The Bloodiest Thing That Ever Happened in Front of a Camera: Conservative Politics, porno Chic and Snuff

In the early 1970s, outrageous claims were made of a new blood-spattered cinematic extreme. This was the legend of the 'snuff movie', which promoted the inhuman notion that a woman had been murdered to satisfy the sexual appetite of a jaded public. The story was produced by a kind of madness incarnate, but it reflected the desperation of America in cultural turmoil.

'Snuff' was a backlash against the naa¯ve liberalism of the counterculture, embraced by people who preferred to believe the worst about their society. Once unleashed the concept was embraced and manipulated by the tabloid media and a variety of political and social crusaders, each using it to further their own cause.

Brutal, evil, ghastly beyond belief, snuff became an iconic urban legend. This book is the true, startling and hideously exploitative history of that legend and how it was created.

SNUFF–THE BLOODIEST THING THAT EVER HAPPENED IN FRONT OF A CAMERA!

Stephen Milligen has written articles on American history and popular culture for the Irish Journal of American Studies and about the adult film industry for Headpress. Needing a change of scene his next research project in a study of Irish giants in eighteenth and nineteenth century popular culture.