The Rape-Revenge genre is one of the most used of all the various themes in exploitation films.  We chose two from the early 80s to look at for this episode. Starting off with 1981's Ms. 45, directed by Abel Ferrara, which tells the tale of Thana, a young mute woman in New York City, working as a seamstress who suffers two brutal sexual assaults on the same day.  She then sets out to take revenge on multiple random men she encounters over the next week or two. It is a gritty and grimy story, as is common for Ferrara's films, with solid performances and a morally challenging storyline.  We follow that up with 1984's Savage Streets, which stars the sensational Linda Blair as Brenda, leader of a group of teenage "ne'er do wells".  After a run-in with the "Scars", a gang of tough guys led by a very impressive Robert Dryer as Jake,  the Scars decide to seek payback with a truly horrific rape of Brenda's younger, deaf-mute, sister played by screamqueen  Linnea Quiqley. It then falls on Brenda to get revenge for that attack, which she does to a sensational, 80's rock score.  We chose these two films without realizing that both featured victims who were mute. Despite this and many other similarities, they could not be more disparate.

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