Product: Day of the Woman (1978)
Rating: 4.0
Jennifer's Day
Anytime I see a movie that has been "banned" and dubbed "the most controversial movie of all time," I'm generally not pleased. Apparently that kind of "reputation" sets up too many expectations for me. This was not entirely the case when seeing I Spit On Your Grave, however. I did have those kind of expectations set up, but the film did what it was supposed to -- evoke emotions.I Spit On Your Grave (aka Day of the Woman) is the tragic story of Jennifer Hill (Camille Keaton). A young attractive writer from New York, Jennifer moves to a small town out in the middle of nowhere to work on her first novel. We quickly learn that this small town is something out of Deliverance country with Deliverance-type residents -- in particular, four men, all of whom work at the general store/gas station. Three of them are as mean as Hell and the other, Matthew (Richard Pace), is "slow," going along with whatever his friends do.Jennifer pulls in to fill up for the first time, the boys see her, and decide to go to her house across the lake and rape her. It may seem as if I'm moving too fast or skipping details, but really I'm not -- that just about sums it up. We soon learn that the initial reason behind committing these rapes is to "make Matthew a man." That reason quickly becomes secondary, as the men turn into utter monsters, losing any sense of "right" they may have ever had. The rape scenes are quite graphic -- they leave the viewer with an acute sense of emptiness and despair -- Jennifer crawls nude trying to escape, having no idea how to. The men catch up with her and continue to rape her. This goes on for 30 minutes, if not longer.Physically and emotionally shaken, Jennifer begins to plot revenge and viewers begin to root for her as we see her deserving revenge. Once Jennifer comes into contact with each of the four men, she brutally kills them, each in a different and very "creative" way.One problem I had with this film overall deals with believability -- would the rapists have killed Jennifer having so many reasons and opportunities to do so? For example, in one scene, Jennifer has the ringleader at gunpoint, but hands her gun over to him (I assume this was all part of her plan). Would the rapist, who just begged the woman he raped for his life, have thrown the gun away as he did? It may just be that I'm forgetting that the rapists in this film are stupid and logic doesn't apply to them.One aspect of the film that makes it especially eerie and unusual is the total lack of any musical score. Perhaps the only music throughout the film is Jennifer's classical music, which she listens to while killing one of the men. This lack of score oddly makes the viewer feel like an invisible observer -- there's nothing to distract us away from the woods, from the rapes, and from the eventual gore.Camille Keaton is excellent as Jennifer Hill. She very accurately portrays Jennifer's transformations from sane writer to pitiful victim, from vengeful killer to satisfied woman. If you can look at the graphic nature of the rape scenes as purposeful, in that we as viewers can better understand why Jennifer does what she does, see this movie. Otherwise, you might just regret it. Rating: 3 / 4(...)