Sex in Horror // The Gory Details

SPEAKER_01 0:25

Hey, I'm Dahlia. And I'm Alma. Welcome to the Gory Details podcast where we discuss horror from every angle. We break it down with humor, sarcasm, and curiosity, looking at what scares and excites us most, what gets ignored, and the people shaping the genre right now. And speaking of people shaping the genre, welcome to our guest, Rabia. Hi, Rabia. Hiya.

SPEAKER_02 0:47

Hello.

SPEAKER_01 0:48

Glad to finally have you on our podcast. I'm so, so excited to be here with you. Well, we're excited to have you on, like I said. And Alma, why don't you tell us a little bit more about Rabia?

SPEAKER_03 1:01

Rabia is a genre film critic, pop culture, and Asian genre cinema expert. She makes the most amazing letterbox lists with niche focuses in international shema. She is also marketing head at Imagine Fantastic Film Festival and Kaboom Animation Festival. She's a multicultural queen who has collaborated with the Korean and Japanese embassies.

SPEAKER_01 1:24

That's uh do you do you ever get to sleep? I mean, because sometimes I'm I swear I'm like on Discord and um you're on there and then you're doing all this other stuff, and it's like, oh my god, this girl does not sleep.

SPEAKER_00 1:40

Sleep is for uh the neurotypicals. Yeah. For the people with less hobbies than me, I guess.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

Oh, and speaking of of hobbies, I can see I'm sure it's not just hobbies, it's your work back there behind you. I see lots of uh amazing things going on behind you. I know people can't see it, but I see some Hello Kitty. I see uh my eyes are are trying to hone in on some things here.

SPEAKER_00 2:06

This is actually um a collab between Hello Kitty and Miffy. Um I'm from the Netherlands, and Miffy is Ninja in the Netherlands. It's from the Netherlands. Um and I love Hello Kitty, so when I saw this, I needed to have it. But yes, behind me and to the left and to the front of me, there's a whole bunch of stuff here. My house is like a museum, collector's paradise, whatever you want to call it. So yeah. I love it.

SPEAKER_01 2:31

And then you and you and Alma were uh bonding over your Chucky's just a minute ago because Alma has all her Chucky's behind her.

SPEAKER_00 2:42

Yeah, I love Chucky. I'm I'm seeing the Hello Kitty Chucky behind you, I think.

SPEAKER_03 2:48

Yes, I have the Hello Kitty Chucky and the Hello Kitty Tiffany.

SPEAKER_00 2:53

Oh, amazing.

SPEAKER_01 2:55

Yeah, Alma has her her Chucky collection, it's just like insane. I love it so much. That's amazing. Yeah, so um, well, today we're not talking about our Chuckies, we're not talking about our Hello Kitties. I know we could really probably go down into rabbit hole discussing all that stuff because that's fun. But today we're gonna be discussing sex in horror. So, yes, so it's not gonna be a how-to or even a best scenes, but rather a general cursory look at the topic. We will get into some horror movie discussion. Um, but uh we can save specific more uh movie discussions for later episodes. What I'm really excited about is going through the years and discussing the evolution of. But first I have a question. And Alma, I'm gonna start with you. What's the first horror movie where you remember sex really sticking out for you?

SPEAKER_03 3:48

Um, that's definitely Friday the 13th for me. Uh, it also started where I realized, you know, if you have sex, you're gonna die. Movie trope. Yeah. Um, I was way too young to be watching that movie. And I it's always stuck out for me, especially because Kevin Bacon was killed afterward. So, and he had a really great kill with the arrow through the neck. That was pretty awesome. But that sex scene was like the first time I remember seeing.

SPEAKER_01 4:21

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So I would have to say for me, it's kind of I if I had thought really long and hard about it, I'm pretty long and hard. I'm see, I just like I don't know what's wrong with me. Yeah. It's gonna happen a lot through the out through this uh conversation, so I'm just gonna have to get it out there. Um, one of the sleepaway camps, I can't remember which one. Um, I wish I could remember uh off the top of my head. Um, but it was one of the sleepaway camps where one of the characters, she's she's getting head in um yeah, that's I remember, and I was again way too young to be watching this this movie. Um, I don't think I really quite understood what was going on, and but I knew something was going on that I probably shouldn't be watching. And I understood, like, oh, this is this is uh sex, this is sexual. I don't know what it is, but I know it's you know something I wouldn't I didn't know have the words for like forbidden and all that, but this is something forbidden and something I shouldn't really be watching. But this is a horror movie. I really shouldn't be watching this to begin with, anyways. But yeah, so I would say it's probably one of the sleepaway camps, definitely for sure. How about you, Rabia?

SPEAKER_00 5:36

Um, so for me it was an anime. Um I think I was and I was still like, oh, I had so many cousins, but I had a cousin, I all my cousins were older than me. So when we were watching stuff, they were watching stuff that was way out of my age range. And um, they were watching Ninja Scrolls, um, which is I I want to say a late 80s uh like gore horror classic. Uh it's uh with Shinobu and and Samurai, and there is uh there are some very sexually explicit scenes in there, uh also non-consensual uh sexually explicit scenes in there. Yeah. Did you understand what was going on? I was just like, why is this guy just almost like half eating this lady? And then yeah, it was just weird to me and then also like sparked a curiosity at the same time. Um and he dies afterwards. Uh spoilers for anyone who hasn't seen ninja sculpts. Um, but her whole body exudes uh poison. So um that interesting and that twist was was even more intriguing to me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:49

And looking back at it now, do you kind of do you kind of look at it through the lens of when you were younger sometimes?

SPEAKER_00 6:57

Yeah, I have to say, like, I have this weird interest in um uh erotic, this crossover between erotics and horror, because they're quite similar, but we'll get into that a little bit a little bit later as well. But there's this interesting like perversion uh crossover where horror and erotica and sex meet each other, and that cross point is very interesting to me. So I'm a little bit maybe of a pervert.

