Fictional Violence: Movies vs. books, page 1

I wanted to repost a blog entry but this seems to be the only place for it. I foolishly made plans to catch the "I Spit On Your Grave" remake this weekend only to find my local theatre (AMC the same puritans who pulled Hatchet II) would not be showing it because of it's content.

I am a big giant dorky fan of horror films and, especially, the so
called "Grindhouse" genre from the late 70's and early 80's. Films
like that were considered lurid and morally vapid but, at least from
an aesthetic point of view, they were also a breeding ground of new
ideas and approaches to film making.

One of the more famously hated movies of that era was "I Spit on Your
Grave". It was lambasted for having a very drawn out (and wickedly
uncomfortable to watch) 20 minute plus rape scene. Granted, it did
nothing to glorify the act or offer any type of titillation but,
rather, depicted a horrible act of violence that would be used as the
engine to drive the narrative forward. You take the rap out of this
picture and you might as well put a hockey mask or William Shatner
mask on the protagonist because she goes from being a scarred soul
hell-bent on revenge to just a two dimensional killer whose sole
purpose is to shock the audience with acts of brutality.

Ironically, once could argue, the rape is the very soul of this movie.
Now if you want to criticize the movie on a more valid ground such as
lighting, directorial choices and dialogue that is one thing but to
utterly dismiss the film because of the rape is pretty childish and,
more to the point hypocritical.

Why do I bring this up now?

Well, the movie has been remade and fashioned into an unrated update
that, or course, the puritanical movie theatres that show 24 screening
of talking cartoon owls day, will not show. Why? Brutal acts of rape
and violence.

Okay. Fine. We shall now be on a noble crusade to protect the
bourgeois from visual images of brutality that will undoubtedly either
offend them into a fetal state of immobility or turn them into a
rampaging horde of pillaging Hessians who will eventually turn on the
government and upend democracy as we know it. Fantastic.

Yet, at the local Walmart, you know that place that sells guns but
refused to sell Marilyn Manson CDs, I managed to procure a copy of Ken
Follett's critically adored masterpiece "The Pillars of the Earth".

Now, this is in no way, an attack on Follett or the novel which I am
finally starting to really enjoy after almost 300 pages of exposition.
But, be still my beating heart, what did I run afoul of on pages
336-339? A brutal depiction of rape that would make the scene in "I
Spit on Your Grave" blush if introduced to each other at a midnight
rave in downtown Madripoor.

And yes that last bit was a reference to Wolverine. Oh shut up.

Anyway, in Follett's opus not only does the innocent vestal ingénue
get raped the act is depicted through the eyes of the rapist to the
point where we get to experience his thrill of exhilaration when he
realizes he has broken through her hymen and how that inspired him to
"drain himself dry" as it were as if he were a bottle of liquid
plumber and she the clogged drain that stood in the way of his
successful flushing.

To top that off the rapist offers up his conquered victim to his buddy
and forces the young woman's young brother to watch the whole event.
Certainly this is as bad, if not miles worse, than anything image that
dances before our eyes in the original "I Spit on Your Grave", right?

Ah, but there is the rub. In "I Spit on Your Grave" the images of the
rap dance before our eyes while the graphic images in "Pillars of the
Earth" just dance in our minds.

So, we come to the ultimate test of how little, as a society, we have
evolved as a group intellect. Write a book that depicts rape but set
it in Olde England, use flowery words and sandwich it into a larger
story of sweeping emotions and political examination and you shall
receive accolades, awards and badly produced mini-series on
substandard pay cable channels.

But, make a movie that depicts rape and then goes onto become one of
the very first modern movies that depict empowered females, set it in
the woods and have it shown on big screens late at night and you have
found yourself a one way ticket to Luridville where your neighbors are
Russ Meyer and the weird bald guy with the whacked out eye balls in
"The Hills Have Eyes". Maybe you can have a snake from "frogs" as a
pet since the landlords in that red light district of town probably do
not come around much to check on the tenants in that neighborhood.

So, despite the fact that we are in the year 2010 and have become a
Nation of Change and Enlightenment we still are not considered mature
enough by the Powers That BE to see movies like "I spit on Your Grave"
at the local theatre playing next to the talking owls and the more
pleasant falling in love with people vampires yet we can pick up
"Pillars of the Earth" as it lays right next to "Harry Potter", "Percy
Jackson" and "The Babysitters Club" on the bookshelf at Wal*Mart.

I, for one, would like to than my Moral Overseer's for sparing me the
sight of such indignities waiting to foisted themselves on my eyes and
steal my soul.

After all it's much better to read about a rapist feeling "the
resistance" of his victim's "maidenead" and then being inspired by
that act to "shove once more, harder still" until "he felt it break"
because, after all, those are just harmless words buried
inconspicuously within 1007 pages of critical genius!

Yeah, I guess it really is not about the message after all but how it
comes packaged that matters. Even now nearly thirty two years after
the original movie came out and 21 years since the book was published.
Two fictional acts of the same brutal act depicted in two separate
mediums separated by 11 years of seeing first light of public noticed
and both remade into the modern age for a new audience yet still
treated much like they were originally.

I find that lack of evolution much more alarming than any fictional
act depicted in either story.