John Ford/Henry Hathaway/George Marshall, 1962

“But darling, it’s a western epic, it’s only three hours long and it features a commanding turn from John Wayne as a Civil War general!” And you wonder why you were dumped?
"Cinerama is something to be wondered at": how The Times saw it, 1962
KEVIN MAHER

8 Audition
Takashi Miike, 1999

A movie about a woman who takes men out on dates, then chops them into pieces? Not an aphrodisiac.
KEVIN MAHER

7 Sex: The Annabel Chong Story
Gough Lewis, 1999

You’ll never want to have sex again after watching this gruelling documentary about the porn actress Chong, who lays bare her damaged soul and her poor, chafed lady bits.
WENDY IDE

6 Shoah
Claude Lanzmann, 1985

The possibility of post-movie discussions about the Holocaust is scuppered by the movie’s ten-hour running time.
KEVIN MAHER

5 Irréversible
Gaspar Noé, 2002

You’re doomed from the opening reel of this nihilistic French stomach-churner. But if you make it as far as the nine-minute rape scene, all mood will be duly killed.
KEVIN MAHER

4 The Death of Mr Lazarescu
Cristi Puiu, 2005

A lonely old man slowly dies of liver cancer as Romania’s labyrinthine health service fails him at every turn. Fun!
WENDY IDE

3 Nil by Mouth
Gary Oldman, 1997

Spousal abuse, drugs, misery, plus Ray Winstone at his most terrifying. The antidate movie.
WENDY IDE

2 Baise-moi
Virginie Despentes, Coralie, 2000

Two zany homicidal French prostitutes on a kill-hungry rampage. And you get to see everything! Hmmm.
KEVIN MAHER

1 Vera Drake
Mike Leigh, 2004

Any film about abortion is best avoided (see also 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days), but the tragedy of the backstreet abortionist Vera (Imelda Staunton) is wrist-slashingly bleak.
WENDY IDE

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