Sex and Violence

The Taint (2010)

So many people want to say something profound. If there’s one thing that’s true of most artists it’s that they seek to comment on the human condition in a meaningful, poignant way. They will find artful ways to enlighten us, or scold us, or simply entertain. Few ever intentionally try to offend us. But that’s where Drew Bolduc comes in. You see, Drew Bolduc also wants to say something profound, but he isn’t interested in exploring human nature as a way to provide a profound commentary. And he has no time for artful diversions or fanciful language. No, Drew Bolduc wants to rip out humanity’s heart, shit down its throat, and make crude phallic-inspired cave paintings in its blood while it looks on in horror.

Such is the case of The Taint, a neo-exploitation manifesto written, directed, and produced by Bolduc, seemingly for the intent of inflaming as much hatred as humanly possible. On the surface it’s the story of a rage virus that infects men and turns them into violence-horny monsters intent on getting off by killing women. So, a typical slasher then, right? Not so fast. Where The Taint diverges from most typical horror movies is its motive.

Most traditional horror films exploit the last girl trope as a way of side-stepping their misogynist tendencies, a backwards way of saying, “See! The girl lives. We’re actually pro-woman.” Of course, this is usually after 90 minutes of awkward sexual politics. The Taint refuses to offer any redemptive form of backpeddling in its story, direction, or general sentiment. Its main thesis is that it is in fact a misogynistic film. But it’s also arguing that to overcome this, we must first acknowledge that fact; and to do that, we can’t leave anything to the imagination. We must confront the misogyny head on, which means -- the sex, the violence, and in the case of this film the many exploding penises.

And that would be all well and good if that’s where it stopped, but it isn’t. The Taint contains enough awkward-looking gore and excessive amounts of free-flowing seminal fluids to satisfy a Troma crowd. So it most certainly addresses the issue it seeks to confront, but it also uses its crude language to spell out something greater. Beyond simply stating that misogyny exists, it posits that all men are misogynists; that it’s something that can’t be helped, because it’s part of human nature. And that to confront this issue isn’t enough. It takes a violent apocalypse for the protagonist of the film to come to this realization. Which means it’s going to take a radical restructuring of this new world to stop the rage virus from spreading, or, in our case, a radical change in the discourse of gender relations.

But, of course, if that doesn’t interest you – exploding penises.