I haven't seen this movie, but in what other art form to we grant this kind of leeway? "Hey, look: an artist just did a painting a steaming pile of excrement. But man, you've at least gotta appreciate the brushwork!" No you don't. It's a steaming pile of excrement.

At least it's artistic? I'd want to say a little more for myself than that. The real challenge is taking artistic talents and channeling them into something worthy, not simply presenting them in their raw form and expect people to be automatically impressed.

And furthermore, hasn't any artistic point that there might be in showing violent sadistic images already been made? We've been suffering through 'realistic' depictions of violence in film since at least Straw Dogs in 1971.