"Torture Porn" is most commonly a phrase applied to a movie the critic applying it didn't like, regardless of merit (cf. The Passion of the Christ). This is unfortunate as it robs the phrase of any meaning.
The label "torture porn" should only be applied to movies where the point of the film is to titillate the viewers through the suffering of others. This is why I don't consider Saw torture porn: However sympathetic Jigsaw is made out to be, he doesn't enjoy the suffering of others and the audience isn't expected to either. In Hostel, the young characters are victimized by the wealthy older psychos, and there's no empathy for the older guy (even before you know how crazy he is).
Death Wish comes to mind--it's the 25th anniversary--though it may not be a good example. Been a while since I've seen it. A lot of those revenge flicks of the '70s were particularly affectionate toward the violence committed.
On the other hand, Hostel II clearly meets the definition, in parts. In what was probably an attempt to keep things edgy, there's a strong focus on the mechanics that make the whole thing possible. Then there are some twists to keep you "on edge" about what happens next but which also tend to put you into sympathy with someone doing violence and enjoying it.
Then there's an actual porn scene where blood is used instead of some other bodily fluid. I mean, really: A hot older woman tortures the "homely" girl and--well, it's pretty awful, or it would be if it weren't so silly.
You could argue the point, since there's no narrative or exposition about the older woman, but director Roth knows how to make something ugly and there was a sympathy, at least at the level of the imagery, for this act. In other words, one gets the sense he is trying to titillate there despite the perverseness and horror of the situation.
Interestingly, Hostel II flopped compared to the first movie's relative success. True sadism is a niche market.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
If you want pure sadism you should not overlook the collected works of Pauley Shore.
ReplyDeleteTorture porn indeed.
lol
ReplyDeleteAt Gitmo, it's a nonstop "Bio Dome", "Son-in-Law", "Jury Duty" marathon.
blake, it is interesting, your distinction as to what you call torture porn. I can't watch these at all because of the torture scenes. I run from anything like that. I guess I had thought that was the real attraction to these type of movies, "Saw" included - the titillation from the torture.
ReplyDeleteNow I like movies with titilation.
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorites is "Faster, Pussycat, Kill, Kill."
Kitten Natividad.
Nobody does it better.
It's an important distinction, Darcy, though it's hard to draw the line. Otherwise you couldn't have a movie with any unpleasantness or "forbidden" stuff in it without being accused of exploiting it.
ReplyDeleteTroop facetiously mentions Russ Meyer but Meyer was the first guy to make a "mainstream" sexploitation flick without bookending it with a doctor or somesuch a la "Don't Let This Happen To You". ("Deep Throat" is often considered to be the first porn to do that but I don't know if that's true.)
Horror has the tricky problem of needing to play on the boundary of offensiveness which is a moving target and success often leads to outrage (as with Freaks, Frankenstein (1933) and John Carpenter's The Thing).
I don't say this to encourage anyone to go see graphically violent films, mind you. That's a matter of taste (and psychology).
But I think the distinction is important. I think Hostel II tries to straddle that line.
I would argue that Saw meets your definition because what is the other reason to see it if not to be titillated by the torture? Every ad for the newer Saw movies shows only clips of people in various states of being tortured. The audience must enjoy seeing the people suffer graphically because that's all that's going on in the film. And when you ask people about the film, all they do is relate all of the "sick stuff" they saw in it.
ReplyDeleteIf the story is the point and the suffering in incidental to that, I don't call it torture porn. But if the film is no more than a showcase of sadistic horrors, I think the term "torture porn" is apt.
Torture porn is one of the only types of film that I will not see.
Someone who does not share my definition of torture porn had the same reaction to Hostel II that you did. Must have been a truly horrendous flick.
I suspect Hostel II disproves your point about Saw, in the sense that it was far more torture-y and far less successful. Plus Roth always puts sex and hot naked chicks in his films.
ReplyDeleteNo, there's a lot more going on in the Saw movies: The torture is based around suspense and mystery, and the later movies are puzzles as stories. (The ending of IV confused the hell out of me until I worked out the timing relative to the others.)
You're hoping--at least I'm hoping, in the Saw movies, that the victim does the right thing to escape his punishment.
Note also that there's no torturer in the Saw movies and no lingering over the torturing. The traps are all pre-set and unwatched, or watched from a distance. There's always a time pressure, which takes the painful parts out of the languorously sexual--unlike in Hostel 2.
Last House on the Left is sort of like this, too.
The torture aspects of Saw are what give the suspense some teeth. People are rather inured to on-screen images, or at least the usual ones.
The last movie I can think of where the violence was largely off-screen yet still really, really horrible was the 1986 movie The Hitcher--and Siskel and Ebert trashed it for being gory, which illustrates my point about effective horror always being attacked.
So, arguably, it's a cheat and certainly it's at least an old Grand Guignol bit of sensationalism, but it very clearly invites you to empathize with the tortured.
In fact, in Saw III, the lead is a character-driven by revenge and given the opportunity to see where that would lead him. You empathize with the victims, you empathize with the guy wanting vengeance, and the Jigsaw becomes almost a force of nature, a kind of bringer of Judgment.
(Again, I'm not encouraging anyone to see it. Just defending it from an artistic POV.)
It's not far off from why I reject the notion of Passion of the Christ as torture porn.
Mmmm. That's really scattered. Up too late, I guess.
ReplyDeleteSaw V, by the way? Not very gory at all. One really bad scene near the end. And one really bad but largely implicit bit at the very end.
I listened to creative screenwriter's interview with Eli Roth about Hostel II. (I haven't seen the movie, but I love horror films, so I was v. interested to hear what he had to say, since Hostel was so popular)
ReplyDeleteAnyhoo, he talked specifically about the scene where the woman kills the homely girl. He said he was aware it was going to be rough for audiences to see this girl get mauled so he purposely filmed it in a very "operatic" way to make it more theatrical and stylized rather than just brutal like the rest of the violence.
Again, I haven't seen it, so I don't know if he was successful or not. He said he will also put silly stuff in his movies (such as someone playing soccer with a disembodied head (!)) to let sort of let the audience know not to take it all too seriously.
I am probably doing a bad job of communicating his intentions, and I'm not defending him. It was just an interesting explanation of how he handles such violent material.
He also took pretty strong exception to critics having moral problems with movies like Hostel, Saw, and other "Splat Pack" fare. Just knowing that he mixes in sexy naked girls with such violent content is enough for me to stay away.
I finally watched "The Descent" by the way and thought it was pretty good, although the caving parts were much scarier than the creatures.
If so, I think he wildly misjudged. It has the cinematic hallmarks that scream "APPROVAL!"
ReplyDeleteI find it very hard to buy that angle, because he was so dead on in the first Hostel.
In Cabin Fever the sex is almost totally gratuitous. But in Hostel, it's central to the story, and he very artfully changes the camera's view of the girls: a) First when you see them through the eyes of horny college guys; b) then later when you realize they're in on it. It kind of raises the movie above the usual.
It is horrifically graphic, tho'.