History Main / ExploitationFilm

* ''Manga/{{Berserk}}'' is a DarkFantasy manga that's all about the journey of [[AntiHero Guts]] as he [[WalkingTheEarth travels]] with his TrueCompanions across [[CrapsackWorld an unthinkably horrible and excessively cruel medieval setting]] where the most horrible things you can imagine happening are all but prevalent, including copious amounts of incredibly excessive fan-service and explicit sexual content that would make a {{Hentai}} look G-rated, [[GratuitousRape heavy focus on rape that is gratuitous as gratuitous gets]], all sorts of [[EldritchAbomination horrifying aberrations and absolutely inhuman monstrosities]] that are enough to make Creator/JunjiIto proud, tons and tons of extreme graphic violence, gratuitous shock value and excessive gore that would make ''Anime/RedoOfHealer'' and ''ComicBook/{{Crossed}}'' look like a Creator/{{Disney}} film, and much more. However, [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools this all works in its favor]] (unlike the other examples) to produce an incredibly compelling story, being a crowning example of TrueArtIsAngsty.

[[folder: An Innocent Girl, Trapped In a Whirlpool of the MOST WICKED, DEGRADED '''Live-Action TV''' Imaginable! ]]

[[folder: Innocent Victims Were Lured Into the Most SHAMELESS, DISGUSTING '''Live-Action TV''' Imaginable! ]]

* ''Film/SwedenHeavenAndHell'' (1968): A largely sensationalized, titillating examination of life in the titular nation, with particular focus on its liberal attitudes towards sex and drugs. Nowadays best known for its soundtrack, from which [[Franchise/TheMuppets "Mah Nà Mah Nà"]] originated.

[[folder: SPEAKER-SHATTERING! BONE-BLASTING! A '''Music''' Massacre!]]
* Music/{{Eminem}}'s ''Relapse'' ConceptAlbum is a grimy SlasherMovie in the format of an album, complete with StuntCasting (Creator/DominicWest as his rehab counsellor, Elizabeth Keener as one of Slim's murder victims), exploitative use of TeenPop stars as victims of the SerialKiller rampage, and some of the most graphic (and unrealistic) violence ever committed to a hip-hop album.

* ''Film/KillerNun'' (1979): A nunsploitation flick about a sister's descent into drug addiction, madness, illicit love affairs, and murder following surgery to remove a brain tumor. Loosely based on the true story of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecile_Bombeek Cecile Bombeek]]

* ''Film/{{COncrete}}'' (2001) is a Japanese film where four yakuza-wannabes abducts a young girl and subjects her to countless hours of torture and abuse, loosely based on the infamous [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Junko_Furuta Junko Furuta]] murder.

* ''Manga/{{Berserk}}'' is a DarkFantasy manga that's all about the journey of [[AntiHero Guts]] as he [[WalkingTheEarth travels]] with his TrueCompanions across [[CrapsackWorld an unthinkably horrible and excessively cruel medieval setting]] where the most horrible things you can imagine happening are all but prevalent, including copious amounts of incredibly excessive fan-service and explicit sexual content that would make a {{Hentai}} look G-rated, [[GratuitousRape heavy focus on rape that is gratuitous as gratuitous gets]], all sorts of [[EldritchAbomination horrifying aberrations and absolutely inhuman monstrosities]] that are enough to make Creator/JunjiIto proud, tons and tons of extreme graphic violence, gratuitous shock value and excessive gore that would make ''Literature/RedoOfHealer'' and ''ComicBook/{{Crossed}}'' look like a Creator/{{Disney}} film, and much more. However, [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools this all works in its favor]] (unlike the other examples) to produce an incredibly compelling story, being a crowning example of TrueArtIsAngsty.

* ''Literature/RedoOfHealer'' and its anime adaptation center around a protagonist who decides to get revenge on his tormentors by raping and killing them (usually in that order). Aside from the heavy focus on rape, the series also features copious amounts of sex scenes and fanservice, to the point that the anime is about as close as you can get to a {{Hentai}} without explicit sexual content.

When these films are set in prisons, ArtisticLicensePrison is practically unavoidable. Those of the Girls Behind Bars genre (''Film/BlackMamaWhiteMama'' for example) feature inmates in absurdly short and/or low-cut uniforms that are all about the {{Fanservice}}. Real life prison uniforms throughout history are usually plain, drab and VERY far from flattering, let alone sexy.

A film which focuses on morbid, shocking elements such as torture, serial killing, cannabilism, and sex in a gratuitous and excessive fashion. For example, a crime movie which focuses more on the lurid details of committing the crime or its effects on the victim, rather than the police efforts to solve it. Or a movie that's excessively violent and gory beyond what's needed for the plot. That -- excessive violence or sexuality -- seems to be the main elements of an exploitation film. "Raw", outrageous footage is the name of the game. Bonus points if the production has that "low-budget" feel to it, though it isn't strictly necessary.

