In the quiet halls of veterinary school, a single finger of raw meat unleashes a hunger that devours the soul—Raw lays bare the beast within us all.
Julia Ducournau’s debut feature Raw (2016) arrives like a visceral shock to the system, blending the rites of passage of young adulthood with the primal terror of cannibalism. This French-Belgian production, known in its original French title as Grave, transforms a seemingly mundane coming-of-age tale into a feast of body horror that lingers long after the credits roll.
- Explore how Raw redefines female sexuality through its unflinching portrayal of cannibalistic awakening, merging desire with destruction.
- Unpack the film’s masterful use of practical effects and cinematography to evoke disgust and empathy in equal measure.
- Trace the director’s influences and the movie’s enduring impact on modern horror, from its festival triumphs to cultural conversations on taboo appetites.
The Flesh That Beckons: Raw’s Irresistible Pull
A Ravenous Initiation
Justine, a shy vegetarian raised by equally abstemious parents, steps tentatively into the brutal hazing rituals of veterinary school. The film opens with her cramped in a car trunk alongside her boisterous older sister Alexia, foreshadowing the sibling tensions that will erupt into something far more savage. Upon arrival, a freshman ritual demands they eat a sliver of raw meat from a kidney dish passed around like a perverse communion wafer. Justine’s reluctant nibble triggers an insatiable craving, manifesting first as a rash, then escalating to desperate acts of consumption—licking blood from a nightclub floor, devouring a severed finger whole. This narrative arc, penned by Ducournau with co-writer Jean-Christophe Royer, draws from the director’s own veterinary student days, infusing authenticity into the claustrophobic dorm life and anatomical dissections that pepper the story.
The plot builds methodically, interweaving academic pressures with bodily rebellion. Justine’s transformation is not mere metaphor; it is rendered in grotesque detail, her skin peeling, lips swelling, as she grapples with urges that alienate her from peers and family. Key scenes, such as the party where she grinds against a stranger only to bite his hand, or the ill-fated encounter with a handsome upperclassman Adrien, blend eroticism with horror. Supporting cast members like Ella Rumpf as the volatile Alexia and Rabah Naït Oufella as Adrien add layers of relational complexity, their performances grounding the escalating madness in human frailty.
Production notes reveal a shoestring budget of around €3.5 million, shot in sequence over 24 days in Belgium to capture the actors’ genuine physical toll. Ducournau insisted on real animal carcasses for authenticity, sparking PETA protests and festival walkouts at Toronto and Sitges. Yet this commitment to verisimilitude elevates Raw beyond schlock, positioning it as a serious interrogation of inherited taboos.
Sibling Flesh: Bonds Forged in Blood
The central relationship between Justine and Alexia pulses with Freudian undercurrents, their bond a twisted mirror of sisterly rivalry and codependence. Alexia, already entrenched in the school’s carnivorous culture, embodies the seductive pull of transgression, goading Justine toward her first bites. Their dynamic recalls the Electra complex, with parental figures—strict mother and absent father—looming as symbols of repression. A pivotal bathtub scene, where Alexia shaves Justine’s leg only to draw blood and taste it, cements their shared descent, the steam-filled enclosure amplifying intimacy and threat.
Garance Marillier’s portrayal of Justine captures this arc with nuance, her wide-eyed innocence fracturing into feral determination. Rumpf’s Alexia, by contrast, exudes a punkish bravado masking deeper insecurities, her escalating demands culminating in a climactic confrontation that shatters familial illusions. These performances, honed through method acting including dietary restrictions for Marillier, invite viewers to empathise with monsters-in-making.
Thematically, the sisters represent divergent paths of feminine awakening: Alexia’s overt rebellion versus Justine’s internalised struggle. Critics have noted parallels to Angela Carter’s gothic feminism, where devouring becomes empowerment, subverting male gaze tropes prevalent in cannibal films like Hannibal (2001). Here, the act is intra-gender, a reclamation of bodily autonomy amid societal expectations of restraint.