SPEAKER_01 7:28

No, there's no perverts here. But yeah, so let's let's go ahead and start off with our early horror. I mean, it started off way back in the days of your uh speaking of those days of when horror started. What are we saying that uh when horror started?

SPEAKER_03 7:49

In 1896 with The House of the Devil. It's not an English movie. We were gonna write down the original title for it, but I wouldn't be able to pronounce it.

SPEAKER_01 8:00

Yeah, sorry about that. We were, yeah, we're we're not gonna be able to pronounce a lot of the names of movies, so we decided just to stick with the English. I apologize for uh our non-English speaking population there. Um, but we have movies such as like Nosferatu. I don't know how many versions of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde that I saw. I mean, that says a lot right there. I mean, I saw at least three or four. I'm sure there's more.

SPEAKER_00 8:27

Oh yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 8:29

Yeah. So uh just in reading through like some of the history and reading about how did it get so or why do you think so quickly got horror and sex got so entangled so quickly or so easily?

SPEAKER_00 8:46

Honestly, I I like like I mentioned before, it's um because it horror lays bare these very um base level emotions, right? Fear. Fear is something that everyone feels at at one point in their life, and it's so easy to um uh to to combine those as well. But at the same time, I think also I think horror is, and this is always like I don't want to say it's a hot take, but I think horror is the most important genre in cinema. It's the first genre that that appeared, it's the most elaborate one, it's the one that can mix with all the other genres. You can have a comedy that is horror, you can have a drama that is horror, you can have like it's it's because it's a base um human interaction. Everyone is is afraid of something, either the future, the unknown, the person next to them, uh, you know, uh family. There's so many ways to be scared. And uh in a way, there is this very close line where um sexuality runs next to it as well, because it's also very base human emotion. Um, and what you see with early horror, but definitely later on in history of horror as well, is that because it's also the closest thing to what is happening in that current zeitgeist in humanity and in in the world, in the culture, um it's uh it's also showing things what uh people are thinking of feeling, and that is always always also closely related to some type of sexuality. So um, you know, if you think of slashers, the I I think it's the book W uh Women, Men, Women and and Chainsaws. Oh, I always get their name wrong, but that there's this famous book written by a woman about where you know how how a female presence sometimes is um substituted or uh their experience is substituted in in horror by, for instance, like a slasher, which is the penetration of the knife, right? Um I I love the the example of alien, for instance, where you see men get pregnant, or you know, uh pe people presenting as male are getting pregnant and and birthing a monster, basically. And it's their ultimate horror is going through that female or you know, uh people with uteruses experience.

SPEAKER_01 11:32

So it's basically it's no, no, I hear you. Absolutely. I was just telling Alma earlier. We'll get into the discussion a little bit further along, too. But you mentioned alien, and it's something I want to discuss when we get into um our uh 70s and 80s discussion too. Um, but yeah, definitely I want to discuss that. Um but uh so do you think that early we're we're you know, also in the early horror, you know, we have our vampires and our monsters, and yes, you know, we're talking about uh repressed sexuality. I think a lot of the times, you know, that's just is signifying or uh, you know, vampires. I think vampires is probably the one that you can most look to. Are the most sexual beings, exactly?

SPEAKER_00 12:19

They are obviously queer because if you live for hundreds and hundreds of years, you know, sexuality and gender doesn't matter anymore. Right. Um, and that whole intimate moment of being held and then like this vein being f found, and then you know, it's it's the same erogenous zones that that people have as well is where they bite down to. So you feel that you know it's almost like an allegory for sexuality in a way, because this open sexuality that that these vampires seem to have, and they just you know, they don't have to conform to society and they can just openly be sexual, but then it's it's it's you know translated as oh, their their blood is being taken and life forces are being, you know, life fluids are being exchanged, but it's very sensual experience.

SPEAKER_01 13:10

Oh yeah. Very sensual experience. Um you and like you said, it's a very uh it's very queer. You cannot be straight, especially when you're thinking about your uh you're thinking about life sustaining. It's life sustaining. Um you can't be if we're just thinking about the primal instinct itself, you can't be picky when it comes to wanting to live, I guess if you want to think of it that way. But then you're also thinking about the emotional aspects of it all. Um when you're living that long, you're you want to connect somehow, even if it is if it is just when you're trying to live literally, um, trying to sustain and get that blood to live, um, you're trying to connect in an emotional level somehow. So um, yeah, you're you're making that connection somehow. So it is very uh sexual in nature.

SPEAKER_00 14:05

Definitely, definitely, yeah. Yeah, and the intimacy that is required to to obtain this life force. I mean, again, like all all the all the places that vampires historically are abiding in in in cinema are very erogenous zones. So yeah, it's it's it's un uh separ it's inseparable uh at this point. And also as far back as as the early, you know, the days of your the f first uh horror movies coming out. I think that's what you know the first Dracula made made it so sensational for people worldwide. I remember my mom, she's uh she she was born in South America, she grew up in in England. Um, and she remembers going to the first Dracula as a young uh girl, and it m had such an impact on her because it's like oh I f I feel like I've watched something forbidden almost. Like, are we interesting? Are we voyeuristically looking into this very, very intimate interaction that's taking place?

SPEAKER_01 15:11

And that is that that feeling of being voyeuristic too. Sometimes it feels a little bit, you know, even when they're not really showing much what it is, those old films when we're just seeing a very kind of tame experience going on, it feels as it does feel kind of voyeuristic in in a sense, definitely.

SPEAKER_00 15:32

No, 100%, 100%.

SPEAKER_01 15:36

Do you think that uh early horror owns the monsters symbolize repressed sexuality trope?

