Drafthouse Films is re-releasing Abel Ferrara’s beloved and controversial exploitation flick Ms. 45, and it’s getting a limited release starting Friday. It tells the story of a mute young woman who gets raped twice in one day and then becomes a man-killing vigilante toting a gleaming .45 through the grimy streets of New York. Is the film misogynistic? Is it feminist? Is there a point to it or is it just exploitive, using rape as the pretext for gory revenge? There was a lot of chatter about the film when it first came out. The re-release is something of an event (especially for those who love the film: it has been notoriously hard to find and see).
Christy Lemire, Susan Wloszczyna and I joined up to chat about the film for Roger Ebert. It was a lot of fun.