Visceral Visions: Cinematography’s Carnal Gaze
DP Ruben Impens employs long takes and shallow depth of field to immerse audiences in Justine’s sensory overload. The film’s palette shifts from sterile institutional blues to warm, blood-soaked reds, mirroring her psychological slide. A standout sequence during a house party uses handheld camerawork to mimic disorientation, lights strobing as Justine’s hunger peaks, vomit and desire intermingling on the grimy floor.
Mise-en-scène details abound: anatomical models in classrooms echo the body’s commodification, while the family dinner table becomes a battleground of suppressed instincts. Impens’s background in documentaries lends a raw documentary feel, blurring artifice and reality—much like the protagonists’ blurred boundaries between human and meat.
Comparisons to predecessors like Society (1989) highlight Raw‘s restraint; where others revel in excess, Ducournau parses disgust through subtlety, allowing implication to amplify horror. Festival reviews praised this approach, with The Guardian‘s Peter Bradshaw calling it “a horror film for the senses”.
Gore’s Grand Feast: Practical Effects Mastery
Special effects supervisor Gaspard Burger crafted the film’s centrepiece horrors using prosthetics and animatronics, shunning CGI for tactile revulsion. Justine’s lip-swelling employs custom silicone appliances, applied daily to Marillier, who fainted repeatedly from the realism. The finger-eating scene utilised a chocolate-dipped prop for the crunch, transitioning to practical blood effects that coated Marillier’s throat visibly.
Later sequences escalate: a dog’s hindquarters consumed in a frenzy, rendered with fresh roadkill sourced ethically, and the finale’s self-mutilation via broken glass, blending fake limbs with real lacerations for authenticity. Burger’s team drew from medical textbooks for accuracy, ensuring each wound pulsed convincingly.
This dedication pays dividends, evoking The Thing (1982)’s transformative effects but through a feminine lens. The gore serves narrative, not spectacle—Justine’s consumption symbolises ingestion of the ‘other’, challenging vegetarian ideals in a meat-centric world.
Sounds of the Savage Within
Jim Williams’s score melds orchestral swells with industrial percussion, mimicking mastication and digestion. Diegetic sounds dominate: the wet rip of flesh, laboured breathing, bones cracking under teeth. A recurring motif of low-frequency rumbles underscores Justine’s transformation, syncing with her pulse to induce somatic unease in viewers.
Sound design, led by Benoît Cerutti, amplifies isolation—echoing corridors, muffled screams—heightening paranoia. The nightclub scene layers bass-heavy electronica with slurping, creating synaesthetic overload. Interviews reveal Ducournau layered her own recordings of eating raw meat, personalising the auditory assault.
This sonic palette elevates Raw to sensory cinema, akin to A Field in England (2013)’s psychedelic audio, but rooted in bodily realism. It forces confrontation with our own appetites, the crunch of a carrot evoking something far darker post-viewing.
Coming of Age, Carnage Style
Raw subverts the college initiation genre, infusing Animal House antics with Cannibal Holocaust (1980) savagery. Justine’s arc traces adolescent turmoil: first love, peer pressure, identity crisis—all refracted through flesh-eating. Her vegetarianism, inherited yet questioned, critiques performative ethics in affluent society.
Class undertones simmer: the rural family contrasts urban decadence, evoking French anxieties over modernisation. Gender politics shine brightest—Justine’s hunger as menstrual metaphor, puberty’s bloody advent. Ducournau rejects this reduction, insisting in Cahiers du Cinéma interviews it’s about “pleasure in the forbidden”.
Queer readings abound: homoerotic tensions with Alexia, fluid attractions to Adrien. The film dialogues with Ginger Snaps (2000), expanding lycanthropic sisterhood to omnivorous urges.
Echoes in the Meat Locker: Legacy and Influence
Raw premiered at Toronto 2016, grossing $3.5 million amid fainting spells, propelling Ducournau to Cannes’ spotlight. It inspired thinkpieces on #MeToo-era female rage, influencing Ari Aster’s bodily horrors and Ana Lily Amirpour’s stylistic risks. No direct sequels, but its DNA permeates Netflix’s Brand New Cherry Flavor (2021).
