Snuff

Well, here it is...the biggest hoax to be perpetrated on the (admittedly slow-draw) 42nd-Street crowd. When it was a mere out-of-print obscurity on VHS, there was a bit of intrigue into the 'authenticity' of "Snuff," but such claims are absolutely ludicrous (the transition to the alleged murder on film is too inept--and shot from too many different angles--to have any realistic basis). What we have here is a dull (and clearly foreign) spin off of the Manson massacre, ineptly edited, and dubbed by morons (a lone redeeming quality that eventually loses its ability to entertain); after being subjected to an hour or so of exposition and relationship ties among a famous starlet and her rich boyfriend, the film devolves into the ridiculous, out-of-nowhere murder sequence. Compared to other provocative, 18+ shockers of the time ("Cannibal Holocaust" comes to mind), "Snuff" is incredibly tepid in the realms of cheap, sleazy titillation and gruesome mutilation--the result is a film that might have been morally objectionable or sickening had the people behind the camera not been so damn daft.

This film is so bad, it's almost good. This film is certainly more famous for the huge controversy that it inspired (apparently the fuss was mostly an intentional publicity gimmick) than for anything actually in the movie. "Snuff" did not create the famous urban legend of "snuff movies" (films wherein someone is murdered on camera for the sake of the film) but it certainly helped popularise them. Despite extensive investigation, there has apparently never been any evidence that "snuff movies" are real, and "Snuff" is so bad it's hard to believe anyone being convinced by it!

"Snuff" started life as a film called "Slaughter" which was supposed to be too bad to release so the distributors re-cut it and added the infamous "snuff movie" scene. Basically the film is a loose re-telling of the Charles Manson murders. A gang of young female hippies under the leadership of a hippie cult-leader with hypnotic powers, target a young actress and her annoying boyfriend.

The acting is terrible and the dubbing is atrocious (in one truly bizarre scene a character is supposed to be twelve but the actress is obviously in her twenties and is dubbed by a man putting on a high voice!) It's not nearly as violent as you may have heard, and what gore there is is pretty unconvincing. All the characters are also just so annoying!

"Snuff" is, of course, in the worst possible taste, but neither fun enough, or gory enough, to be a real guilty pleasure.

It may come as a surprise to learn that my DVD of "Snuff" is the most played disc in my collection. I must add that this isn't down to the film's playability. No, the reason why this DVD was played night after night was its amazing sleep-inducing properties. It took me at least 4 or 5 attempts to finally finish this movie. "Snuff" is as bad as the reviews say. In fact, it's worse.

Despite some interesting ingredients (a bevy of beautiful women, a seventies' soundtrack with an interesting Steppenwolf-like quality, a splattering of blood and gore, exotic settings, etc.), the film manages to be way beyond the realms of enjoyment.

The last 5 minutes that gave this film its notoriety can be caught on documentaries such as UK Channel 4's "The Dark Side of Porn - Does Snuff Exist?" Even if you're a completist, save your money. This film just isn't worth the outlay.

Dire. 1 out of 10.

Notorious cult item that has to do with a Manson-like cult leader and his bevy of lovely women who do his bidding. They kill a bunch of people before finally targeting a pregnant actress and her rich boyfriend.

Aside from that main storyline, there's also a tacked on ending that was falsely advertised to have been real snuff footage. The gore doesn't even look realistic though, especially the snipping off of a finger. No question about it, this is a bad movie. It's also pretty aimless, and there's a ridiculously overlong parade scene that made me want to hit the fast-forward, though I resisted. There is admittedly some fun to be had, as much of the film is really cheesy with some elements that you can't help but laugh at, not the least of which is the dubbing. Other than the cheese, the only other thing I liked about this movie was the presence of cult actress/director Roberta Findlay as one of the cult followers. I've always had the hots for her, so seeing her here or in any other film is always a pleasure.

My praise for "Snuff" stops there, however. Most will flat-out hate it, and frankly, I can't blame them.

Any glutton who loves awful movies has sat through dozens of inherently unwatchable films in the hopes of finding the rare beast that is both completely un-viewable and completely awesome at the same time. While Snuff leans more ardently toward the former, the current DVD presentation of this film helps this deservedly obscure classic drift a bit toward the latter.

Let's clarify that this film wasn't intended to be passed off as an actual "snuff" film. If such a genre truly existed, which we won't debate here since we're clearly talking about a film that is NOT a "snuff" movie, chances are it would look a bit more like the footage hinted at in Mute Witness or 8mm than a carefully edited multi-camera affair with dubbed audio and generous arrays of stock Carnavale footage. If anyone ever truly believed that filmmakers murdered someone on camera and surrounded that footage with a pseudo-story about biker chicks who kill random people in surprisingly un-bloody ways, somehow found a way to bypass all of those dicey regulations concerning murder and its illegalites, and found a distributor to get a theatrical release for said footage... Seriously, no one did. I promise you.

Yes, this movie is tedious, far too long, and so ineptly made that I can not find a single reason to recommend it. To normal people, that is. However, if you actually know what this film is, and still have any interest in seeing it, then you kind of need to, because it is as wretched an example of film-making as you could ever hope to encounter. Scene after scene, it is a shining an example of crappy C-grade schlock. But, you know, some of us really love crappy C-grade schlock.

We don't want good dubbing, quality special effects, or actors who had heard of the phenomenon of "acting" before the cameras were turned on them. We aren't concerned with continuity, character development, or coherent story structure. We simply want to spend 80 minutes of our life watching something that vaguely resembles a film, yet ends up being an hour and twenty minute exercise in incredulity that forces us to question what's wrong with us for enjoying something that is clearly so un-enjoyable.

This film is a joke. And one would suspect that the film-makers knew this. Now, the reason that Snuff is awesome is that not only did a piece of unwatchable trash like this gain some level of infamy, but 30 years later, there is a reasonably intelligent person sitting at their computer typing this missive at 3:33 in the morning, and another one reading said missive because they have yet to view this film.

Ignore what you've heard about the grand guignol finale of this film, because it truly is a disturbing bit of nastiness. The fact that it follows such a laughably bad precursor is probably the point of this entire affair. And kudos to Blue Underground for presenting this film as they did, in a package without cover art, synopsis, or special features, which, contrary to the numerous criticisms of this I've read, captures this film perfectly. If you would really want a Criterion Collection pressing of Snuff, then you are clearly missing the point.

Fans of terrible movies won't find one much more primitive than this (although I'd also tip my hat to The Last Slumber Party). If that sounds appealing to you, then you will thoroughly enjoy Snuff. If not, I really have to question what you thought you were in store for when you popped in a non-existent-budget South American film from the '70s called "Snuff".

Do I recommend this? No, absolutely not. But do I own it and love the fact I own it? I kind of have to...