Peter:
Have you played PV? I sort of get back to my original response to Patrick, based on study of photos of the course and footage from things like Shell's.
It's not just the penal nature of the course immediately off the fairways and greens that looks intimidating -- they are, as many here have suggested, quite wide and big. It's the carries required to get to them that also, from my perspective as both a short and somewhat wild striker of the ball (moreso driver than irons), look quite intimidating.
In some respects, I think the course would play as something of a par 76 or 78 at a minimum for an 18-handicapper, because I'm guessing most 18-handicappers would play all of the par 4s of 400+ yards as par 5s, because the carries into the greens (and more precisely, the penal nature of shorting those approaches) simply aren't in their arsenal. (PV has, according to my dated World Atlas of Golf, six par 4s of 400+ yards, plus two others at 391 and 399).