SPEAKER_00 15:42

Yes, 100%. Um if you look at the different monsters, the classic monsters that come from early horror, they're all a representation of wanting to be with an other, but you can't do it in a traditional way. So, oh, you have to be kidnapped by the the the the creature of the g you know, the black lagoon, for instance, or something like that. Yeah, yeah. And it's like, oh, this this other, this I mean, it it's also a lot a lot of times unfortunately based in racism because people were fantasizing about interracial relationships that fell too taboo, so then they would, you know, fictionalize it into a monster, a trope. Um but then at the same time, uh you see this fetishization as well happening because, you know, secretly people people were really digging it.

SPEAKER_01 16:41

Oh yeah, absolutely. And that's the way they could kind of live out or kind of yeah, be able to experience those things without actually, you know, breaking those, like you said, breaking those taboos. Um but getting into the haze code area, those uh years, interestingly, um, those were about 1934 to 1968. So those where we started seeing the censorship on screen. Now, obviously, it wasn't specifically about horror, but we're talking about horror here, and we're gonna see it um kind of uh uh manifest in different ways. Filmmakers were learning how to work around these restrictions. We started seeing it um with uh symbolism, dialogue, situationships. Me and Alma were talking about um uh earlier with certain movies, like uh we saw it with like the rope. Um, we saw it when the cat people, the picture of Dorian Gray. I know that's a little bit more kind of like I'm I'm probably pulling, you know, trying to search for something there, but I I see it in the picture of Dorian Gray. Oh, the haunting, such a that one's not even that one's overtly kind of like, yeah, we're we're seeing it there for sure, but um definitely like so. What are some uh images or some things that we see in uh the Haze Code era that uh are ways that they filmmakers, filmmakers were trying to um put their stamp on the sexuality and horror that they could get away with?

SPEAKER_00 18:18

Oh, that's interesting because I'm from a different part of the world. So um I obviously like I I had access to a lot of Asian content, and what you see in that particular era is that they were becoming more sexual on screen. Uh I mean it's the period where Teruishi, a famous Japanese uh filmmaker, um, started uh exploring even more uh perversion and sexuality on screen. Uh so you get movies like uh Horrors of Malformed Men, where he combines art and uh this particular dance art called Bhutto, uh, which is contemporary dance, and uh BDSM and horror into one movie with a fantastical storytelling. So um, and here in the Netherlands, uh nudity became even more prevalent. It became normalized almost. Like I've watched children's movies where you could see breasts in on screen, full frontal, even. So it's interesting that there's just such a difference between where you've been in the world uh during different times, and if you've seen movies from those times, they'll be different. Yeah, definitely. No, I didn't even think of that.

SPEAKER_01 19:35

Yeah, absolutely. You're c you're right. You're thinking it from a uh well, like you said, you were you do watch a lot of Asian horror and um but you do live in the in the Netherlands. Yeah. And so you do watch a lot of, I'm taking it, you do watch a lot of European horror.

SPEAKER_00 19:54

I grew up with a lot of European horror, and I grew up with mostly a lot of Asian horror because uh the diaspora in the community that I'm part of, uh, that was the thing. Like someone would get a tape, someone would get a DVD, someone would get like a bootleg somewhere, and everyone would watch it. So I was way too young watching some of these Asian horror movies. But at the same time, um it it it's something that's far more normalized within the community that I grew up in. So um I saw the thing when I was six years old because my mom and my aunt from India, they were just chilling at our house and they were watching it. And the rule is whatever the grown-ups are watching, that's what they're watching. And if you as a kid can't handle it, then you leave the room, and that's that's that's it. I love that. That's your fault. Get out of here. Yeah, if it's too scary, view, that's your that's on you. So I that's how I ended up way too young uh watching Hellraiser. Well, I was six years old when I watched the thing. I I was way too young when I watched some of these slashers in American movies. Um because they would just show up at late night on our TV. Um, we had cable like Dutch cable, but that that they would bring in American stuff as well. So uh I did have a dip into American culture in that way, but we never had the same type of censor that uh took place in in the United States because of this sexually quite free country that I grew up in myself. So, like I said, like most of the children's movies and and series here, even at a later stage, so from the time that I was growing up, because obviously I'm from the 80s, I'm not from the 60s. So um uh it was very normal to to sh to to have horror and and sexuality in there. Yeah, it was not something that they would um censor.

SPEAKER_03 21:44

Right. Yeah. Well and we're seeing these movies a lot later. Sorry, Dahlia. Um we're seeing these movies a lot later outside of the Hayes Code era. And so they really stick out for us because it's like, why are they doing That or what is that? And why are they so specifically um being more symbolic with things? It wasn't so much that that's what they really wanted to do, but they had to because of the rules of the time period. So you look it up and you're seeing, oh, dancing, you know, that's the they're gonna have a long dance scene. Or um the situationships that we saw were like these two men are living together, but it's never brought up that they're in a relationship together at all. They're just they don't even say roommates, they're just in, you know, like we're watching a day in their life of like in the the rope of this murder. But you know, in the haunting you have a a character that's gay and she is not mentioned to be gay in the whole movie, but you knew because that was a story, that was a book before it was um before it was a movie, and you see all those little little tiny things that are like oh, and shadows. They she they used shadow and and things like that. Um but they had to be very careful about how they use their shadows and how they use their uh because all these these rules and regulations that they had to to live through.

SPEAKER_00 23:27

It's it's so interesting to hear all this because obviously there's like this cultural shift that happened uh, you know, within Western filmmaking during the during the Haze Code. And then obviously we're all looking at it way later after it's been made. But is there any movie uh that you would say for someone who who didn't grow up with with these movies? I've seen a bunch. Uh The Haunting is definitely something I've seen. But what is something that you feel like, oh, this is during this Haze Code era, if you're uh era, if if there's a movie that you're not cultural familiar with, um, this is something you would watch because this really shows or like embodies this censorship that was happening in the United States during that time. But it was still good horror.

