31 Days of Halloween 2017: Raw

2016, Julia Ducournau -- download

In her first feature film, Ducournau makes one of the most memorable films in our last few seasons of doing this. Like so many of the basically tense movies we see during these runs, its not technically horror, but it provides the most visceral horror response. I found myself talking to the screen, and jumping from one end of the sofa to the other, wishing to climb out of my own skin.

More than ten years of being primarily a sofa movie watcher really has changed me.

Justine is being dropped off at veterinarian college by her parents. She's meek, almost childlike and obviously uncomfortable with the open social dynamic of the college. Almost instantly she has to confront the worst situation, as she is forced to eat a rabbit liver during a hazing ritual. Her family is rabidly vegetarian, but she is guilted into doing it by her own older sister.

And then things begin to change for her. Strange cravings, bizarre behaviour and outbursts. She almost immediately abandons her life long vegetarian lifestyle, but the raw chicken tells us this is more than just adjustment. During an unfortunate accident during a waxing attempt, she cuts her sister's finger off. Her sister faints and she proceeds to eats the finger like a chicken wing.

Her sister explains later that its a family thing, and shows her how to deal. Fake an accident, force a driver off the road, eat the dying driver. Either that or succumb to the inevitable all consuming cravings.  Justine cannot imagine killing and refuses; its the wrong choice.

Its a French movie so sex and cravings get all mixed up together. It never swerves away from the merging of the two carnal desires, even when Justine has sex with her gay roommate. Eventually that leads to her inevitable doom, but her sister comes to her rescue in the most horrible way. All the while, the movie is exploring this like a vampire myth, instead of as a story about crazy cannibals in the French countryside.