LATE-STAGE CANNIBALISM:

Contemporary Cannibal Consumers in Literature and Film

Beginning in the 2010s, ushered in by the popularity of vampires (The Twilight Saga, 2008-2012; The Vampire Diaries, 2009-2017) and zombies (Zombieland, 2009; The Walking Dead, 2010-), cannibals have re-emerged as prominent figures in creative works across popular media. In contrast to the cannibal exploitation films of the 1970s and 1980s by Italian filmmakers, which centered around the experiences of Western travelers threatened by exotic tribes of cannibals in the Global South (Il paese del sesso selvaggio [Man From Deep River], 1972; Cannibal Holocaust, 1980; Natura contro [The Green Inferno], 1988), more contemporary aesthetic productions present cannibal protagonists with whom audiences, while also experiencing bodily horror and disgust at their behavior, are encouraged to empathize. On the contemporary cannibal menu, there is much more to chew on than the entertainment of exploitation.

In this dissertation project, I argue that taking the trope of cannibalism seriously opens up more nuanced understandings of being human in a world with other human (and non-human) beings. More pointedly, the dissertation project attends to the popular resurgence of the cannibal trope as a framework for digesting the lived experience of late-stage capitalism, addressing tensions in class relations, gender dynamics, sexual desire, and environmental change. The project explores the trope of cannibalism through a comparative analysis of select Mexican, U.S. American, and Argentine cultural productions of literature and film following the 2008 financial crisis.

The project draws on a historical and folkloric knowledge as well as past literary/cinematic handlings of the trope to capture the evolutions of the contemporary usage of the cannibal as a cultural figure. The context of the project involves theoretical discussions concerning models of neoliberal activity in late-stage capitalism – such as biopower, necropolitics, gore capitalism, and horrorism; the role of affect and embodiment in the critical consumption of literature and film; as well as the power of narrative. At the intersections of these areas, the project itself focuses on significance of the trope of the cannibal.

Through analyses of various texts and the function of the trope of cannibalism at play in them, the project seeks to uncover the affective dimensions of consumers’ appetites for cannibal narratives. The project’s primary concern is taking the trope of cannibalism seriously as a powerful narrative tool for digesting the lived experience of late-stage capitalism, addressing tensions in class relations, gender dynamics, sexual desire, and environmental change. By focusing on contemporary cannibal literature and film from Mexico, the United States, and Argentina, I trace how the figure of the cannibal shape-shifts across national borders in the Western hemisphere to achieve different critical interventions for various creators.

In its comparative scope, the project observes the mutation of renderings of cannibalism as narratives travel across national borders, particularly the de-politicization of the cannibal as the figure travels northward. The project begins by recovering the origins of the label of “cannibal” and examining the folkloric dimensions driving forth rumors and salacious tales of human-eating tribes. A brief literature review of anthropological perspectives regarding the real or imagined practice of cannibalism in the Americas is included to provide a basis of comparison for fictional depictions of cannibalism in creative cultural productions explored in the dissertation case studies.

The first case study enacted is comparative analysis of the 2010 Mexican horror film Somos lo que hay [We Are What We Are] directed by Jorge Michel Grau, a striking narrative capturing the failure of the neoliberal project in Mexico, and its 2013 English remake We Are What We Are directed by Jim Mickle, a rendering which desaturates the critical potency of the original when deployed as another U.S. American story of exceptionalism and rugged individualism. Comparison of these two films invites a consideration of the differences of neoliberalism when applied across borders. I argue, through critical observation of the mutation of the cannibal family in cinema, we can better understand conceptualizations of patriarchal capitalism and nuclear family bonds under neoliberalism, as well as our “cruel attachments” (Berlant) to both, as imagined across national borders.

The second case study is a comparative analysis of U.S. American filmmakers Diablo Cody and Karyn Kusama’s dark comedy horror film Jennifer’s Body (2009) and U.S. American writer Chelsea G. Summer’s novel, A Certain Hunger (2020). Through analysis of these two works, I argue that the trope of cannibalism is a powerful illustration of horror genre conventions, one that is both “abject” and “excessive.” Furthermore, I assert that the trope is a useful tool for feminist invention as it both (1) challenges the traditionally anti-feminist phrase, “man-eater,” and (2) brings horrific attention to what should actually disturb society – the forced sexualization of young women, the regulation of women’s own sexual appetites under patriarchy, as well as the relative disposability of older women whose sexual appeal has been given a social “expiration date.”

The third case study is a comparative analysis of the 2015 novel Bones & All by U.S. American author Camille DeAngelis, its 2022 film adaptation Bones and All directed by Italian filmmaker Luca Guadagnino, and the 2022 romcom horror film Fresh written by Lauryn Kahn and directed by Mimi Cave. Using cannibalism as a framework for thinking through identity and sexual appetites (Bataille, Probyn), I investigate the ways in which cannibal hunger operates as a metaphor for queerness in both the novel Bones & All and its film adaptation Bones and All. Far from being a fixed metaphor, I argue that cannibalism instead represents heteronormative violence in Fresh. Comparison of these three works demands an attention to the ways in which what we crave, via the stomach or the heart, can reveal something even greater about the nature of our social relations.

The last case study is a comparative analysis of U.S. American author Ottessa Moshfegh’s Lapvona (2020) and Argentine writer Agustina Bazterrica’s Cadáver exquisito [Tender is the Flesh] (2018), two novels which utilize cannibalism in striking narrative ways to enact socio-cultural critique against the environmental impacts of patriarchal capitalism. Informed by Sushmita Chatterjee and Banu Subramaniam’s edited volume Meat!: A Transnational Analysis, I consider the assumed necessity of meat in the human diet depicted by Moshfegh and Bazterrica in their respective novels. As both works present scenarios in which (non-human) animal meat is no longer available (e.g., overpopulation, polluted food supply, and manufactured scarcity), the narrative “solution” presented is the consumption of human meat, which necessarily raises vital questions of who gets to eat and whom is eaten. Analysis of the two works demands a critical re-evaluation of “ethical” consumption, both gastronomically and narratively.

Across these case studies, I argue that the contemporary cannibal’s political potential mutates as it travels across national borders. I observe that, in U.S. film and literature, the figure of the cannibal is no longer used to serve a political critique on an economic system as presented in Mexican horror cinema, but rather, cannibalism is used to address gender dynamics, sexual desire, and identity practices. When the figure of the cannibal “returns” to Latin America in Argentine literature, its critical potential to illuminate systemic political issues is revitalized. At this research project’s end, I advocate for the ways in which the trope of cannibalism can function as a heuristic for anticapitalistic, ecocritical feminist intervention in re-evaluating consumption practices.