The audience at the Sundance Film Festival got comfortable indoors to watch “The Killer Inside Me,” but soon found themselves shifting uncomfortably in their seats.

Michael Winterbottom’s latest film centers on West Texas deputy sheriff Lou Ford (Affleck) who’s revealed to be a psychotic killer.

The adaptation of the Jim Thompson noir novel from 1952 does not spare the viewers from seeing both Jessica Alba and Kate Hudson’s characters getting brutally beaten in detail by the sheriff. The scenes were so unsettling, The Hollywood Reporter’s Risky Business blog described it: “It’s ultra-real, excruciating to watch and, in some viewers’ minds, inexcusable.”

It appears that “Killer” has raised the debate again about violence in film, whether or not it is necessary or just glorified.