In TheSixties and TheSeventies, these films reached something of a Golden Age -- perhaps in response to the "arty" mainstream films of the [[UsefulNotes/NewHollywood Hollywood Renaissance]]. This was the era of drive-in "grindhouse" double-features and limited releases touring around the country with crackly prints and at times missing reels. It was also the era of {{Blaxploitation}}.

It's sometimes debatable as to whether a given film is an Exploitation Film or not. If there's a heavy emphasis on plot and background detail, yet at the same time the visceral elements are emphasized and played up in detail, then people will disagree on whether or not it fits this category. For example, ''Film/ThePassionOfTheChrist'' goes into a ton of detail in watching UsefulNotes/{{Jesus}} be tortured. Yet, many churches were turning out in droves to see it, despite it being a film that consists of two hours of torture followed by the death of the lead character. Due to the movie's theme and background material, some argue that it isn't exploitation at all, since Jesus's torture was not intended for the audience's excitement, while others argue precisely the contrary.

Because one person's "gritty realistic drama" is another's "entertainingly realistic grit", the line can sometimes be pretty thin.

In the past, such films were sometimes made featuring lurid scenes with the supposed intent to be educational, such as ''Film/ReeferMadness''. However, the lurid scenes were often meant to be the main source of entertainment.

A film which focuses on morbid, shocking elements in a gratuitous and excessive fashion. For example, a crime movie which focuses more on the details of committing the crime or its effects on the victim, rather than the police efforts to solve it. Or a movie that's excessively violent and gory beyond what's needed for the plot. That -- excessive violence or sexuality -- seems to be the main elements of an exploitation film. "Raw", outrageous footage is the name of the game. Bonus points if the production has that "low-budget" feel to it, though it isn't strictly necessary.

A film which focuses on morbid elements a lot, the type of morbid elements that fascinate or excite people. For example, a crime movie which focuses more on the details of committing the crime or its effects on the victim, rather than the efforts to solve it. Or a movie that's excessively violent for no real reason. In fact, that -- excessive violence or sexuality -- seems to be the main definition of an exploitation film. "Raw" is the name of the game. Bonus points if the production has that "low-budget" feel to it, though it isn't strictly necessary.

That's part of the dividing line. Is the violence or sexuality contained within a movie gratuitous, meant largely for entertainment? Or is it used to enhance the plot or theme? Since ''Literature/TheGirlNextDoor'' is a fictionalized story based on a true crime involving a real girl who was systematically abused by her family, what is it? Is it exploitation because the story itself is fictionalized and involves made-up characters instead of literally retelling the story of the crime? And even if it did retell the story of actual crime, would it still be exploitation?

* ''Film/MasterOfTheWorld1983'': A movie about warring prehistoric tribes with lots of lingering shots of messy decapitation and cannibalism.

* ''LightNovel/RedoOfHealer'' centers around a protagonist who decides to get revenge on his tormentors by raping and killing them (usually in that order). Aside from the heavy focus on rape, the series also features copious amounts of sex scenes and fanservice, to the point that the anime is about as close as you can get to a {{Hentai}} without explicit sexual content.

* ''Manga/{{Berserk}}'' is a DarkFantasy manga that's all about the journey of [[AntiHero Guts]] as he [[WalkingTheEarth travels]] with his TrueCompanions across [[CrapsackWorld an unthinkably horrible and excessively cruel medieval setting]] where the most horrible things you can imagine happening are all but prevalent, including copious amounts of incredibly excessive fan-service and explicit sexual content that would make a {{Hentai}} look G-rated, [[GratuitousRape heavy focus on rape that is gratuitous as gratuitous gets]], all sorts of [[EldritchAbomination horrifying aberrations and absolutely inhuman monstrosities]] that are enough to make Creator/JunjiIto proud, tons and tons of extreme graphic violence, gratuitous shock value and excessive gore that would make ''LightNovel/RedoOfHealer'' and ''ComicBook/{{Crossed}}'' look like a Creator/{{Disney}} film, and much more. However, [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools this all works in its favor]] (unlike the other examples) to produce an incredibly compelling story, being a crowning example of TrueArtIsAngsty.

* ''Film/MeganIsMissing'' (filmed 2006; released 2011): An exploitation "[[SoBadItsGood film]]" posing as a warning against strangers on the internet, wherein a girl named Megan goes missing after meeting up with someone she met on the Internet, and her friend Amy seeks to find her and take him down, only to fall victim to him herself.

* ''The Bunny Game'' (2012): A prostitute getting sexually tortured and raped ForTheEvulz by some trucker with nothing else to the plot. It ended up getting [[BannedInChina Banned in the UK]] due to eroticizing sexual violence and sadistic violence and was also unrated in America. This is one of the nastier examples out there, alongside ''The Human Centipede 2'' and ''A Serbian Film'' (though it's nowhere near as infamous as those two).

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* ''Film/{{Karla}}'' (2006): Based on the true story of two of Canada's most infamous serial killers, Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka.

