I Spit on Your Grave- handling of rape

In our film, we have come up with the idea to have a number of experiences that effects a persons life in some way. These experiences range from having a physical disability to committing a murder (to reinforce the thriller generic conventions of our film), however we also thought of a subtle rape scene to be included in our film. From this idea, it has allowed us all individually to research into rape scenes of films that handled the situation in a appropriate way and some that may be seen as inappropriate.




OUR FILM

In our film, we have decided to handle the rape scene in a low key way, which gives enough evidence to suggest what is happening without actually showing anything inappropriate. We have chose to do this by having a point of view shot from the criminals perspective, showing the victim laid down on a bed, struggling and panicking hysterically. from this we see nothing but the unzipping of each persons trousers where the scene cuts off back to our original film. We have done this so we can portray the thriller side of our film; whilst also maintaining the content to be appropriate to our age rating/ audience of 15. 

1. I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE
Storyline (description taken from IMBd)

Writer Jennifer Hills takes a retreat from the city to a cabin in the woods to start on her next book. But Jennifer's presence in the small town attracts the attention of a few morally depraved locals who set out one night to teach this city girl a lesson. They break into her cabin to scare her. However, what starts out as terrifying acts of humiliation and intimidation, quickly and uncontrollably escalates into a night of physical abuse and torturous assault. But before they can kill her, Jennifer sacrifices her broken and beaten body to a raging river that washes her away. As time passes, the men slowly stop searching for her body and try to go back to life as usual. But that isn't about to happen. Against all odds, Jennifer Hills survived her ordeal. Now, with vengeance, Jennifer's sole purpose is to turn the tables and inflict upon them every horrifying and torturous moment they carried out on her... only much, much worse.

I Spit On Your Grave has the power to show rape in a realistic way, due to the high budget and age rating of the film; meaning they can show the audience a more gruesome and detailed attack. Because of this, I Spit On Your Grave has been rated one of the most controversial films to be released; which further can be argued how well they handled the storyline. The directors appropriately rated the film according to the graphic content of the film (nudity, violence, sexual assault etc) therefore suggests that this film overall handled the rape attack appropriately, however from further research into the film and looking through comments from the audience of the film, it can be argued that many people saw it to be inappropriate, where one individual dubbed it as 'pornography'.