This Coleslaw Archive: Snuff (1976)



Movie Review: Snuff (1976)
By Tucker Battrell

Snuff was sold with the gimmick that it actually contained a real snuff film at the end of the picture. Intriguing gimmick to gore-hounds, but admittedly pretty hard to believe from the outset. The film follows a Manson-like cult lead by man named Satan (pronounced Sutawn) who has four or five hippie girls with knives do his bidding. We get a good sense of his leadership style straight away when one of the girls is hording drugs and the others catch her. She is told she must "feel the pain and not flinch from it". He's a real charmer. So, they hold her down and rub a knife between her toes smearing bright orange blood all over her foot while she moans in agony(?). Enter Terry London, beautiful Hollywood starlet just visiting the country to make a film. Her director is in love with her and she has a boyfriend on the side. This would all be very boring if it weren't so terribly acted and dubbed. The director claims she'll do anything he asks her to because she is under contract, including nudity and standing on her head, but she assures us she will not stand on her head for him. The girl has values and she will not violate them. She also at one point picks up a ringing phone, asks for someone and gets them! She's magical.
So, the whole film is basically "Sutawn" and his girls killing people in unimpressive ways. Like so many gore films the dialogue is so much more entertaining than the kills. There's a flashback of one of the girls to when she was raped by an older man. Since this takes place off camera and the performance of the woman providing the dubbing is so ridiculous it manages to deliver what may be the funniest rape scene ever. So it culminates in the killing of the actress who is now pregnant and it's meant to remind us of the Sharon Tate murder, and it does, I guess. This is the point in the film we've all been waiting for. At the end of this scene, the film shifts to what is supposed to be a real snuff film.
The transition and delivery of this scene is so sloppy and unconvincing it's hard to imagine the filmmakers were actually trying to fool anyone. During the Sharon Tate killing we hear a "cut!" and there's a cut to a film crew shooting the scene. The director of the film we've been watching then proceeds to lure one of the actresses to make out with him and he and the crew kill her. Of course there are shots of the camera crew and it's edited and completely phony even if you don't consider the unconvincing gore. It was a good gimmick, however, and now it's on DVD where more of us can see it. It is pure garbage, but quite hilarious garbage. There's quite a few boobs, toe-cutting, multiple stabbings, finger-cutting, evisceration and a stabbing cross-cut with an woman having an orgasm. If that's not enough to tempt you consider a scene where "Sutawn" hilariously jumps up on a picnic table and tells a girl to "submit to me and pain" and then two other girls kiss. That oughta do it.

Grade: F
Entertainment Value: B-