Movie Review: Salo, or the 120 Days of Sodom

So I finished watching Salo, or the 120 Days of Sodom. I was actually a little nervous to watch it, sure I was going to regret the experience. One review I read called Salo an "endurance test" - will the viewer make it all the way through? Raise my hand in victory, I made it all the way through!

Where to begin? 

Well, first of all, it's actually not a bad movie and not nearly as deplorable as most reviews make it out to be. From what I've read, I was expecting 2 hours of rape, graphic torture, and other forms of humiliation. Yes, there is definitely all of that, but perhaps I imagined these acts were going to be much more graphic, simply from reading a description. I read that there was a scene where a girl is made to eat bread with nails in it. The scene itself is not as bad as it sounds on paper - the girl takes a bite, screams, and blood comes out of her mouth. 

But that wouldn't be enough to be considered controversial, would it? The film is based on the Marquis de Sade's book "The 120 Days of Sodom," which he wrote while imprisoned in the Bastille. It tells of four f-ed up in the head rich dudes who hole up in an isolated castle with some 46 victims that they will use to act out their sexual desires and fantasies, getting ideas from listening to the sordid stories of four brothel madams. I've actually read some of the book (you can easily find it online) but it is very long and nothing more than a graphic account of each days' descent into sexual depravity. I can only read so much about poop eating. Yes, POOP eating. We'll get to that later.

So the film follows a similar plot - set in Fascist Italy near the end of WW2, four Fascist leaders come up with the brilliant plan to kidnap nine teenage boys and nine teenage girls, take them to a deserted, isolated mansion and do whatever they want to them. They also bring along four old whores who will tell them disgusting stories of their clients' depravity, in order to give them "ideas" of what they might like to do to these teenagers. The men's appetites seem to be mostly homosexual, so I don't see why they needed the girls. Anyway. 

The violence in the film didn't really get to me until the end. The teenagers chosen to die are taken to the courtyard, where they are tortured and I guess killed, since we don't actually see their deaths. One boy's eye is gouged out with a knife (yes, you DO see it happen) and a girl is scalped. The four Fascists each get a turn to watch what the others are doing to the kids, as they sit and watch the festivities through binoculars from a window in the mansion. All the while, the victims are being held down by four other male youths, perhaps in their teens or twenties, who have been the guards the whole time the kids have been in the mansion - subjugating the teens so that the adults can have their way with them. 

Every review seems to focus on the violence and depravity of the film, but one thing I found the most interesting and worthy of discussion is not what happens to the victims, but the victims themselves and their sometimes lack of emotion about what is happening to them. They seem to have no problem standing naked before the four men, even before the abuse begins; their faces are blank as they listen to the disgusting stories told by the madams; even during the banquet of shit (yeah, you read that right), the kids ACTUALLY FUCKING EAT THE POOP. They could have easily pretended or whatever, but as one girl says to another, "I can't go on," the other girl is taking a big forkful of poo into her mouth. This is all saying that there is little or no resistance from the victims for hardly any of what happens to them. Is it because they know that there is no way out of this situation, that they can easily be killed? There are four armed guards near them at all times, and they are in an isolated mansion far from any help. Is it a child's fear of disobeying adults?

The kids also have no desire to help each other out. If this were a movie made now in America, I bet you there would be at least one rebellious character who would try to stand up to the men. But the kids never say ANYTHING. Even when the bearded man squats down, shits on the floor, and then makes one girl eat it with a spoon, no one even tries to say, "Hey man, that's gross, don't make her do that." Sure, if they stand up to them, they risk being punished or killed, but GD, would they at least fucking try??!!

They even turn on each other in one scene. When the freaky ass dude with the goofy smile and lazy eye goes into the boys' room as they are sleeping to punish one of them for breaking the rules, the kid says, "Wait! Spare me and I'll tell you about the girl who keeps a picture under her pillow." So they go to the girls' room. They wake up the girl, say they know she has the photo and she says, "Wait! Spare me and I'll tell you about the girls who have sex together every night." So they go into the room where the two girls are necking and catch them. One of the girls says, "Wait! Spare me and I'll tell you about the boy who has sex with the black maid every night." This time, all four of the Fascists go to the room where the boy and maid are having sex, and they shoot him 20 times. A chain reaction of betrayal that ends in one boy's death, a death that could have been avoided if the kids hadn't narked on each other. He is perhaps the lucky one, however, considering what the others go through later. But how could they do this? Do they really wish ill will on the others, when they must know that they are not going to make it out of that mansion alive? Going along with these sick men might for a time save their lives, but what about their souls? Seeing as this movie is constructed based on Dante's description of hell (the movie begins in the Antechamber of Hell, then the following sections are the Circle of Obsessions, the Circle of Shit, and the Circle of Blood), surely these kids have entered the ninth and deepest circle of hell, where the worst sinners are punished - the ones who betray.

One quick note on the banquet of shit: I know there are a lot of weird paraphilias out there: people with foot fetishes; arousal by exhibitionism; hell, even people aroused by amputees. Some of these numerous paraphilias out there are somewhat understandable, if not just weird. However, I will never, ever in a million years and beyond EVER understand coprophilia/coprophagia. Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, EVER. Yet, there is a whole market out there for scatological porn. Remember 2girls1cup? Yeah, that wasn't just a viral video that somebody made to gross people out, it was clips from a real porn movie. Never understand it. Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, EVER.

All in all, and repeating what many other reviews of this movie have said over the years, this is an interesting movie to analyze, but not one that I would want to see again or recommend to others. I mean, what parts can you look forward to watching in this movie? The girl pissing on the bearded man's face? Or the kid getting his tongue sliced off? Trust me, seeing it once will be enough. I'm sure you'll remember it for a long while.