SPEAKER_01 24:14

Um I don't I think uh it probably the cat people's a good one, I think, mainly because um that is a really good. I mean, they talk about it though. They do talk about how she is not going to um uh sleep with him. I mean it's it's pretty obvious that she's not going to. But I think the reason why it would be a good one is because she doesn't. She's not going to. And it is uh if she does, it's going to something bad is going to happen. So that is the whole point of the story. If she does go through with it, something bad will happen. And then all the then we start seeing all these these things start happening throughout the movie where um we're start uh it's it's not it's not being painted in a good light. It's you know, it's it's all negative. It's we're not being shown her in, I don't know. At least that's how I it's been a while since I've seen it. So you could be telling me, oh Dahlia, you're not, you know, you're remembering it completely wrong. But the last time I saw it was several years ago. I've only seen it like a couple of times. So uh, but at least that's how I remembered it.

SPEAKER_03 25:27

And I think that um part of it is that the subject matter is sex for that movie. What makes it so interesting is that it's from 1942 during the the that era, and they had to not only was that the actual subject of the movie, but they had to work it into the movie where they're following all of these rules about it. That's a movie where they use shadow a lot. Um and they use it, but um like her form is, you know, she's a beautiful woman, and everything that they're doing is uh probably against the Hayes Code era, but they're following all the rules in order to show and talk about sex in a way that is still in a restricted area of you know conversation that they're not supposed to be having in movie pictures.

SPEAKER_01 26:28

It's just one of my favorite movies, I think, just in general. I think that's why I I brought it up. So um I'm sure there's plenty of conversations that can be had about that movie alone, I think.

SPEAKER_00 26:41

I I I I feel yeah, I've I've only seen Cat People once, but it did have an impact and is so beautifully made, but looking at it up from a different lens and knowing that it was during the era where the censorship was taking place, it gives it a new layer, uh definitely. I'm also wondering if if all the shadows were partially maybe also um influenced by things like Nosferatu, like the original Nosferatu, where they had to play with a lot of those shadows too. Because again, there's like uh I I feel that horror is at the always at the precipice at the start of any type of technological or cinematic uh evolution that happened within the industry worldwide because they always had to be more creative with how they showed things and and how to create things on screen. And I feel that that that there might be some influence there. I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_03 27:35

No, yeah, I think you're right. I think you're right.

SPEAKER_01 27:38

Absolutely, because we do see that a lot. Um again, that could be a whole other conversation right there too. As you as you start talking, I'm like starting to see it everywhere too. It's like, oh my God. It's like we really are starting to see a lot of these things everywhere. Um but uh that's again, this haze code, we could be talking about this just forever here. But getting it to this sexual revolution area era, I'm gonna keep saying area, excuse me. Um oh, we have so many, so many. This is when we started seeing, Robbie. I know you said you were seeing it way before we did in the United States, but this is when we started seeing the explosion here in the United States. Right after, what years did I say it was after 1968? Um, here in the United States, we started seeing it with movies like uh, I mean, there more movies, but just some general examples are like Carrie, Rocky Horror, Picture Show, Alien, um where we started seeing more about bodily autonomy. We started seeing it in movies with even clothing choices. We started seeing in the costume, the costumes that were wearing the movies, uh, sexual freedom. Um, we even started seeing with topics such as, you know, we would start seeing it sexual assault. I mean, that that was the way we started seeing it here. I'm not saying they didn't do that, you know, in other cultures and in other uh countries, but you know, we did start seeing it a lot here in the United States in movies, you know, sexual assault, um, you know, being portrayed in movies as uh as a way of coming out of that haze coat era. Um but how do you feel that the I mean you've looked back on it now, obviously, because if you have a different uh you have a different experience growing up where you were, but looking back on it now, when you could see our evolution of our uh cinema history, how do you feel about how we kind of exploded onto the into the genre of, you know, our real sexual, I guess, um, and you know, becoming into the horror genre?

SPEAKER_00 29:48

I I think it's one of the most interesting eras, to be honest. I think uh a lot of my favorite movies are from this era. Um uh like I mentioned before, the whole alien thing where, you know, it's a mirrored experience of not only because literally the the face huggers, like they penetrate, you know, and they and they impregnate and it's happening without consent, and there's nothing you can do. You can run left and right and and get away, but there's no escaping uh from it. And it it almost feels like this underlying fear, and I'm pretty sure someone else have mentioned has mentioned this in history before, but of this fear of men, um, specifically, you know, uh those who sign male at first feeling this fear of like, what if we were put in the same situation as people who can get pregnant? What if we were forced in society uh to look at it from that perspective? Um, because it it it it's it's not women who made these. Uh, but we have a female, strong female protagonist. Um, and she is a final, she's a final girl before any final girl. She's not a final girl, she's a final woman. Yeah. Um she outwits all the men, women, and and and people on um in both first two movies uh in such a way, like there's military there, there's robots there, there's workers there. No, she's the one who gets shit done when it when uh when stuff goes down. And I think it almost feels like this ode to um female empowerment, even though it's not, but in a way it also is to say, like, you know, you can have all this crazy stuff going on, but at the end of the day, this this she's she's not cowering away like a little scared girl. She's not this, you know, the innocent virgin in the in the trope story. She's a woman just trying to get shit done. Oh yeah, absolutely. Uh meanwhile, left and right men are going down, going down. Uh and um yeah, she's just working it through it. She's like, no, I'm gonna use my brain. I'm just gonna empower and get this done and save the kids, save the cat. Yeah. And it it it's interesting to see all these other uh movies from that same era because I mean it's also the start of a lot more exploitation in in America's. Yes, exploitation, yes. Absolutely. Uh but then always it's linked to some type of female empowerment, even though it's female exploitation, there's always some type of like strong female uh character uh in those movies. Um and across across the globe, the exploitation was very much happening as well. You have the female prisoner series in Japan, for instance, and in the Netherlands, there was uh, you know, it's the the arrival of things like Amsterdam and stuff like that. But it it's interesting to see, especially in American um cinema around that time, that they were very honest. I think more honest so than in the years that follow. I I feel that this was this is like a reignitement uh almost as as an outsider looking in. It felt like this passion for showing things like it is, like telling stories, being experimental, pushing boundaries, but also having a full reflection of what people were feeling in that current zeitgeist was like full on back on track. Uh right.

