Friday, September 29, 2006

Hey everyone! Just a few passing thoughts...

I've been interesting in checking out, and perhaps even writing about, the nature of sexually-based violence in film. I saw "These Hills Have Eyes" over the summer (unrated version on DVD) and was quite shocked at its violence. Here's the kicker...It wasn't the violence in general, but rather the violence toward women. There is a scene in a trailer where two women are sexually violated and then one is killed. The men, however, are killed in the film via other means which have nothing to do with their sex. To be honest, I was disgusted with the film and had wanted a warning about that sort of violence against women.

I starting thinking after I saw it...Is this a normal thing for horror films? I know that violence toward women in general has occurred in horror for a long time, but was the mechanism of the violence sexually based?

As a counter example, I saw "Snakes on a Plane" recently. While utterly horrible (as it was supposed to be) it at least contained an element of balance of violence toward each sex.

Your thoughts? Any other good examples?