ON THE LIST: I Spit On Your Grave (1978)

Its titlecard is inappropriately similar to that of Deep Throat, isn't it? I mean for what is infamously a real torturefest, it conjures some rather unwelcome erotic connotations, doesn't it? But anyhow... I Spit On Your Grave was probably the first Nasty I ever saw, and I can't quite remember how I first came across it. Possibly my dad. But either way, I read up, added it to my LoveFilm list and got the DVD through the mail. I remember being unimpressed in terms of production, and overwhelmed by just how much rape you can fit into a single scene. Nowadays, I own the double DVD set with the unsettling remake attached, which I will probably review separately for this page at some point. So I have seen the movie a few times since, and with my later-gained film knowledge and admiration for Ebert's work, I look at it similarly, yet in more detail.

In my research, I found an amazing fact out. Director Meir Zarchi was once driving by a park in NY at night when a girl came running out of the bushes bloodied and naked. Zarchi helped her by seeking police and medical assistance, later receiving a thank-you letter and offer of reward (which Zarchi declined) from the girl's father. So what inspired thing did Zarchi decide to do in response? Sponsor a rape charity? Get involved with some kind of rehabilitation centre for sexual assault victims? Nah. He made I Spit On Your Grave. If you've read this far and still have no knowledge of the movie, continue and see why this seems like such an inappropriate decision.

Jennifer Hills (Camille Keaton) is an author who has rented a pretty stonking 'cabin' in the woods, where she plans to pen her novel in peace. But unfortunately she stops at the Wrong Gas Station that Roger Ebert so wonderfully summarised. It is occupied by weirdo hicks, including one simpleton who works as the bicycle delivery boy. Jennifer stupidly tells the strangers where she is staying, and the delivery boy Matthew (Richard Pace) is ordered up to deliver some groceries. He seems harmless enough, but his three buddies take a pervy liking to Jennifer, and kidnap her boat when she's sunbathing in it later. With their speedboat, they tow her to shore where they proceed to gang rape her in the woods.

It's long and painful to watch. It goes on for ages, and I seriously mean ages. Minute after minute. When it is finally, mercifully over, Jennifer drags herself back to the cabin. She grabs the phone...BAM! The fellas are all there before her. And they start to gang rape her again, this time forcing Matthew to join in. Yep, seriously. These two barely separated sequences make up some 25-odd minutes of solid rape. While cruel and gratuitous, it also just gets ridiculous. They beat the hell out of her and leave her for dead.


But Jennifer gets up again, and takes bloody revenge on all the guys, including poor Matthew, who expresses simple and confused remorse, and was definitely bullied into it. Ebert expertly says that the guys treat Matthew as "their pet retard". The revenge is silly and largely unexciting and lacking in mayhem. One part also relies on one of the guys being seduced by the girl he repeatedly raped and left for dead, without for a second hesitating due to her supposedly being dead and yet actually being alive to tell the tale. In any case, he gets what he deserves. So by the end, Jennifer has been lengthily and repeatedly sexually and physically assaulted, but emerges somewhat 'victorious' with all the guys dead. The end.

There are reports of real rowdy catcalls from audiences back when the movie opened. Apparently men would shout encouragement at the men during the rape scenes, and women would should encouragement at Jennifer during the revenge scenes. Ebert speculated as to what each group of hecklers thought about the portion of the movie for which they were silent. This movie is definitely brutal and distasteful, mostly for its ridiculously lengthy rape. People are still divided as to whether the movie is misogynist or feminist. If Zarchi's sentiments are to be believed, he intended it as something of a feminist movie. But the product is most definitely questionable. I mean, at the very least, if the suffering is meant to be equaled out by the end, each man should have received a 25-odd minute torture.

I Spit On Your Grave is pretty terrible on all levels. Camera work is minimal, sound quality is crap, acting and dialogue is wooden, and the entire scenario seems to me a really shitty way of responding to such a traumatic event as stumbling across a rape victim. It's a crappy product, and unlike most of the other overhyped titles, very much deserved its place on the ridiculous result of media sensationalisation that was the Video Nasty list.