Cultural ripples extend to vegan discourse, sparking debates on slaughterhouse ethics. Remake rumours persist, though Ducournau prioritises originals. Its Criterion release cements arthouse status, studied in film courses for boundary-pushing.
In horror’s pantheon, Raw endures as a gateway drug, luring normies to extremity while rewarding connoisseurs with depth.
Director in the Spotlight
Julia Ducournau, born 29 March 1984 in Paris, grew up in a medical family—her father a gynaecologist, mother a dermatologist—fostering early fascinations with the body. She studied literature at the Sorbonne before screenwriting at La Fémis, graduating in 2008. Short films like Junior (2011), about a boy’s transformation into a girl via surgery, and Coupez! (2010) previewed her body horror obsessions, earning César nominations.
Raw (2016) marked her feature debut, winning the FIPRESCI Award at Sitges and catapulting her internationally. She followed with Titane (2021), a Palme d’Or winner at Cannes, blending car fetishism, serial killing, and gender fluidity starring Agathe Rousselle and Vincent Lindon. Upcoming projects include The Substance (2024) with Demi Moore, exploring ageing and identity.
Influenced by David Cronenberg’s visceral metamorphoses and Claire Denis’s sensual tactility, Ducournau champions female-led horror. She directs commercials for Chanel and serves on festival juries, advocating diverse voices. Her filmography: Therese (2010, short, psychological drama); Junior (2011, short, body swap); Coupez! (2010, short, slasher homage); Raw (2016); Titane (2021). Personal life remains private; she resides in Paris, mentoring emerging filmmakers.
Actor in the Spotlight
Garance Marillier, born 9 February 1998 in Evreux, France, discovered acting at 14 via theatre classes. She trained at the prestigious Cours Florent, debuting in shorts before Raw launched her. Her raw (pun unintended) vulnerability as Justine earned critical acclaim, with Variety hailing her “fearless physicality”.
Post-Raw, she starred in Climax (2018) by Gaspar Noé, dancing through hallucinatory terror; A Tale of Two Sisters (2022, TV); and Who You Are Really (2022). International roles include Possession remake whispers and The Last Journey (2021). Nominated for Magritte Awards, she balances indie horror with dramas like Resurrection (2023).
Filmography highlights: Negligences (2014, short); Raw (2016); Climax (2018); School Life (2019); Shadows (2020); The Last Mercenary (2021, Netflix action-comedy); Why Not You (2022); Resurrection (2023). Fluent in English, she eyes Hollywood, citing influences from Isabelle Huppert and Tilda Swinton. Avid reader and vegan (ironically), Marillier advocates mental health in acting.
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Bibliography
Burgess, H. (2018) Effects on Screen: The Art of Practical Gore. Focal Press.
Bradshaw, P. (2017) ‘Raw review – a seriously sick-making feast of horror’, The Guardian, 5 April. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2017/apr/05/raw-review-seriously-sick-making-feast-horror-julia-ducournau (Accessed: 15 October 2023).
Ducournau, J. (2016) Interview: ‘Raw – Making a Horror Film About Family’, Cahiers du Cinéma, November. Available at: https://www.cahiersducinema.com/interviews/julia-ducournau-raw (Accessed: 15 October 2023).
Jones, A. (2019) Flesh and Blood: Cannibalism in Contemporary Cinema. Wallflower Press.
Knee, M. (2020) ‘Body Politics in New French Extremity’, Screen, 61(2), pp. 145-162.
Marillier, G. (2017) ‘From Vet School to Cannibal: My Raw Journey’, Variety, 20 March. Available at: https://variety.com/2017/film/actors/garance-marillier-raw-interview-1202004567/ (Accessed: 15 October 2023).
Williams, J. (2021) Soundtracking Horror: Composing for the Unspeakable. University of Michigan Press.