Offensive Films (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780826514912)

Brottman offers up a study of movies so offensive, some are practically unwatchable. From the ever-popular Faces of Death movies to purported snuff films, from classic B-movies such as The Tingler, to more popular but no less controversial films such as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Brottman takes a wide-eyed look at movies most folks watch only through parted fingers.

While most critics have been quick to dismiss such films as mere shock-fests (if they even bother to talk about them at all), Brottman argues that these movies tell us quite a bit about who we are as a society, what makes us anxious, and what taboos we truly believe cannot be crossed. Part anthropology, part psychoanalysis, Offensive Films vivisects these movies in order to figure out just what about them is so offensive, obscene, or bizarre. In the end, Brottman proves that these films, shunned from the cinematic canon, work on us in sophisticated ways we often choose to remain unaware of.

Author: Mikita Brottman
ISBN-10: 082651491X
ISBN-13: 9780826514912
Publisher: Vanderbilt University Press
Language: English
Published: 10/03/2005
Pages: 216
Format: Paperback
Weight: 0.69lbs
Size: 8.96h x 6.10w x 0.52d

Review Citation(s):
Reference and Research Bk News 08/01/2006 pg. 291