I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE 3: VENGEANCE IS MINE
Directed by: R.D. Braunstein
Starring: Sarah Butler, Jen Landon, Doug McKeon, Gabriel Hogan, Michelle Hurd, Russell Charles Pitts
Jennifer Hills has moved to Los Angeles and has changed her name to Angela to avoid any recognition or notoriety. At the behest of her counsellor she starts to attend a group therapy session where she strikes up a friendship with a woman called Marla. However that friendship is tragically short lived and Jennifer soon finds herself on a violent and vengeful path…
Ever since watching WRONG TURN, I've been intrigued with the phenomenon of the "final girl" in horror films and what happens to them once the film's narrative ends. It should be noted that the character Jennifer Hills is not a "final girl" - Notwithstanding she was the "only" girl to begin with, final girls are interested in survival, not vengeance. A Final Girl would not hang around to try and turn the tables on her attacker(s). A final girl is forced to use whatever weapon or circumstance is within her immediate vicinity to survive, whereas the likes of Jennifer (and Katie in Pt 2) spend a lot of time fantasizing about how they will get their revenge.
Nevertheless, Vengeance Is Mine manages to bring something new to the table by showing us what happened to Jennifer after her original ordeal. She is an ascerbic shell of her former self, keen to keep everyone at arms length: especially men. We witness that Jennifer has violent fantasies about murdering those who harass her, such as the Latino trio she's accosted by on the street. She's seeing a psychiatrist who manages to convince her to attend a help group for other rape survivors. Here she meets three people in particular, Oscar, Cassie and Marla. Oscar is the only man in the group, and attends because his daughter was raped and later committed suicide after her rapist was found not guilty. Cassie is a teenager in a horrific position in that her ordeal is ongoing - her own stepfather is her abuser and has managed to deflect her accusations against her. Marla is cagey about her own past abuse but has a very forthright attitude and isn't afraid to confront idiots who try to heckle her on the street. She and Jennifer bond quickly and soon Jennifer is starting to relax for the first time in forever.
It is Marla who leads Jennifer into assisting her on some retribution. However it isn't for themselves, but to help Cassie. They are able to ambush her stepdad and beat him up, threatening him with more if he continues to assault Cassie.
After telling Jennifer that she is going to see her ex-boyfriend to pick up some personal effects, Marla suddenly disappears, only to be found murdered a couple of days later. Even though its damn obvious that her ex-boyfriend killed her, there is little in the way of evidence and the police have to let him go, which incenses Jennifer to the point that she decides to exact revenge on behalf of her friend.
One of the common themes of the I Spit on Your Grave series is the ineffectuality of the police. In the original film, they are nowhere to be seen at all. In the remake, the local sheriff is an active participant in Jennifer's torment. In the previous entry, the police detective at least feels guilty about not helping Katie enough but proves ineffective in either helping or stopping her. Set in Los Angeles, this film has the most prominent police presence but once more are not interested in helping the victims of rape. Jennifer is appalled that more effort is being made to solve the murder of Marla's ex bf (a known rapist and abuser of women) than of Marla herself (who is portrayed by the police as a victim waiting to happen - because she had a history of being abused by her ex, her death was just an inevitability in their eyes). Her views are shared by Oscar, who is wracked by guilt for convincing his daughter of "doing the right thing" and reporting her assault to the police. Regardless of the truth of the situation, it's very rich of the cops to interrogate a group of rape victims about the murder of a rapist.
Among the things that Jennifer and Marla discuss is the concept of the "nice guy". One of Jennifer's co-workers is Matthew, who is constantly trying to ingratiate himself with her. Jennifer is assuming that Matthew is "seeking a reward" for being nice to her and sees her as some sort of challenge to be solved. His tenacity would seem to bear this out - its one thing to be pleasant and professional at work without the need to be best buddies or worse, and Matthew's constant attempts would be grating on anyone.
What truly sets this film apart from the others is that Jennifer is wreaking revenge on behalf of other people, and is driven to do so from a mix of her personal history and the realisation (rightly or wrongly) that if not her…then who? The vengeful murders committed are no less passionate that those committed in the other films, with a particularly graphic castration and sodomy with a steel pipe being the…erm…highlights.
The film ends with an interesting twist regarding her therapy sessions, which doesn't quite work logically but nevermind, and also the suggestion that Jennifer's mind is just as fractured at the end of the film as it was at the beginning.
THE VERDICT
If it is possible to actually enjoy and be entertained by a film in this series, then VENGEANCE IS MINE just about fits the bill. This film manages to break the cycle of graphically depicted rapes without losing any of its bite. Although not a "final girl" per se, Jennifer is a hardened survivor and rather than force her through the same experiences the film allows her agency to choose to help others in a similar plight.
What this film also manages to do is destroy any notion that any rape/assault depicted in any of these films is some sort of misogynistic experience of empowerment, transforming these women into better, stronger, more independent women. This film makes it clear that their ordeals have broken them as people. They are having to reconcile their experiences with trying to reconnect with “civilised” society and the void between the two is sometimes too large to cross. Civilised society does not want to be faced with the depths to which mankind can sink. Even Oscar, who’s daughter was raped, begs Cassie at one point to stop with her tale of abuse.
7 out of 10 (MikeOutWest)