Raw, and a Reflection on “New French Extremity”

by Fionn Murray





While watching Julia Ducournau’s 2016 film Raw, I found myself thinking the same thought I had while first watching Audition or Antichrist. It was probably shortly after a scene of pubic trimming gone horribly awry, at which point I thought, “I think this director might be literally insane”.



Ultimately, it’s the kind of response that any serious director of horror films should aspire towards, maybe even the only response. Raw is an excellent film, and Ducournau is unquestionably an exciting talent in modern cinema. The film is unhindered by constraints of genre, tone or good taste; it is uncompromising and utterly demented. This, I thought, is what “New French Extremity” should have been about from the beginning.



The term “New French Extremity” was coined by James Quandt, in reference to a loose collection of particularly transgressive French films in the 2000s, which went to unusually punishing lengths to shock and alienate their audiences. Although Quandt was initially referring to arthouse films that were rooted in the arthouse, often featuring graphic unsimulated sex scenes, “New French Extremity” later came to refer to more mainstream horror films.

Image source: https://imgur.com/a/0dYUh



Everyone has their own private vocabulary, and for me, the word “extremity” has always been suggestive of radicalism and iconoclasm, which made me very excited about the prospect of “New French Extremity”. It suggested a new kind of horror film, extreme not just in its depiction of violence and gore, but also radical: in narrative structure, subject-matter and tone. A kind of horror film which would alarm and horrify, but also challenge the viewer’s preconceptions and provoke deeper thought.



Of course, “New French Extremity” was no such thing: rather, films in this loosely-defined genre were only “extreme” in their gruesome approach to stabbings and bloodletting. In every other regard, they were extremely conservative, perhaps even more so than their American counterparts. Most films in the genre were perfectly content to adopt an established generic framework (home invasion, slasher film, torture porn etc.) and attempt only to outdo their peers in litres of fake blood expended.



Granted, setting oneself modest goals and achieving them is no bad thing. A few months ago I watched Inside (or À l’intérieur), and sure enough, it was extremely gory. It’s certainly interesting seeing a slasher film in which the killer is a woman, but, sadly, that’s essentially where the film’s innovation begins and ends. While watching Haute Tension, I found myself thinking “I think this director might be literally insane… to think anyone would be convinced by a bullshit twist ending like that.” (In Adaptation, Charlie Kaufman somehow managed to satirise Haute Tension a year before it was even released). Even Martyrs, sometimes considered the “thinking man’s torture porn”, is really just a series of increasingly preposterous torture set-pieces strung together by pseudo-profundity no more persuasive than the campiest serial killer from any American psych-thriller.



Clockwise from top left: Raw, À l’intérieur, Haute Tension and Martyrs. Source: https://imgur.com/a/V0ITi





I acknowledge that exceptions may exist: for example, I haven’t worked up the nerve to watch Gaspar Noé’s Irréversible. But I maintain that most of the films under the umbrella term “New French Extremity” are entirely undeserving of the label. “Extreme” has to mean more than just “violent and gory”: truly “extreme” films should shock and subvert audiences on levels other than merely the visceral.



Which is why Raw was such a pleasant surprise. Yes, it is violent and gory. But it’s also shocking in its narrative structure and tone. This film is really… entertaining, with an upbeat, pumping soundtrack and dozens of one-liners - at times it feels more like a morbid black comedy than a “horror film”. It takes the archetypal plot structure of “adolescent girl experiences her sexual awakening” and swallows it whole, digests it and vomits it back up: recognisable, but misshapen and deformed. While watching it, I was strangely saddened that so many other films in this loose genre had missed the opportunity to be this daring and unconventional.



Go see Raw. You may need a bucket, but you won’t regret it.





Feature image source: www.sbs.com.au



