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I Spit on Your Grave (1978) poster

I Spit on Your Grave (originally titled Day of the Woman) is a 1978 American rape and revenge horror film written, directed and edited by Meir Zarchi. It stars Camille Keaton, Eron Tabor, Richard Pace, Anthony Nichols, and Gunter Kleemann. The film tells the story of Jennifer Hills, a fiction writer based in New York City who exacts revenge on each of her tormentors after four men gang rape and leave her for dead.

I Spit on Your Grave is noted for its controversial depiction of extreme graphic violence, in particular the lengthy depictions of gang rape, that take up 30 minutes of the film's runtime. During its wider release, the film was branded a "video nasty" in the United Kingdom, and was a target of censorship by film commissioning bodies. As such, film critic Roger Ebert became one of the most notable detractors of the film, calling it "a vile bag of garbage". The film remains highly controversial to this day, even being considered to be one of the worst films ever made. For some, it is this controversy which has led to it being deemed a cult classic. Despite the controversy and negative reviews, the performance of Camille Keaton was praised by critics. In 2010, the film was included in Time magazine's "Top 10 Ridiculously Violent Movies".

The film spawned a 2010 remake, which has since spawned two sequels of its own: I Spit on Your Grave 2 (2013), and I Spit on Your Grave III: Vengeance Is Mine (2015). A direct sequel, I Spit on Your Grave: Deja Vu, was released in 2019 with Zarchi and Keaton both returning.

In her memoir Inside Out, Demi Moore confirmed that she is the scantily clad woman on the film's poster, posing with her back turned.

Plot[]

Short story writer Jennifer Hills lives in Manhattan and rents an isolated cottage in Kent, Connecticut near the Housatonic River in the Litchfield County countryside to write her first novel. The arrival of the attractive and independent young woman attracts the attention of Johnny Stillman, the gas station manager, and Stanley Woods and Andy Chirensky, two unemployed men. Jennifer has her groceries delivered by Matthew Duncan, who is mildly mentally disabled. Matthew is friends with the other three men and reports back to them about the beautiful woman he met, claiming that he saw her breasts.

Stanley and Andy start cruising by the cottage in their boat and prowl around the house at night. One day, the men attack Jennifer. She realizes that they planned her abduction so Matthew can lose his virginity. She fights back, but the three men rip her bikini off and hold her. Matthew refuses to rape Jennifer out of respect and pity for her, so Johnny and Andy rape her instead. After she crawls back to her house, they attack her again. Matthew finally rapes her after drinking alcohol. The other men ridicule her book and rip up the manuscript, and Stanley violently sexually assaults her. She passes out; Johnny realizes that she is a witness to their crimes and orders Matthew to go and murder her. Matthew cannot bring himself to stab her, so he dabs the knife in her blood and then returns to the other men, claiming that he has killed her.

In the following days, a traumatized Jennifer pieces both herself and her manuscript back together. She goes to church and asks for forgiveness for what she plans to do. The men learn that Jennifer has survived and beat Matthew up for deceiving them. Jennifer calls in a grocery order, knowing that Matthew will deliver it. He takes the groceries and a knife. At the cabin, Jennifer entices him to have sex with her under a tree. She then hangs him and drops his body into the lake.

At the gas station, Jennifer seductively directs Johnny to enter her car. She stops halfway to her house, points a gun at him, and orders him to remove all his clothing. Johnny insists that the rapes were all her fault because she enticed the men by parading around in revealing clothing. She pretends to believe this and invites him back to her cottage for a hot bath, where she masturbates him. When Johnny mentions that Matthew has been reported missing, Jennifer states that she killed him; as he nears orgasm, she takes the knife Matthew brought with him and severs Johnny's genitals. She leaves the bathroom, locks the door, and listens to classical music as Johnny screams, bleeding to death. After he dies, she dumps his body in the basement and burns his clothes in the fireplace.

Stanley and Andy learn that Johnny is missing and take their boat to Jennifer's cabin. Andy goes ashore with an axe. Jennifer swims out to the boat and pushes Stanley overboard. Andy tries to attack her but she escapes with the axe. Andy swims out to rescue Stanley, but Jennifer plunges the axe into Andy's back, killing him. Stanley moves towards the boat and grabs hold of the motor to climb aboard, begging Jennifer not to kill him. She repeats the order he made to her during the sexual assaults, "Suck it, bitch!", then starts the motor, disemboweling him with the propeller as she speeds away.

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