People are voting emotionally.

Better Late Then Never

Watch something else. There are very few redeeming qualities to this film.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Snuff is one of that small group of movies where the story surrounding its production and release supersede its contents by some margin. Exploitation directing duo Michael and Roberta Findlay made a Manson inspired flick in Argentina in 1971 called the Slaughter. Due to its low quality it did little business but was nevertheless bought by the producer Allan Shackleton who left it on a shelf for several years not sure what to do with it until he heard the rumour about the existence of snuff movies; to this end he put some money together and filmed a new five minute ending which showed a woman being viciously murdered by the film crew responsible for making the film we have just watched, the idea being that this was a real killing. The movie was released to great controversy with publicity generated by protesters and investigators, some of which were hired by the producers themselves on the correct assumption that bad publicity is still good business. Needless to say the gamble paid off and the film made a lot of money. And despite being a hoax, it only furthered the idea of the existence of snuff movies.Ultimately, for better or for worse, the end scene is what defines this film. A lot of the comments I read downplay the ending somewhat and say its laughably unconvincing, etc. Don't get me wrong it is an obvious fake with professional editing and all that. But I honestly found it to be an actually nasty and uncomfortable viewing experience. The murder of the woman is brutal and sleazy accentuated by the quite decent gore effects for its day. This material would be strong anyway but it is made pretty grotesque on account of the objective of the movie which was essentially to draw people in to the cinema on the promise of seeing a woman being viciously murdered for their viewing pleasure. Obviously from the point-of-view of today we can look back on it as an example of extreme bad taste cinema but you have to remember that at the time of its release its selling point was it was real murder on offer and quite a lot of people believed it, which is obviously a pretty low way of getting punters through the door; the very fact that so many of them did hoping to see a woman be killed before them is a very disturbing facet of human nature that's for sure.There is one thing that you can say for sure about Snuff and that is that it certainly provokes a reaction. It's an overwhelmingly negative reaction it seems, yet it appears to offend people in two very distinct ways. There are those who are appalled at the whole tastelessness of the concept of the last five minutes, while there are others deeply irritated by the awfulness of the first 70 minutes. Going by all other reviews I have read, I have to accept that my view on this movie is a massively unpopular one but, dare I say these words…I actually enjoyed the main story, The Slaughter. I get the feeling that there is more shame attached to that, than someone liking the snuff bit! I am under no illusions about the technical ineptness here as this is certainly a Z-grade production with ropey camera-work, chopsocky level dubbing, a police station situated in a car-park, and on and on. But I have seen lots of poor quality movies and, frankly, this one is a lot more interesting that a lot of them. Admittedly, my fascination with the whole Manson murder case and all that that entailed makes the contents of this story-line get immediate plus points from me, as its parallels are so utterly blatant, after all the plot focuses on a group of female killer hippies led by a cult leader called Sat-an, who eventually wind up entering the grounds of a mansion and kill everyone there culminating in the stabbing of a pregnant film actress, who it hardly needs stating is a Sharon Tate substitute. It's essentially an exploitation movie with sex, drugs, violence and acid rock. It was ropey stuff sure but the bad girls were good to watch and anything with a counter-cultural vibe gets pass marks from me. Additionally, some of the dialogue scenes were laugh-out-loud funny in an unintentional way and the murder scenes were mostly heroically daft. There is neither title card nor credits for The Slaughter, those having been removed by Shackleton in his objective of passing this off as an actual criminal undertaking. The DVD distributor Blue Underground recently tried to find an original cut of the film to no avail. It may be lost and I for one think that it is a bit of a shame that it nowadays is only inextricably linked to Snuff. So there you go, I like The Slaughter!In the final analysis, Snuff is both historically important and extremely notorious, while essentially being very strange. Its legend goes before it. Enter with caution would be the best advice.

Notorious cult item that has to do with a Manson-like cult leader and his bevy of lovely women who do his bidding. They kill a bunch of people before finally targeting a pregnant actress and her rich boyfriend.Aside from that main storyline, there's also a tacked on ending that was falsely advertised to have been real snuff footage. The gore doesn't even look realistic though, especially the snipping off of a finger. No question about it, this is a bad movie. It's also pretty aimless, and there's a ridiculously overlong parade scene that made me want to hit the fast-forward, though I resisted. There is admittedly some fun to be had, as much of the film is really cheesy with some elements that you can't help but laugh at, not the least of which is the dubbing. Other than the cheese, the only other thing I liked about this movie was the presence of cult actress/director Roberta Findlay as one of the cult followers. I've always had the hots for her, so seeing her here or in any other film is always a pleasure.My praise for "Snuff" stops there, however. Most will flat-out hate it, and frankly, I can't blame them.

Snuff (1976) * (out of 4) Notorious Argentina film, which was released in the States being promoted as a real snuff film. The producer actually hired Women's Rights groups to protest the films since there was a claim that the ending was real. The start of the film deals with a Manson like group who murder an actress, ala Sharon Tate. The ending is the only real highlight as we get to see the snuff footage of a woman being cut up on a bed. The effects look quite real and are very effective.That said, the reputation of this film has kept it alive all these years but I think most will be disappointed when they finally see the product.

It may come as a surprise to learn that my DVD of "Snuff" is the most played disc in my collection. I must add that this isn't down to the film's playability. No, the reason why this DVD was played night after night was its amazing sleep-inducing properties. It took me at least 4 or 5 attempts to finally finish this movie. "Snuff" is as bad as the reviews say. In fact, it's worse.Despite some interesting ingredients (a bevy of beautiful women, a seventies' soundtrack with an interesting Steppenwolf-like quality, a splattering of blood and gore, exotic settings, etc.), the film manages to be way beyond the realms of enjoyment.The last 5 minutes that gave this film its notoriety can be caught on documentaries such as UK Channel 4's "The Dark Side of Porn - Does Snuff Exist?" Even if you're a completist, save your money. This film just isn't worth the outlay.Dire. 1 out of 10.