I Spit On Your Grave (1978)

Trailer:

*Spoilers Throughout*

What’s It About: A brutal rape and revenge story. Ok, let’s bring on the funny!

Here are some of my observations as I watched the film:

• Jennifer is obviously affluent, she lives in mid-town in the late seventies.
• This whole opening scene of her driving to the country really could have used a main title of some sort.
• Jennifer has supposedly driven to Connecticut, but this gas station looks like it should have a kid on the porch playing the banjo; whose family tree looks like a stump. (Thanks BH)
• The gas station attendant is a dead ringer for Prince Humperdink. I thought that would be funnier than saying Chris Sarandon.
• A couple of local guys taking turns throwing a knife into the ground. Yeah, this town just rakes in the tourists.
• A skinny-dipping scene in broad daylight and only six minutes into the picture! Well, we are truly eschewing traditional Friday The 13^th protocols now.
• In those Daisy Duke cutoffs and knotted-in-the-front shirt, I could watch Jennifer put away her clothes all day long.
• And at this scene’s pacing, that very well might happen.
• The retarded grocery delivery guy is really going for the retarded Oscar in this scene.
• I never understood the presence of or when to use a bicycle bell.
• The fishing scene with the local scumbags is just begging for banjo music as well.
• Men were still calling women “broads” in the late seventies?
• Do these dick-trees actually think that doing donuts in a speedboat will turn Jenny on? I call her Jenny.
• Jenny goes outside at night to investigate strange noises without the gun that was clearly shown in an earlier scene, which was just there to establish that she has it apparently.
  

  Pretty much the only tranquil scene of the movie.

• Again with the speed-boating douchebags.
• A completely lost/unaware crewmember watches the yokels chase Jenny through the woods.
• Some free advice: make sure your windows are down during the first rape scene. My neighbors walked on the other side of the street from me for two weeks after this screening. Oddly enough, I ended up liking it that way.
• Jenny escapes and walks through what seems like a mile of swamp and forest completely naked, only to run into these shitheels again. How did they know where to wait for her, what are they wood nymphs?
• This is a tense and disturbing scene, but it sounds like Andy is playing the ending to Baba O’Riley on his harmonica.
• What is it with rapey townsfolk screaming like pigs when they chase you? I guess Ned Beatty could shed some light on this.
• Once again, be sure to turn down your speakers when Andy anally rapes Jenny.
• Jenny finally manages to get back to her cabin, granted she had to crawl most of the way.
• Fuck my old boots, the scumbags were waiting in her cabin and are raping her again.
• Matthew the r-tard apparently has to take the lenses out of his glasses while he rapes.
• The other rapists’ constant cheering interferes with Matthew achieving orgasm. You really have to feel bad for the piece of shit at this point huh?
  

  If “Of Mice and Men” was remade by Tarantino.

• Stanley decides to forgo raping Jenny and just beats and kicks her, which results in the other men holding him back and dragging him out of the cabin. So, just for clarification: rape is just dandy, but assaulting her? That’s just wrong.
• Matthew somewhat becomes the plot’s fulcrum when he decides not to kill Jenny, but just make it look like he did.
• This movie does for secluded cabins what The Accused did for pinball machines.
• I suppose Jenny’s red canoe floating back to her can be seen as a symbolic catalyst for her revenge.
• You gotta give it up for her at this point. Two weeks after being raped three times in one day, she’s right back to work on her new novel. Stephen King got run the fuck over and took longer than that to get back to the prose.
• When reminiscing about rape and murder, it’s so sad when it puts you off your hot fudge sundae. I cannot wait for these oily pricks to die.
• After learning that he left her alive, Matthew receives a beat-down from the other three fuckwads. Still feel nothing for him.
• Now Jenny finally loads the gun.
• If this gang of liquid shit is waiting for her in the church, I’m punching out.
• Johnny, the head rapist, is apparently a doting father and loving husband. Ecccchh.
• I always love shots of grocery stores in the seventies, you get to see all of the great stuff they don’t make anymore.
• Matthew watching the butcher saw some pig’s ass in half is obviously foreshadowing.
• When Jenny taunts Matthew to have sex and he gets on top of her, it is enough to drive you abstinent.
• Alright, she finally hung the pudding-head and dumped his body in the lake. One down.
• Well, shit on a stick! Jenny lures Johnny back to her cabin, gets him in the tub, and gives him a high-school handshake. Right when Johnny’s about to pop, she goes full-on Lorena Bobbitt and lops his schwantz off with a knife. Two down.
• It’s still hard to believe this is supposed to be Connecticut.
• An axe in the back for Andy, and we’re down to one.
• Jenny eviscerates Stanley with the speedboat’s outboard motor. Saved the best for last huh?

Jenny has definitely upped her game when confronting illegal whalers.

Scare Level: Watching a group of townies greasily stare at a beautiful woman from out of town, will always give you the heebie-jeebies.

Gore Level: A very good amount of blood, and depending on which version you see, some minor guts from the boat evisceration.

Nudity Level: Camille Keaton is naked for almost 2/3 of the movie.

Best Line: “Sometimes I look at these gorgeous looking chicks, I mean the ones that look like real knockouts, sexy and all… and I wonder if they gotta take a shit too.” Andy, your deep thoughts move me.

Best Scene: There are four scenes of gruesomely awesome revenge. Pick one.

Worst Scene: Any scene that tries to elicit sympathy for the dim-witted Matthew. Retarded or not, at the end of the day he’s still one of the villains. There are also three violent rape scenes. Pick one.

Overall: People outside of horror/exploitation fandom look at you funny when you say that this movie is one of your favorites. I don’t mind saying that this is one of my favorite Grindhouse movies. You don’t like it for the rape unless you’re a fucking rapist, you like it for the arc and for the revenge. An original one-sheet poster that was given to me as a Christmas present hangs in my den to this day. How do you justify that? Well, if you’re not in the mood for arguing the movie’s merits you simply say, “I love the ass on that woman.”

Score: 7 Screams Of, “I Can’t Stop The Bleeding!” (out of 10)