Posted on: July 2nd, 2010 BOX OFFICE: GROSS – 8 Films Built On SHOCK
This is the most shocking film you will ever see.
You will pass out in the theatre.
You will vomit on your way out.
Many films make this claim, or claims like this. Some use shock value to drive audiences to the theatre, capitalizing on our mass curiosity of the perverse. Some use shock value as a means to express themselves creatively. Or so they say. Regardless, it seems that every couple of years we get that one movie that has everyone buzzing, proclaiming it as the most disturbing movie you will ever see! while church groups and protective parents sharpen their pitchforks.
Do they always pan out the way they’re promoted? Are they ever truly shocking or inventive? Is it all hype? Let’s take a look back at 8 of the most sensationally shocking films to stir up audiences over the years.
The Last House On The Left (1972 / 2009)
Wes Craven’s big-screen debut tackled a fairly untapped topic back in 1972 – gang rape. Not the raping of gang members, but of the lead character, seventeen year-old Mari. The brutality doesn’t end there though, as Mari’s parents continue the savage violence, this time towards their daughter’s assailants.
The film, in both its sexual and violent nature, received a slew of censorship and was banned in multiple countries, though the UK took offense to its existence the most. The film was finally given a release in the UK, with an 18 rating, in June of 2002 after 31 seconds of sexual violence was cut out.
The film was remade in 2009 and kept fairly close to the original film. This version is still quite a tense horror film, but an excruciatingly long and explicit rape scene (involving a minor, no less) makes this unwatchable in my books. Showing the audience that much rape and for that long is completely unnecessary and just downright horrible.
Rating: Rape is really tough to sell, even against the backdrop of a revenge film.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)
Tobe Hooper melded real-life events and brave, new fictional horror with his 1974 masterpiece, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which followed four friends found in the clutches of a vile, cannibalistic family in the backwoods of rural Texas. Leatherface, one of the film’s villains, was quickly solidified as a true icon of horror.
While the film carries the reputation as being shocking and gross, TCM is one of the few films of its time that manages to move past that stigma and captivate audiences on a truly visceral level. Everything aside, this is a fine film, an influential film. Like any progressive-thinking horror film though, Massacre carries with it the requisite controversy; a screening in San Francisco had theater-goers running out of the cinema, and Toronto police actually asked a theater to pull the it, due to local crime believed to have been exacerbated by the movie.
Whether you love the film or hate it, one can’t argue that The Texas Chainsaw Massacre’s release was an important day in the annals of film history. On October 1, 1974, audiences could not have expected nor would they have wished to see as much of the mad and macabre as they were to see that day.
Rating: A true classic.
I Spit On Your Grave (1978)
Originally titled ‘Day of the Woman’, I Spit On Your Grave is another rape-revenge film, only this time the victim herself is the one on the bloody rampage following a graphic and horrible assault in the woods. The interesting part of this film is just how the victim manages to exact her revenge: with sex. The same power her assailants took over her is the same means for her to dish it right back to them. One by one, young Jennifer Hills seduces these monsters, and in their moment of vulnerability she ends them (she even chops one of their “rape tools” off in a bathtub). ISOYG is a little less realistic than The Last House on the Left, and a tad easier to watch, with the victim being (arguably) vindicated.
Just like Last House, the film felt the cold hand of censors in the US, and was even banned in a few other countries. The film carries a sordid debate of whether or not it glorifies violence against women or portrays a strong, feministic message, [SPOILER] with the female lead winning in the end. Regardless, it’s high up there on the list of films some people can’t bear to watch. Roger Ebert famously said the film is “a vile bag of garbage…without a shred of artistic distinction”.
Watch it for yourself, if you have the fortitude.
Rating: More shock than substance.
Cannibal Holocaust (1980)
Is there any urban legend greater than Cannibal Holocaust? Unfortunately, the film is real. Unfortunately, it’s no good and the legends, the things you’ve heard about the film, are more shocking than the film itself.
There isn’t really a story to Cannibal Holocaust. If there is, it’s so thinly veiled over the attempts to work viewers into an “oh my god did I just see that” frenzy. Played out as lost footage, 19 years before The Blair Witch would use such a device, the film follows a documentarian as he searches the Amazonian rainforest for a crew of lost American anthropologists. It becomes clear rather quickly, that they’ve been caught by a tribe of cannibals.
