In Which I’d Like to Do Things for Which I Have No Stomach
Okay, so my undergrad thesis was on this terrible 1987 movie called The Believers, and how the film both reflected and created images about Cuban immigrants, Santeria, and the various ritual/satanic abuse nonsense that was going on at the time.
That is the single most concise manner in which I’ve ever described my thesis. You’re welcome.
Anyhoo, I’m becoming increasingly obsessed with a new genre of films called ‘torture porn’ - basically, Saw, Hostel and the like. Here’s a perfect description from an LA Times’ review of Hostel II:
…the plot finds three nubile coeds trapped in an Eastern European sadism club where fiends on vacation pay to slowly carve up strangers.
They’re part of a specifically post-9/11 genre, and seem to have a lot to tell us about fear of the unknown, the the emasculation created by such fear, and its relations to femininity. These films (as well as things like Law and Order: SVU - my least favorite television program this side of According to Jim) differ from slasher films of the 1980s, though they are in some ways closely related. I could write all sorts of a thesis on this.
But I can’t watch them.
I’m the girl who made jw sleep in my bed with me after The Ring. Andrew and I had to walk out of Severance at the Chicago International Film Festival (a selection I’m sure I’d be hearing about for years if only he could remember going). I even pretended I wanted to read my book at Danielle’s second-grade birthday sleepover where we watched A Nightmare on Elm Street. (In my defense, it was a highly inappropriate choice for seven-year-olds.)
fourfour is my inspiration for this post, though I ultimately disagree with many of his points. Here’s the quote from Hostel and Hostel II’s director that set me off:
I had been looking for stuff you could do to girls that would be awful but not so horrifying that you felt like you couldn’t watch it or you felt like you had been kicked in the stomach.
I’ve highlighted the operative word there. Granted, the two originators of the genre (Saw and Hostel) were both male-based. Ultimately, however, I think you could argue that all of the films are about emasculation and its regeneration through violence (with a healthy dose of xenophobia thrown in through Hostel, Severance, and Turistas).
But who really knows? I can’t bring myself to even watch these films without a guardian. I need Brandon Simmons, who successfully shepherded me through Silence of the Lambs without my ever seeing anything ugly/rotten/overly-scary.
Roth says that his films are political commentary. On a Fox talk show he created a stir by blaming President Bush for the recent torture horror. He called it all art responding to a world of ugly violence and a country disdainful of other cultures.
I don’t buy it. If Roth is honest and his films are commentary, he’s still not addressing the increasing sexualization of violence we’ve been seeing in many films and, disturbingly, many more television shows. I may have to suck it up and watch these films. Who wants to take care of me before/during/after?
A Queasy-Does-It Guy [LA Times/calendarlive.com] via fourfour
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