SPEAKER_01 33:28

So um if you could pick out what well, do you think there was a director or somebody it could be it, you know, it doesn't have to be an American filmmaker that uh did this best.

SPEAKER_00 33:44

Uh oh, it's so hard to hard to say. I mean, I I always have the problem that I can't choose because there's so many children's. Um I think uh um if we're looking more into uh 70s and 80s, for instance, I think John Carpenter is a really good uh name to mention. Um uh specifically because he did things like Alien and Halloween. Um yeah, absolutely. Uh you know, made all his own music, he did a lot of different uh other interesting stuff um uh in the fantastic genre around that time as well. Uh Day Live is one of my favorite movies of all time. It's still so, so relevant. Oh, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 34:33

One of my favorites.

SPEAKER_00 34:35

You and I can uh can can totally hang uh on this. They just have have they live on repeat while holding our uh Chucky dolls. Yes, yes. You're welcome to join as well, of course. Um but uh no, I I I think that's the interesting. I think if we're looking specifically from a Western perspective, um because in the East it was still very scattered. Um you have people like Daro Rishi, but he's very niche, like I mentioned before. You had the female prisoner series, but again, very niche. It was very exploitation corner. So I think if we look in a more broader sense and and uh if we look at horror that reached a more mainstream audience, then definitely I would go with uh with Carpenter for for for this. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:22

Yeah. We were talking about we're gonna go, I was gonna go back to Alien, and I'm sorry that I'm going back to Alien. I said we weren't going into movie specific, but I did want to touch upon this just because I was having this conversation with Alma earlier, and I I mentioned Alien to her, and she's like, I didn't think of Alien like that. And I'm like, really? I'm like, for me, it was like very I said, maybe I'm imagining it, but for me it was very obvious. And she's like, I just never thought about it.

SPEAKER_00 35:50

And I'm like, oh no, the face fucking and the and the boob, all the boob, like mouse, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 36:00

Yes, like I've seen I've I've seen it, obviously, and everything, and I had thought of it, but I guess I just never thought of it in the sexual revolution type of con.

SPEAKER_01 36:11

Uh like um like yeah, I totally understand what you mean now, but you just didn't think of it like that. Yeah. But for me, it was it was all about like I'm gonna do this to you, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna pregnant, I'm gonna, I was gonna pregnate you, I'm gonna impregnate you. I'm gonna do this stuff to you, and the fact that you like the way you said, Rabia, that I am doing this to you as you are a man, and I am doing this uh against your will, and um those fears. Yeah, those fears of I'm going to uh um these are things that happen to women and you know the fear of like having a man lose control of his body. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:53

Yeah, I love that. And it again, it's it's a movie that's made, you know, decades ago, but it's still so relevant today because if we look at, for instance, the current state of American politics, right? Female auton autonomy being taken away, um, uh forced pregnancies, forced births, um, this is a direct parallel to that. So it's something that's still very, very relevant. And that that fear that lives with it is still very, very relevant.

SPEAKER_03 37:27

And speaking of bodily autonomy and the sexual revolution, we never we didn't bring up also, but uh sexual freedom and using sex as as the um using sex for not uh we uh in horror it's used like as exploitation, but it was empowerment for the women. Oh yeah. And and they also started bringing up things like abortion and things that were not allowed to speak about in the previous movies of before 68. Um all these movies started coming about and it was like it was female empowerment to see that that strong woman um lead have sex, but at the same time, uh horror used that as ways to get butts in seats.

SPEAKER_00 38:19

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and like uh Dahlia mentioned before as well, I you know, this is the I I think also the same era where you had things like Last House on the left and um uh oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01 38:37

I spit on your grave is a spit on your grave.

SPEAKER_00 38:40

I always get confused because my Wi-Fi at home is called IP on your grave. Um as the as the letters IP. Um so I always forget that it's I spit it. It's I spit on your grave. Yeah, um I mean obviously it's uh it's in a very perverse way, um, the type of empowerment that's being given, but also at the same time, the you see a lot of queer uh sexual liberation in these films. I mean, you mentioned Rocky Horror uh Picture Show, but there were a lot of other movies uh starting the 70s until like you know, mid-90s, where you would see men who you would normally see in very masculine roles take on a more drag performance or a cross-dressing performance. Um and that was very interesting to see because it kind of normalized it for for the people again, like outside of the United States, like, oh yeah, that's normal. Like, you know, it's totally cool. Um, not understanding that, you know, that's something that was still highly contested and looked down upon on in that in the United States themselves. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:53

I love hearing this uh point of view from someone who's not in the United States. Like it's just it, it's it's so refreshing because it's yeah, I don't know. I can't put words to it right now, but it's just I love hearing it. It's like it feels like we were so repressed over here, you know. Not me personally, I don't feel like, but just as a as a country, just the way you know we went through the different eras and everything, and then just you know, even today, sometimes I feel like we are. Um, speaking of going into modern horror, um, you know, that that encompasses such a large many years, you know, after um wait, did I already speak about the slasher? No, no, no, no. Okay, we forgot to bring it. Yeah, I want to let's let's ignore me. I was gonna go into modern horror before I spoke about slasher. Uh slasher 70s, 80s. Let's talk about that that period. That's gonna be fun. Um, Friday the 13th, Halloween, the nightmare on Elm Street 2. Oh my God. Those are just a couple, a few book movies. We have a whole bunch to talk about right there. This is where we really start seeing sex equals death trope. Oh my god. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 41:08

