Snuff: Not Safe for Children to Read
I'm a fan of the gritty police drama, and I used to pride myself on never covering my eyes no matter how gory horror films became. I laughed my way through Friday(s) the 13th, etc... in the 80s. I would have seen Faces of Death, but someone told me there was animal torture in those so I opted out. Still, I was as curious as any troubled teenager.
For years I owned books with super creepy photos, including one collection of homicide photos from the 30s and 40s. Georges Bataille's Tears of Eros even had photos of the death of a thousand cuts, an execution performed in China. That one always made me nauseous, but I kept it because it was Bataille's.
When I moved here in 2004, I gave those books away. I had begun my progress toward forensic psych and I found that I couldn't stand them any more. They set my teeth on edge. The more real this all becomes, the less I can remove myself from it. I cleaned house. I still have the really horrid Answer Me! because I haven't seen the friend to whom I was planning to pass it, but that's it for residue.
But for fiction, I was still a horror fan. Several months ago, I watched a "horror" film which was much more of a gorefest. It was by Troma films, and it sucked. It was really just gore without purpose. I thought back to all the movies my friends and I used to watch, and I realized two things:
a) I no longer need that to work out my own traumas
b) Violence now makes me feel sick
Last night I watched a documentary on Snuff films. It's called "Snuff".
I thought it was going to be a faux-documentary/horror film. I wanted to see it because I did some research into snuff films in college. I had no idea what it would be like.
It was most emphatically not faux. Not faux.
It was too much for me, and it took me almost an hour before I felt okay, and by that I mean not like I was about to faint.
That is soooo out of keeping with my self-concept but somehow I am okay with it. I'm getting soft, and I think that's a good thing. The way I was toughened wasn't healthy.
There was police footage of the SF serial killers (Leonard Lake & Charles Ng) who took victims to their cabin in the hills and videotaped the murders, but that wasn't the worst. It was creepy to hear the conversations between killers and victims, but they didn't show any of the actual violence. That was the only thing they edited, and it was probably because the police wouldn't let them show more.
In all the other footage, they pulled no punches. I had to fast forward quite frequently.
I'm a pretty tough cookie, but there are two things I cannot stand and one is animal torture the other is, apparently, the sound of a man being slowly beheaded. There was a shot of a piglet being killed, and the screams will forever live in my memory, often causing me pretty serious headaches when I think of them, and the footage of the hostage taken by extremists and then beheaded. The worst part was that I watched it on Netflix for TiVo and the fast forward button has a delay. Even when I was quick enough on the draw, it took a little too long to perform the command.
The thing is, I have no problem looking at dead things when it serves a purpose, like an investigative purpose or a removal of remains. I've removed several dead cats from my yard in the Richmond. I've seen other footage of crime scenes. I've seen dead humans in real life. Dead is one thing. Dying is an entirely different thing. Entirely.
I still feel off.
I think I may have been cured of whatever affinity for reality based horror films I still had.
For years I owned books with super creepy photos, including one collection of homicide photos from the 30s and 40s. Georges Bataille's Tears of Eros even had photos of the death of a thousand cuts, an execution performed in China. That one always made me nauseous, but I kept it because it was Bataille's.
When I moved here in 2004, I gave those books away. I had begun my progress toward forensic psych and I found that I couldn't stand them any more. They set my teeth on edge. The more real this all becomes, the less I can remove myself from it. I cleaned house. I still have the really horrid Answer Me! because I haven't seen the friend to whom I was planning to pass it, but that's it for residue.
But for fiction, I was still a horror fan. Several months ago, I watched a "horror" film which was much more of a gorefest. It was by Troma films, and it sucked. It was really just gore without purpose. I thought back to all the movies my friends and I used to watch, and I realized two things:
a) I no longer need that to work out my own traumas
b) Violence now makes me feel sick
Last night I watched a documentary on Snuff films. It's called "Snuff".
I thought it was going to be a faux-documentary/horror film. I wanted to see it because I did some research into snuff films in college. I had no idea what it would be like.
It was most emphatically not faux. Not faux.
It was too much for me, and it took me almost an hour before I felt okay, and by that I mean not like I was about to faint.
That is soooo out of keeping with my self-concept but somehow I am okay with it. I'm getting soft, and I think that's a good thing. The way I was toughened wasn't healthy.
There was police footage of the SF serial killers (Leonard Lake & Charles Ng) who took victims to their cabin in the hills and videotaped the murders, but that wasn't the worst. It was creepy to hear the conversations between killers and victims, but they didn't show any of the actual violence. That was the only thing they edited, and it was probably because the police wouldn't let them show more.
In all the other footage, they pulled no punches. I had to fast forward quite frequently.
I'm a pretty tough cookie, but there are two things I cannot stand and one is animal torture the other is, apparently, the sound of a man being slowly beheaded. There was a shot of a piglet being killed, and the screams will forever live in my memory, often causing me pretty serious headaches when I think of them, and the footage of the hostage taken by extremists and then beheaded. The worst part was that I watched it on Netflix for TiVo and the fast forward button has a delay. Even when I was quick enough on the draw, it took a little too long to perform the command.
The thing is, I have no problem looking at dead things when it serves a purpose, like an investigative purpose or a removal of remains. I've removed several dead cats from my yard in the Richmond. I've seen other footage of crime scenes. I've seen dead humans in real life. Dead is one thing. Dying is an entirely different thing. Entirely.
I still feel off.
I think I may have been cured of whatever affinity for reality based horror films I still had.