Review of Day of the Woman (1978) by Shane J — 01 Sep 2010

Granted, this was the forth time I've seen this little flick, but to me, its still about as brutal as you can get. Pretend its 1978 and you've just become one of the very few extremely lucky people to have seen it.

Having been banned in nearly every country in the world, I'm sure you would have been shocked and felt extremely dirty for even taking part in a viewing. The brutality comes in the form of two things; the raping and the killing.

A young writer named Jennifer, played damn well by Camille Keaton (supposedly the grandaughter of acting great Buster Keaton) moves out to a small town for the summer for some peace, relaxation and a way to finish her latest novel.

What she didn't expect was for four of the town's creeps to invade her personal space. After racing around in their boat and hijacking hers, they drag her to shore and proceed to gang-rape her for a solid 23 minutes of film.

Incredibly disturbing to watch, you feel very sorry for what she is going through and almost wish you were in the movie so you could try and help her. All in all, she is raped three and half times by four different men.

Camille plays these rapes scenes very honest and real. You feel her pain. You can see it in her eyes and hear it in the way she cries out, knowing that nobody is going to help her. When they've gotten out of her what they want, they decide that they need to kill her so she won't tell the authorities.

They send in Matthew, the one young man with a little bit of a sense of moral, but none of the brains to do anything about it. He almost carries out their plan, but can't bring himself to do it, however he tells his three "friends" that he did.

For two weeks they assume all is well. What they don't know is that Jennifer DID survive that fateful day and is slowly plotting and planning her revenge! At this point you are rooting for Jennifer to do the most evil and depraved acts to these four guys that you've ever seen.

While the kills do come off gratifying, none are really that inventive. A hanging, two axe kills and death by a cut to groin end the lives of her assalants. I Spit On Your Grave might not be as disturbing as it was 32 years ago, but it still makes you want to take a shower after you watch it!