Where did that come from? Yeah, you saw it and you knew that they were gonna die. That's why um the first time I remember seeing Friday the 13th stuck with me so well. Because it was like that was definitely, even as a child, you got that point. That point was just plain as day right in your face. You know, if they're gonna do it, they're gonna die. And Halloween. Oh no, they did it, they're gonna die. Oh, she's on her way to have sex, she's in trouble. And you can say it for so many movies of that time. Um, Sleep Awake, not Sleep Awake camp, but you know, um, what's it called? Slumber Party Massacre. Um that one. Uh, she was on her way to go have sex and um showing your breasts, showing your sexuality. Uh, it was a form of empowerment. And it was like, yes, you know, I'm comfortable being naked. Some of the women were very comfortable being naked, but when you saw them be naked, you knew that that was something that was going to get them murdered also.

SPEAKER_01 42:15

Exactly. They're gonna die because they showed their breasts or because they had sex, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 42:20

Um which is again like looking at an outside as an outsider in, that was so weird for us because here we didn't have that trope. I mean, there was breasts glore on Dutch TV. Um, so we were like, why do the Americans hate naked people so much? It's like, oh, they did do they not like boobies? What's going on? No, it's like um so it's it was so weird because then you have this very big cultural uh divide or like a cultural, uh not divide, um um how do you say it? Like this, it's this very big uh difference between the two cultures because over here we're watching French movies and you know, everyone's like erotic thrillers, and you know, everything is anything and everything on the descent is happening. You're watching a TV show and a girl's getting grabbed by the in the back by by her by her neighbor, and she goes like, Oh neighbor, what are you doing now? And she's like, Kitty's out, everything. Um, and then you switch to uh a mainstream horror movie, which for us American movies were mainstream horror movies that we would watch. Uh, and then you see indeed like people get stabbed to death. Like, oh no, Americans, they're so afraid of sex because whenever whenever sex is in the picture, someone has to die. It was a form of punishment. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. That's that's how we saw it as the outside aside just looking in. It's like, oh, they're they're really, really strict about sex, and when they're really horny at the same time, what's happening over there?

SPEAKER_01 44:00

Very horny. Um, well, speaking of it was his horror punishing sex. Um, we were using it as a as a form of punishment. Um, or you can also think of it uh we were having were we also having fun with it? We to just throw it in. Um I mean, we could look at it both ways. We wanted to add sex to have a little bit of fun. Um or we were looking at it as a form of punishment. We could, you know, I don't know, we could doing both of them. I think you know having fun.

SPEAKER_03 44:30

I think the having fun with it wasn't wasn't the strong point of the sex. Whenever it was featured in when I when it was featured in these in these times, they were shown very briefly, and most of the time the only person you saw was naked who was naked was the female.

SPEAKER_02 44:47

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 44:47

And then so then it was over, and you know, or you'd have the the this the whole cigarette smoking, it was done, let's have a cigarette, and then all of a sudden it was like the next but next the next thing was going to be a death, it was going to be be somebody is going to get killed. But I don't think they really were having too much fun with that. I think we were they was done too much through the male lens, yeah. Um, through the male gaze.

SPEAKER_02 45:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:16

Um one of the one of the best examples is is the Slumber Party massacre that was written by a woman to make fun of um all those things. And that's why it was supposed to be more female empowerment, but the man didn't get it. The producers didn't get that. So all they wanted to do was, hey, let's just have big old um um uh what's it called, shower scenes with naked women and things like that. I don't think that they were having fun with it, and I don't think that they knew what good sex was either because of what was featured in these movies, you know. I think they were repressed, and so they thought just showing the man, you know, get his rhythm on for two seconds and was probably realistic from their eyes. But for the woman, I don't think that was any kind of fun, you know?

SPEAKER_00 46:09

No, and it it's so interesting that you mentioned that about repression as well. Um because uh I the moment that sex happens or something sexual happens, the death happens and it's the slasher. And like I mentioned before, it's the penetration of the weapon, right? So there's a lot of penetrating happening, but it's not technically sexual, but it is sexual in the way that it's being framed because it's all this frustration is going and just going and going, and it's uh some of these movies you can really tell that that focus that they weren't having fun with the sex part, but they were definitely having fun with the kills part. And the kills get more creative and they get more elaborate and they get more stuff out there where you have the spears going through two of them at the same time, and it it it's it's definitely the slasher area is was very, very creative when it comes to very penetrative uh kills.

SPEAKER_03 47:04

Oh, absolutely. And it's especially I'll bring it up again, the slumber party massacre, because even in the shots where they show him holding his weapon, he holds it between his legs, and then they show the woman screaming um right in between his legs, it's like they're using that that weapon as representative of the sex as well. And you see it so much in those shots, those those shots uh um where they're getting stabbed. I mean, you see in Psycho, even though they weren't showing anything, where she is is the most vulnerable place that she could possibly be in the shower, um, getting stabbed repeatedly, and they're showing little bits of her because that's all they can show. But, you know, they're definitely having more fun with the with the killing than they were with the the sexuality part.

SPEAKER_00 47:52

Yeah, I would even go as far as saying that it's almost filmed like a P.O. fee porno because it's from the the male gaze, right? The the position of the man who is killing and who's doing the penetrating. And from their position, you're looking down at the victim and seeing them uh get killed. So it was definitely there was perversion going on one way or another.

