“I get this ache… And I, I thought it was for sex, but it’s to tear everything to fucking pieces.”
We blame the curse of womanhood on Eve. The Bible tells us the first woman was tempted by a serpent to eat fruit from the tree of knowledge, thus dooming all of womankind with the pain of menstruation. And it often does feel like cruel and unusual punishment. Those who menstruate spend roughly one week per month doubled over in pain as ferocious cramps rip through our abdomens, followed by several days of uncontrollable bleeding and skyrocketing hormones. Although periods vary wildly from person to person and evolve over the course of a lifetime, there’s little most of us wouldn’t do to avoid the phenomenon entirely. Many horror creators have tackled menstruation, but few as effectively as John Fawcett . His 2000 film Ginger Snaps explores the power and pain that comes with crossing this bloody threshold while daring us to equate monstrosity with female power.
Ginger ( Katharine Isabelle ) and Brigitte ( Emily Perkins ) do everything together. These death-obsessed sisters have no friends but each other and spend their free time staging and photographing grisly recreations of their own violent demise. When a roving monster attacks Ginger on the night of her first period, the frightened teen begins a strange transformation. In addition to a newfound lust for the boys in her class, Ginger sprouts hair in her still-healing scars and finds a tail growing from the bottom of her spine. Brigitte turns to an older drug dealer named Sam ( Kris Lemche ) to help find a remedy for her sister’s increasing monstrosity. But Ginger’s not so sure she wants to be cured. She’s enjoying her newfound sexuality and a nagging desire to tear the world apart.
In the latest episode of Bloody FM’s The Lady Killers Podcast , co-hosts Jenn Adams, Sammie Kuykendall, Rocco Thompson, and Mae Shults, continue their celebration of spooky season queens. Over slices of mom’s comforting angel food cake, they’ll compare and contrast becoming a werewolf with the notorious “curse” of becoming a woman. From where does Ginger’s lust for destruction emerge? Why are these sisters so obsessed with death? Does Sam actually think about Brigitte like that and what’s going on with Pamela’s hair? As Halloween approaches, the Lady Killers will gather in a greenhouse lit by a full moon to chat about curses, creatures, and sisterly love.
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