ABSTRACT
Representations of sex and violence have often been paired together as there is, arguably, a sexual component in mediated violence, and a violent component in mediated sexuality. Horror and pornography are genres that are especially prone to excess and incorporate a reaction from the spectator’s body. The horror film, like pornography, not only disregards taboos but ventures to expose the secrets of the flesh, to spill the contents of the body. These disreputable genres violate taboos by privileging the act of exposing the body; they show what is usually concealed. Both porn and horror are dominated by the transgression of bodily boundaries. Both genres present the body as fragmented pieces: pornography, through the use of extreme close-ups; and horror, through dismembered limbs and exposed insides— literal spectacles of the body in pieces.