SPEAKER_01 48:15

Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Um, do you think people are more comfortable with violence than they are with sex since we're talking about, you know, we're talking about all this violence? Um I I personally do think they are, because uh I don't know, we see all the like just in we're not talking about horror, just horror. When we're talking about like action movies and other types of movies, we see uh we see a lot of violence where you throw on a sex scene, it's like all of a sudden, oh my god, let me clutch my pearls. It's like um, I don't know, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:46

It it again, so for for outside of the so different. So we always talk about like, oh, these Americans, they love violence more than they love sex because look at their movies, it's much easier to blow up 15 buildings in a movie or show someone horrifically dying than to have like one titty or one butt cheek out. Yeah. Um, and it's it's not the same in the rest of the world, even with very, very conservative societies such as like India or South Korea, Japan, um, sexuality is something that's very much acknowledged even in family movies. Um I I made a list uh about you know sexy Bollywood movies, and these are all mainstream movies that played in the cinemas where people went with their kids. Um, and the same with Japanese films, even if you go outside of the horror genre, outside of the exploitation and the BDSM era and stuff like that, it's it's it is a natural, normal part of life. So South Korean movies, very conservative uh country in general. But if you look at their movies, not the series, because they are more conservative than serious, but they they do yearning so well, does so we don't mind. But when it comes to the movies, and there is sexuality, it's very full frontal. It is a class uh um actors performing those acts, and it doesn't demean them in their uh career either. Like it's not something that they then you know get typecasted for or that it puts like a damp on their um uh on their growth as an actor in the industry in any way, shape, or form, which is what I understand very opposite when it comes to the United States and Hollywood in general. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:39

Oh yeah, absolutely. I think uh definitely it's more yeah, you could see an actor uh it would be more comfortable doing an action scene than doing a sex scene for sure here in the United States. Well, uh I would yeah, definitely for sure. Um would slashers have been so popular if they hadn't been associated with nudity or sex, do you think? I I I I I I oh sorry, go ahead.

SPEAKER_03 51:14

Okay, I'll I'll go first. She definitely um I don't think so. Because I don't I'm I'm gonna go with I don't think so because I'm gonna go with the default that if it was wrong, then why was it right? Because they were always trying to put that focus at the end of the day when you listen to the producers, the directors, um, the commentary on movies, they were like, let's put more butts in seats. We want to put more butts in seats. That's always the the the the what they want to do is put more butts in seats. So they needed to see that. They they they look at Return of the Living Dead. I was thinking of Return of the Living Dead because they wanted to show uh a naked woman. And when she got completely naked, they even had her shave. And the director or the producer, I'm not sure who decided that that was too much. That was too much, and that that might deter people from coming to see it. So they had to make her a little piece to cover up her genitalia with with like hair or something. I don't even remember exactly what they did, but they were thinking of it so much that even showing too much was something that they feared that they might do and keep people from coming and putting that butt in the seat. So yeah, I'm gonna go with that.

SPEAKER_00 52:43

I uh completely agree. Famous quote is sex cells. Um, and all these movies were aimed at a quite young uh teenage group, and hormones uh really work. So if you want to get more butts in seats, as Alma's saying, um, yeah, you have to appeal to their base uh nature, and that's you know, being horny. Oh yeah. Especially in such a again, like for what I understand as a more repressed society, um if you can't find it in places in the mainstream, then this is the one place where you'll be able to find it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 53:24

And they they did think of the women. I'm trying to remember what movie specifically it was where they said if we knew that that many women were gonna come to the movies, we would have put some naked men in it too. But I can't remember what that was, what movie that was. And uh so they were occasionally thinking of the of the women, but occasionally, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 53:46

It does seem to be geared towards more towards the men, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 53:50

Yes, but have you seen that meme of um it says nobody and then it says um slasher movies of the 70s and 80s, and it shows all the men in their tight shorts and their short shorts and and their half shirts and the way that they would dance provocatively and stuff like that. So they were showing male sexuality. It was just a lot different than the way that they featured it for women. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:17

And men in crop tops, men in crop tops. Tight shirts and crop tops were 70s and 80s, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 54:28

So moving on to modern horror now, finally, now that I can get back to that. Sorry about that from earlier. Um, what has changed? So now we're seeing more sexual exploration. We are seeing those queer relationships coming out more into the open. Um, we are seeing that uh streaming come on to where uh we're seeing more horror, sexual relationships uh being more on the forefront in our streaming uh movies. Uh, so we're starting to see a lot more of this being on the forefront rather than being um, you know, kind of more hidden and all that. So some of the movies that I was thinking of were like It Follows, X, Raw. Obviously, there's more. Those are just a couple of movies off the top of my head that I had uh thought of. Of course, Robbia, I'm sure you have some great, fantastic movies that you're probably thinking of, like, oh, these are some great movies I want to discuss.

