Nunsploitation

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Nunsploitation is a film genre and belongs to the field of erotic and exploitation films . The name is a suitcase word from Nun , the English word for nun, and Exploitation, the name for a film genre with cheap production and drastic presentations. The term refers to exploitation films that feature nuns and monasteries.

history

Nunsploitation is part of the centuries-old tradition of tales about misguided, violated or sexually deviant nuns . Examples of this can be found in Giovanni Boccaccio ( Il Decamerone , 1351), Pietro Aretino ( Ragionamenti , 1600) or Denis Diderot ( La religieuse , 1762). Corresponding films came mainly in the 1970s from Italy , Japan , Spain , Great Britain and the Philippines . Today, remnants of this genre can be seen in porn films .

Socio-cultural context

The peak of nunsploitation films can be found in corresponding Italian productions from the 1970s. This benefited from the reduced influence of the Vatican on cultural consumption. The high output of nunsploitation films can be seen in connection with the falling audience figures in Italian cinemas since the early 1960s. With speculative content and nude scenes, which were not offered by television at the time, one hoped for high income with comparatively favorable production conditions. The nunsploitation films were stylistically influenced by the Italian sex comedies of the 1960s, some of which already chose that ambience of the Middle Ages and Renaissance as a backdrop (e.g. L'armata Brancaleone by Mario Monicelli , 1966), which also dominated the nunsploitation films would be. In addition, the existing literature was used, primarily Boccaccio and Aretino. Overall, the nun was initially more of an episode figure and only gradually became the protagonist in entirely monothematic films. Serious films such as The Devils ( Ken Russell , 1971) or Il Decameron ( Pier Paolo Pasolini , 1971) also took up the topic and made for imitators in the trash film sector. After all, it was also the story of the uncelibate nun from Monza , Virginia de Levya , who lived with a man and fathered children and was walled up for punishment , that preoccupied the imagination of filmmakers, which at first became satirical ( Il monaco di Monza , Sergio Corbucci 1963), then led more sexually oriented and more explicit productions (e.g. La monaca di Monza , Eriprando Visconti 1969).

Motifs

The recurring theme of these films is the woman who is made a nun against her will, mostly as a punishment for previous violations of morality. In the monastery, masturbation - also joint or mutual - is often indulged, between the nuns erotic or sexual bonds are created or sexual intercourse is carried out with a man who has been smuggled in. The transitions between religious and sexual ecstasy are presented as fluid. Sins have to be punished regularly, with the nuns being whipped bare-breasted and sexual connotations being offered again. Ultimately, the activities of the nuns have to be stopped again and again by male church authorities.

Nunsploitation films (selection)

literature

  • Tamao Nakahara (2004): Barred Nuns: Italian Nunsploitation Films In: Ernest Mathijs / Xavier Mendik [eds.] (2004): Alternative Europe. Eurotrash and Exploitation Cinema since 1945. London, New York: Wallflower Press. ISBN 1-903364-93-0 .
  • Stiglegger, Marcus: Sadiconazista. Fascism and Sexuality in the Film Gardez! Verlag, 2000 ISBN 3-89796-009-5 .
  • Marcus Stiglegger: Sadiconazista - Stereotyping the Holocaust in the exploitation cinema , at ikonenmagazin.de .
  • Gaby Herchert: "Acker mir mein bestes Feld": Investigations into erotic songbook songs of the late Middle Ages. With dictionary and text collection. Diss. Phil. Duisburg 1995. Münster, New York: Waxmann 1996, ISBN 3-89325-423-4 , pp. 165ff .: 'Geile Mönche und Nonnen' (Internationale Hochschulschriften 201).