I talked about this a bit in my discussion post, but I would like to go a bit more in depth here. When first viewing
I Spit On Your Grave, I definitely experienced some aspects of catharsis in seeing her take down all of the Disgusting men who raped her, but it still felt like something was missing when the film ended. I think this could be due to something that Creed discusses in her book. Creed writes, "It is significant that the three rape scenes in the first half of
I Spit On Your Grave are filmed in a completely different way from the revenge scenes of the second half. Whereas woman-as-victim is represented as an abject thing, man-as-victim is not similarly degraded and humiliated" (Creed 130). Creed goes on to explain how the woman is the "complete and total victim" of the film. (Creed 130 again lol). Jennifer's general harassment and rape take up such a large portion of this film while the murders of the men are spread out and take much less time. I remember when I saw the scene of her going into the church and asking for forgiveness for what she was about do, I was really excited to see her revenge.
It feels weird to say, but I feel like her murders of the men just did not live up to what happened to her in the beginning of the film. They were not degraded at all really... She was so calm and nice to them before they died! It totally rubbed me the wrong way. I understand that she was trying to trick them, but I think that I would have felt more cathartic if there was more time spent humiliating them. It felt like they were killed so quickly, and then the camera was taken away from them. With her rape, we see her body constantly on the ground and unconscious. The only male character that really was tortured and humiliated was the one she circled around with the boat for a while. This film was definitely hard to watch for me, and although I felt some relief from Jennifer's revenge, I still felt uncomfortable about it all. I probably would not watch this it again.
I talked about this a bit in my discussion post, but I would like to go a bit more in depth here. When first viewing I Spit On Your Grave, I definitely experienced some aspects of catharsis in seeing her take down all of the Disgusting men who raped her, but it still felt like something was missing when the film ended. I think this could be due to something that Creed discusses in her book. Creed writes, "It is significant that the three rape scenes in the first half of I Spit On Your Grave are filmed in a completely different way from the revenge scenes of the second half. Whereas woman-as-victim is represented as an abject thing, man-as-victim is not similarly degraded and humiliated" (Creed 130). Creed goes on to explain how the woman is the "complete and total victim" of the film. (Creed 130 again lol). Jennifer's general harassment and rape take up such a large portion of this film while the murders of the men are spread out and take much less time. I remember when I saw the scene of her going into the church and asking for forgiveness for what she was about do, I was really excited to see her revenge.
Hi Alison! I HECKED UP and accidentally watched the 2010 remake instead of the original and at first was really pissed at myself but now am realizing how the two films are different and what the filmmakers decided needed revamping and what stayed the same.... Spoiler alert, the remake is pretty degrading too. The camera exclusively follows the male gaze and never strays from Jennifer's body, other than when Matthew is struggling with guilt and shame before and after raping her. The rape scenes take up more than half of the movie and it still feels like this is all an excuse for men to humor a dark rape fantasy, but when she kills them, she designs their murders according to what they did to her. It felt more satisfying I think than it sounded in what you wrote in your post here, but it was still kind of an afterthought. I think it is a shame that they had an opportunity to change so much and make this so much more empowering and they really just didn't, but at least her revenge was more satisfying the second time around I guess???
ReplyDeleteIt would have been an interesting exercise to watch the remake and the original together with reading Creed and Clover's take on the film. I agree with you Alison that neither film really feels satisfying as a revenge for sexual violation of the sort that the character endures. I think that this has something to do with the film's failure to have an impact beyond its original demographic of young male viewers.
ReplyDeleteHey Alison! I agree with like, everything you said, I felt unsatisfied with the revenge half of the film. Like, we get so many close up shots of Jennifer in pain, but we get just as many shots of the rapists face as well, and we get to hear all of their taunts and laughs. In contrast Jennifer's revenge doesn't do close ups of the guys in pain, and through that and the laugh of other humiliation definitely sticks out. It makes me curious about if there's a pain/pleasure mixture that's "inevitable" (in the film) kind of like how Creed points out in I think Chapter 9?
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