SPEAKER_00 55:28

Oh, um there's so many. I I think what's interesting in the modern horror era is globalization, obviously happened in the meantime between the 90s and now. Um, so a lot of more international influences, people, you know, streaming, people have more access to international titles. So all these um Western movies have to compete with now the rest of the world, with yeah, Asia taking up 60% of that market, right? Um, and that's not even counting the whole Asian diaspora. So if you now want to get your money, then you have to appeal to a broader audience, you have to appeal to a broader set of cultures as well. Um may be more conservative, some may be less conservative, but they all have their own flavor of horror and how they manifested in their own countries. And they seem to be very popular here in the West as well. I mean, look at South Korean um uh cinema, specifically horror cinema, booming in uh in the West. And when I say the West, I mean Europe and and and North America in this case. Uh Japanese uh horror and especially like the weird niche gory stuff coming out and being crazily popular, uh whether it's stuff like Meatball Machine or you know, Vampire Girl versus Frankenstein Girl or you know, bigger things like Ichi the Killer. Ichi the Killer opens with a cum shot. It's a literal cum shot, and in the cum you see the words Ichi form. So I mean, uh that's I so yeah, I mean that there's uh well how how do you compete with that? How do you open up to that? How do you give people from the right uh generation more voice and a more prominent voice and invest in them so that they can show you what uh the reflection of society at this point in time is, you know, reflection of American society that is more true than old white men, you know, telling their stories only from their particular uh perspective. And it's been bringing in a lot of very interesting movies. Um uh again, like I'm an Asia expert, so I'll always name some Asian movies, but uh even if you look at movies that have sexuality in them, but then don't go fully the whole way. Um I love recommending the Raz series from India uh to everyone. Uh it's it's you never see full nudity, you never see people going all the way, but it's such a sexual film, it's definitely erotic horror. Um, and it is but it's still mainstream, you can still watch it with your grandma in the room. Um, although it gets very seamy and spicy at spaces. Um, but there's still interesting stories. Uh, if you look at South Korea, you have things like Nap Namja Bad Guy and stuff like that, where you look at exploitation of women or handmaiden even, where you look at colonization happening from the Japanese to um um and where women find um refuge together and explore their sexuality together. And even though it's something that in their regular society conversely is not openly accepted in South Korea queerness um uh in gay identity and other sexualities or gender identities in film, in mainstream film, it's something that you can still prevalently find. Like it like you had, you know, during the Hayes Code, two men living together. Here you have two girls that are always together. You have that with the uh Memento Mori series, for instance, Wishing Stairs, What Whispering Corridors, which is uh both Japanese and in um South Korea, you had a lot of these girl school movies, basically, all girl schools, and there is not a man to be found, they're not part of the plot. They're you know, they all pass the Bexel test, basically. And it's an unspoken thing that this love that these girls are talking about and this affection, this deep affection that they're um uh experiencing is queer uh affection, is queer love. Um, and then there's either a ghost or a curse or something else uh, you know, uh happening around them, and then you get to the kill your gaze trope, obviously, that happens unfortunately still around the world, not as much as it used to, but it's still very much there. Um, so it's interesting to see how sexuality has evolved in modern horror uh to become more part of the plot, part of the story. Um, it can enhance things, it it shows also a better reflection of society in a way. Um, and we've become less perverse, I I want to say almost with it. So it's become less um almost as you had the the like I said, the porno POVs in the 70s and 80s, we've now moved to the more soft and realistic um uh settings where you know maybe a guy does eat a girl out, or maybe two guys are having fun together, and it can be uh it can be something without without moving into this fetishization uh or if it does get into it, it's it's like it's really gonna be about the movie.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:11

It's gonna be really out there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because there are there are those there still are those movies out there. Oh yeah, definitely. Definitely. No, but oh, oh my god, this was a fantastic conversation. We could keep talking forever. I know we could. But uh, like uh we would love to have you back on to the podcast to discuss more problems. My pleasure. Anytime, let me know. Yeah. So um I do have one final question though. Um if horror reflects our fears, what does how horror treats sex tell us? Um okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:54

Well, how horror treats sex would be that we are very still behind in times being very repressed sexually, um, being very much that it's it's it's still too taboo a subject. Um we've done that to ourselves in in the cinema we've made over here to at least in the over here in the United States, do you mean, right? Yes. Yes, yes, for sure. I'm saying this definitely from the American cinema um point of view. It just is just not a good a good time. Um occasionally you do, and then when you see it done right, the examples are so few and far between that people have such great conversations about them. And even the the most the greatest sex scenes that you'll see in horror, they're still um so just taboo in in the fact that there's just not they're still not in the in the main light. And I'm not saying that all horror needs to have sex or anything like that, but definitely if we treated it better, it would be more part of the story instead of just something to show one scene to the next. How is this person going to get killed? Or or whatever. Sex can be beautiful, sex is enjoyment, sex is pleasure, and they and and yet we're not seeing that so much in American cinema. You know. I mean we you know, just and I'm saying that outside of the occasional, you know, the occasional one. Yeah, but I totally get that.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:40

Yeah. Yeah. No, I uh I have to agree. Um I feel and I fear that uh unfortunately the world in in general is becoming more conservative. So even countries that have shown um until recent history this openness to showing sexuality and horror or just sexuality in cinema have pulled back from this slowly. Uh and it is a trend that I'm fearing will will become more prevalent uh depending on how the world politics progress, obviously. Um it's uh it's a shame that we don't see more um normalization of uh of sexuality in in cinema and in cinema as a broad term, not just in horror. Um and it's a shame to see that this trend is unfortunately also a reflection of current society because younger generations, Gen Z and Gen Alpha, are specifically becoming more conservative when it comes to sex, where it almost seems like the millennials are the last um generation that were trying to discover more openness, um, more freedom, more uh expression in this, and now that they're regressing back to a more conservative state. So uh even though there is still a lot out there, you have like the you know, you knew French extremity movement, you have Neon and and A24 trying to do their best uh here and there, um, with uh with more indie titles, and it's still it's not a movement that has completely come to a standstill or uh completely regressed already, but you can tell that that uh that is something that is currently uh taking place. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:40

Oh wow. Well, thank you so much again, Rabia, for joining us. And uh, where can people find you online if you wish to be found?

SPEAKER_00 1:05:49

Yeah, yeah, good question. So I'm on Letterboxd, I'm on Blue Sky, I'm on Instagram every now and then, um uh and I'm on the cultured curators. If you want to find me, just type in RPISH, Rpish, that's my name on any and every social media. You can find me probably on a whole bunch of other sites as well with old old accounts. Um, and uh I write for the cultured curators and horror movie blogs. So uh I'm happy to to have those in my links as well. But yeah, if you follow me on my socials, like I said, Rpish, RPI S H, then you'll see all those links coming through. And definitely on my letterbox if you want to see some cool uh movie lists.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:30

Awesome movie lists, I must say, for sure. Thank you. All right, Alma, and where can people find us on the interwebs?

SPEAKER_03 1:06:39

You can visit our website at thegory detailspodcast.com, on Instagram, the gory podcast, on Blue Sky, the Gory Details, and buy me a coffee.com slash the gory details.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:52

And again, thank you, Rabia, for joining us, and thank you everyone for listening. Until next week. Bye. Bye bye.