When the Motion Picture Association of America began enforcing the Hays Production Code in 1934, filmmakers were forbidden from tackling such topics as miscegenation, drug use, venereal disease or white slavery. Not only was it forbidden to ridicule the clergy, but the use of such pointed profanity as hell, damn and gawd was also prohibited. With the abolition of the Code and relaxation of social attitudes in the mid-1960s, exploitation films flourished in Americas grindhouses and drive-ins. You could walk down Manhattans 42nd Street and discover films like The Female Butcher, I Drink Your Blood and The Corpse Grinders, whose titles alone wouldve been unthinkable a few years earlier. Seeking an edge over prestigious studio pictures, exploitation filmmakers set out to make the films their competitors wouldnt, and filled their movies with as much blood, nudity and violence as possible. Just like Jurassic Parks scientists, though, just because they could didnt mean they stopped to consider if they should. In the name of making a quick buck, the Hays Production Code became more like a checklist for exploitation filmmakers. Drug use? Check. Surgical operations? Check. Sexual perversion? Check. The following films all set out to shock and disgust, and are best summed up by the tagline for Uwe Bolls movie Postal (2007): Some movies go too far. Others start there.
Ian Watson is the author of 'Midnight Movie Madness', a 600+ page guide to "bad" movies from 'Reefer Madness' to 'Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead.'