The film is notorious for a number of things, mainly the on-screen killing of animals (to be specific, a caotimundi, tarantula, snake, squirrel, monkey and pig are all literally murdered in the film, uncensored) and the subsequent criminal investigation involving the film’s director, Rugerro Deodato, following the release. Four days following the film’s debut in Milan, Deodato was arrested under suspicion that all of the deaths in the film, of humans, not just animals, were real and that Cannibal Holocaust was a legitimate snuff film. Prior to its release, Deodato had it in the performer’s contracts that they could not appear in any other media for a year following the release of the film, to keep up the appearance of this being a documentary. That quickly came up to bite him in the butt, and Deodato had to gather the actors on an Italian talk show to prove it was, in fact, not real. The long arm of the law retaliated by banning the film for the next three years, until it was released in 1984 with a significant amount of cuts.
Cannibal Holocaust is a terrible film. Not just because of the animal cruelty, though really that’s enough, but because there really is no point to the film other than showing us disturbing imagery (for example, a naked woman being sacrificed via bludgeoning with a phallic stone after having been raped by it). By today’s standards, the violence isn’t all that shocking, but still, Cannibal Holocaust is just bad in every way.
Rating: A complete waste of celluloid. Offensive.
The SAW Films (2004 – 2010)
The greatest trick the devil ever pulled, was releasing a new Saw film every year for the last seven years to huge box office success. Somehow the powers that be have taken what Cannibal Holocaust was on paper, added some flashy camera techniques and recycled sets and made it completely mainstream and accessible.
Now, I don’t mean to come down on the Saw films, I found the first to be a valiant effort with an interesting idea (performances aside) and the third film to be interesting. I also applaud the use of non-linear storytelling over the course of the films, even if they have become more contrived than an M. Night Shyamalan film. The fact of the matter is that these films really aren’t good, and they most definitely are made for one reason: money. Ok, maybe two reasons: money, and “what crazy contraption can we cook up that will kill this dude”. The first film debuted the infamous jaw-snapping trap, and if you can get past the erratic music-video camera cuts then you have a mighty thrilling scene were young Amanda escapes the device. As the series progressed, we were privvy to more intricate, and ridiculous traps and torture machines, taking the thrill away from the kill.
Regardless, Saw has made it’s mark on Hollywood whether the franchise ends with this years Saw VII or finds a way to continue on Jigsaw’s legacy (dude has been dead for more films than he’s been alive). It’s not the worst horror franchise to exist, and at least it makes no false claims as to what it really is: superfluous and gross.
Rating: If lessons in torture is what you like, then you’ll find Saw to be as satisfying as McDonalds.
Hostel (2005)
Two young American sex-hounds travel through Europe in search of thrills, unbeknownst to them that an underground organization exists to put their lives in the hands of the highest bidder. Moral of the story: Stay the fuck out of Slovakia.
Like Saw before it, Eli Roth’s Hostel – one of the first films to earn the “torture porn” label – used shock as its linchpin. The difference between these films, is that Hostel is far more effective at telling a story and making us care for our main characters. The violence and gore, though abundant, isn’t there for the sake of being there, and actually has connective tissue to the plight of our victims. The film’s direction is a step above Saw, and on the whole everything feels much more real as opposed to just being splattered on the screen. If anything Hostel carries with it far more subtext (cultural ignorance, sexuality, fetishism) than any other “gorno” film like it. And it’s sickly funny.
Hostel received its fair share of criticism and backlash from censors and parents alike, but ultimately the film lurched beyond that stigma and ended up a fairly successful mainstream film, putting Eli Roth on the map and letting him do a second Hostel (ultimately not as well-received as the first). A third film in the series is being made without Roth’s participation.
Rating: A fun yet squirm-inducing trip through the wild mind of Eli Roth.
Antichrist (2009)
Based on my review, Antichrist could be the most artistically driven film on the list. The buzz surrounding the film made it out to be the most vulgar, explicit thing ever made, and that couldn’t be farther from the truth. There are less than a handful of scenes which are tough to watch, but they exist within this beautiful and haunting story of a husband and wife in mourning over their dead son. Not your typical horror movie, is it? Lars Von Trier’s take on the genre is stunningly shot, and the performances from Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg are award-worthy.
