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Help, I started watching these notorious, near universally panned exploitation films because I was in a bad mood and wanted something to be angry about, except I accidentally ended up thinking they were KIND OF FUCKING GREAT, ACTUALLY, and now I am forced to declare myself a card-carrying member of the Dead Rapists Cinematic Universe fanclub. I swear with hand on heart that I'm not trying to be iconoclastic here. I just. I thought these were good films. I enjoyed them. I can see where the critical consensus is coming from and I don't think it's Wrong, per se, but I also really just completely disagree, which I guess means that I am either a bad feminist or (I'd prefer to think) just vibrating on a different frequency than the mainstream in this case.
Anyway, backing up a bit: I Spit On Your Grave is an extremely controversial rape-revenge horror movie franchise. It's about...well, I guess the genre label is pretty self-explanatory. A rape survivor exacts murderous revenge on her rapists. The original film was released in 1978, and widely banned or censored around the world for its graphic depictions of sexual violence. (A brutal gang rape scene takes up 30 full minutes of runtime.) A remake came out in 2010, followed by a couple of sequels; in 2019, the original director and lead actress returned with a sequel to the 1978 version. So far I have only watched the 2010 remake and its 2015 direct sequel. I plan to watch the 1978 as well but will probably skip the 2019 sequel (which apparently kills my first movie Final Girl blorbo) and am undecided on the 2013 middle movie of the remake trilogy (unrelated plot with all-new characters).
I'm going to put the entire rest of this post under a cut for obvious reasons. But tl;dr, if you can stomach the sexual violence, these movies absolutely have a place in the feminist conversation imo and are very impactful, successful horror in their own right.
( Potentially triggering discussion of potentially triggering films under the cut )
Has anyone else here watched any of these movies? Or want to use my "objectively" bad taste new obsession as a jumping-off point to gush about your own favourite exploitation media? Just tell me I'm not alone here in actually really, really liking something I'm by all accounts supposed to hate.
Anyway, backing up a bit: I Spit On Your Grave is an extremely controversial rape-revenge horror movie franchise. It's about...well, I guess the genre label is pretty self-explanatory. A rape survivor exacts murderous revenge on her rapists. The original film was released in 1978, and widely banned or censored around the world for its graphic depictions of sexual violence. (A brutal gang rape scene takes up 30 full minutes of runtime.) A remake came out in 2010, followed by a couple of sequels; in 2019, the original director and lead actress returned with a sequel to the 1978 version. So far I have only watched the 2010 remake and its 2015 direct sequel. I plan to watch the 1978 as well but will probably skip the 2019 sequel (which apparently kills my first movie Final Girl blorbo) and am undecided on the 2013 middle movie of the remake trilogy (unrelated plot with all-new characters).
I'm going to put the entire rest of this post under a cut for obvious reasons. But tl;dr, if you can stomach the sexual violence, these movies absolutely have a place in the feminist conversation imo and are very impactful, successful horror in their own right.
( Potentially triggering discussion of potentially triggering films under the cut )
Has anyone else here watched any of these movies? Or want to use my "objectively" bad taste new obsession as a jumping-off point to gush about your own favourite exploitation media? Just tell me I'm not alone here in actually really, really liking something I'm by all accounts supposed to hate.