* ''Demonophobia'' is a fairly old SurvivalHorror game akin to ''VideoGame/ClockTower'' with one big claim to (in)fame: [[TheManyDeathsOfYou the myriad different ways]] the young heroine can [[CruelAndUnusualDeath brutally meet her end]]. In addition, the aforementioned heroine spends the last leg of the game completely naked, and the setting is {{Hell}} itself.

* The ''VisualNovel/BoyfriendToDeath'' series consist of {{Gorn}}-filled, {{Squick}}-filled, and sex-filled scenarios between the player character and the psychos that they might end up in relationships in.
* ''VisualNovel/DiabolikLovers'' concerns a girl left in the care of a BigScrewedUpFamily of vampire {{Bishonen}} who repeatedly try to sexually assualt her, all done for {{Fanservice}}.

* ''Manga/{{Berserk}}'' is a DarkFantasy manga that's all about the journey of [[AntiHero Guts]] as he [[WalkingTheEarth travels]] with his TrueCompanions across [[CrapsackWorld an unthinkably horrible and excessively cruel medieval setting]] where the most horrible things you can imagine happening are all but prevalent, including copious amounts of incredibly excessive fan-service and explicit sexual content that would make a {{Hentai}} look G-rated, [[GratuitousRape heavy focus on rape that is gratuitous as gratuitous gets]], all sorts of [[EldritchAbomination horrifying aberrations and absolutely inhuman monstrosities]] that are enough to make Creator/JunjiIto proud, tons and tons of extreme graphic violence, gratuitous shock value and excessive gore that would make ''LightNovel/RedoOfHealer'' and ''ComicBook/{{Crossed}}'' look like a Creator/{{Disney}} film, and much more. However, [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools this all works in its favor]] (unlike the other examples), providing one of the greatest stories ever told in fiction and being a crowning example of TrueArtIsAngsty.

!!The Gates of Hell ITSELF Couldn't Hold Back Their '''UNSORTED''' BUSINESS!
* A lot of the {{Spaghetti Western}}s were either these or interpreted as these, although by the standards of nowadays they seem quite tame and kind of arty.
* Many of Creator/TheAsylum's movies, especially the horror rip-offs, would fit right in here, to the point that they wouldn't seem ''that'' out of place playing in a 70's Grindhouse theater. This is largely due to them being direct to [=DVD=], and therefore able to get away with a lot more sex and violence than [[TheMockbuster the movies they're ripping off.]]
* ''Not Quite Hollywood'' is a documentary on UsefulNotes/{{Australia}}'s exploitation film industry of the 1970s and 80s, dubbed 'Ozsploitation'. Films featured include ''Film/AlvinPurple'', ''Barry [=McKenzie=] Holds His Own'', ''Film/DeadEndDriveIn'', ''Film/LongWeekend'', ''Film/MadMax'', ''Film/TheManFromHongKong'', ''Film/{{Patrick}}'', ''Film/{{Razorback}}'', ''Film/RoadGames'', ''Stork'', ''Film/NextOfKin1982'', and ''Film/TurkeyShoot''.
** Its followup, ''Machete Maidens Unleashed!'', is about Filipino exploitation films.
* Pretty much anything made by Creator/{{Troma}}.
* Hong Kong is no stranger to exploitation movies either. Aside from ''Film/WomenOnTheRun'' above, there's also movies like ''Film/NakedKiller'', ''Film/TheUntoldStory'', and others that pushed the bounds. Many of these movies were Category III.
* As noted above, many filmmakers in the 30`s and 40`s made these kinds of films under a thin veneer of educational content, ''Film/ReeferMadness'' and ''Film/ChildBride'' being particularly infamous examples.
* A number of [[LifetimeMovieOfTheWeek Lifetime Movies of the Week]] feel like this, with [[Main/GoryDeadlyOverkillTitleOfFatalDeath over-the-top titles]] and plot elements like abusive husbands or fathers, [[TeensAreMonsters evil teenagers]], [[NewMediaAreEvil modern technology]], and other things that would be scary to middle-aged housewives, until such movies became a punchline in the public consciousness (and Lifetime has gone more in the direction of {{Camp}} since then).
* A number of Christian movies from Creator/PureFlixEntertainment and other studios also feel like this as, despite their attempts at making TheMoralSubstitute for more popular movies, they share many of the same qualities of your typical Lifetime Movie of the Week.

Compare VideoNasties ([[YouCanPanicNow moral panic]] about these films that occurred in Britain in TheEighties), {{Gorn}}, TorturePorn, {{Euroshlock}} (which is commonly accused of this) and MurderSimulators (The latter is the video game version of this trope).

ArtisticLicensePrison is practically unavoidable. These of the Girls Behind Bars genre (''Film/BlackMamaWhiteMama'' for example) feature inmates in absurdly short and/or low-cut uniforms that are all about the {{Fanservice}}. Real life prison uniforms throughout history are usually plain, drab and VERY far from flattering, let alone sexy.