Many factors led to this film being inaccessible; it’s a small, art-house type film that received limited runs in most cities (though to be fair, it is available to stream online through Netflix and Amazon) and naturally, the violent content played a part in Antichrist becoming one of those films that was talked about and written off before it was even seen. The film stands alone in this list as being the only one to truly balance story, visuals and shock in a work of art.
Rating: Absurd and beautiful at the same time. Seek this out.
The Human Centipede: First Sequence (2009)
If you haven’t yet heard about The Human Centipede, let me paint you a picture: one of Europe’s top surgeons specializing in the separation of conjoined twins suddenly goes batshit and figures he’s been doing it wrong. Now, thanks to the help of two hapless American tourists and a Japanese man, Dr. Heiter conducts his breakthrough experiment – connecting three humans via one digestive system. You got it… ass to mouth. To the power of three.
It plays out just as insanely as it sounds, and yet remains totally watchable. The film isn’t more graphic than anything we’ve ever seen; if anything the explicitness of the film’s gore is over-hyped and really only tied to one scene. It’s just the sheer fucking thought of it and the sight of three adults with their mouths sewn to each others asses while a crazy German doctor spits orders at them, like you would an unruly mutt. Once you get past the absurdity of the situation, the horror element begins to sink in, and you realize that holy shit, this is actually a plausible, horrifying situation. The film’s use of tension by way of our main character’s struggle to escape – she’s the middle of the centipede, and worst possible placement – is entirely effective, and dare i say it, entertaining. Centipede is actually a good movie, and it doesn’t just rest its hat on the one gimmick, even though it very well could have.
If anything, The Human Centipede should be applauded for giving us German actor Dieter Laser, who is now a national film-geek treasure. His performance as the twisted Dr. Heiter is one for the history books; entirely engrossing and completely and utterly batshit insane.
The film is currently making rounds in limited release.
Rating: Unique, macabre and daring, all rolled into a three-assed beast of beauty.
Films like these, whether they have a solid leg to stand on or are being shocking for shock’s sake, will continue to pop up every year or so. Having examined the progression of the level of violence and just how much a film can get away with, I’m curious as to how we could possibly push the boundaries any further. With films like Saw and Hostel being mainstream hits, what does that mean for the smaller films? Will they need to really step out of the box, conceptually, to shock audiences like The Human Centipede?
Modern media and the internet have provided an endless stream of real violence, one need not be on YouTube for long before they can see it, so how does this exposure, this desensitization affect our stomachs at the movies?
I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
4 Responses to “BOX OFFICE: GROSS – 8 Films Built On SHOCK”
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Ian Bennett Says:
July 2nd, 2010 at 9:33 pmNo ‘Final Destinations’?
I thought that whole series was more entertaining and vomit inducing than the Saw movies, save Saw 1.
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Ryan Ferrier Says:
July 2nd, 2010 at 9:49 pmI would argue that the Final Destination films were incredibly mainstream and uncontroversial. I did enjoy them though. Like you said, much better than the Saw films.
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TRAILER: I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE Remake « Giant Killer Squid - Film, Comics, News, Reviews and more Says:
August 7th, 2010 at 11:04 am[...] recently wrote about I Spit On Your Grave, its controversy and its impact in my article Box Office Gross: 8 Films Built On Shock. For 1978, the film – albeit hard-to-watch, the very essence of exploitative – did have [...]
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Ricky Says:
August 18th, 2010 at 10:30 am“Modern media and the internet have provided and endless stream of real violence, one need not be on YouTube for long before they can see it, so how does this exposure, this desensitization affect our stomachs at the movies?”
Hey Ryan,
With the above in mind, I’d be interested to find out what your views are on A Serbian Film. Here is the plot:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Serbian_Film
and here is the trailer:
http://www.trailerspy.com/trailer/8035/Serbian-Film-Red-Band-Trailer
I plan to write a piece on shock cinema myself soon and would like to get as many viewpoints of this film before its release. Gratuitious? Thought Provoking? Soul Raping? These have all been mentioned by reviewers so far. But one thing they all seem to be saying is that no film has ever pushed them so far. I’m just wondering, like yourself I’m sure, just how far modern society, what with the internet, needs to be pushed these days to go to the cinema?
Looking forward to hearing from you.
Ricky