cinema history class: snuff

Session: Gory, Gory, Hallelujah! Week 4
Movie: Snuff (1976)
Directed by Michael Findlay, Horacio Fredriksson, and Simon Nuchtern

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Plot:
In South America, a Manson-like cult figure has several women in his thrall, and leads them to commit murders. Horror ensues.

Reaction and Other Folderol:

A little background is in order. What became Snuff started out as a low-budget exploitation film called Slaughter. That film was directed by Michael and Roberta Findlay. There are conflicting accounts as to whether it was ever released theatrically. At any rate, after it sat on the shelf for several years. Producer Allan Shackleton added a cinema verite-style ending in which an actress is supposedly disemboweled. The added scene really has nothing to do with the rest of the film. The result, Snuff, was advertised in a way that implied that the movie was, in fact a snuff film, and apparently there were some people who believed it. I'm not quite sure how anyone can see the hokey effects and believe it was real. But I suppose if you see the movie once onscreen and you can't rewatch it then maybe you can be convinced. In case you're interested, here's the added scene:

Putting aside the added ending, Snuff has all the incomprehensibility of El Topo, but without the artistic imagery. I hated El Topo (that film is still a point of contention within the class) because it wasn't really understandable. But at least it had some beautiful shots. Snuff's plot, such as it was, was also hard to understand, and -- visually -- it was just ugly.

About that plot -- it's clear that the film was intended to have a plot. The early murders and the dialogue are clearly targeting a story. But they can't really focus in on it. In service of this nonplot, the movie throws in whole lot of stuff. At one point, one of the characters starts spouting off about arms sales to Arab countries, the Arab/Israeli conflict and Adolf Eichmann. That particular scene featured a loud impassioned argument. Though the characters were really into the issues they were arguing, it was a bunch of gobbledygook.

Those of us in the class rated this movie very poorly because it was such a load of crap. Keith, on the other-hand, gave it more credit because it marked the end of a style of movie-making.

As an aside, the story of the Findlays is quite an interesting one. In case it's of interest, here's an item about them from Cinefear's blog.

Ratings

Me: 2

Bob: 1.1

Christina: 4.5