Looking for video of people acting without conscious thought

May 9, 2009 1:00 PM

Looking for video clips of emotionally detached, animalistic behaviour.

I'm looking for video clips that show humans acting in an animalistic fashion, without thought. This is for a project I'm working on, here are some suggestions for the the kind of thing I'm looking for

"eating, face smeared with raw meat, blank-faced sex, mechanical stabbing or attacking - basically of zombies doing things other than eating human flesh, though they don't have to be zombies. I need clips that show this display of primal yet blank-faced animality- it can't be emotional. So it's a weird combination of robotic and animal, brainstem in the driver's seat."

I'm mostly stumped, but would love to come in with some examples. Do you have any suggestions? Clips can be from anywhere, but it's best if they're on YouTube or elsewhere online for easy access.

posted by yellowbinder to Media & Arts (10 answers total)

Maybe a clip from American Psycho. That movie has some bizarre brutal behavior mixed with certain systematic, almost robotic elements. There are also plenty of clips available on YouTube.
posted by Buttons at 1:11 PM on May 9, 2009

Like Buttons says, look for movies/tv shows with sociopath/psychopath characters. For example:

TV
-Dexter (Dexter)
-Heroes (Sylar)

Movies
-A Clockwork Orange (Alex and his droogs)
-Othello (Iago...sorry, can't recommend a particular film adaptation)

Here's an IMDB topic search for "psychopath", which is a good jumping off point.

If you're looking for something a bit less mainstream, there's the fake-snuff film/animalistic/torture porn stuff like Cannibal Holocaust or August Underground. (Be warned, the one minute of August Underground I watched made me want to turn it off, and I have a high tolerance for things like that.) But having not watched much of either, it may not be what you're looking for.
posted by JauntyFedora at 1:33 PM on May 9, 2009

So basically you want someone doing their thing while in a mental state that is not self contemplative. I'm guessing this sort of thing isn't what you want.

Somebody doing serious marshal arts would probably be in the state you're looking for (i.e. not a lot of chest thumping and what not to intimidate or impress but serious competition with things happening as fast as flesh will allow with no time to think, just do.)
posted by Kid Charlemagne at 2:19 PM on May 9, 2009

The first thing that came to mind reading your description was the Rage Virus in 28 Days Later.
posted by mochilove at 2:56 PM on May 9, 2009

There's a Buffy episode called The Pack in which people start acting like animals -- hyenas to be precise, I think.
posted by tracicle at 3:53 PM on May 9, 2009

You can find plenty of mechanical stabbing in The Manson Family.
posted by leigh1 at 6:24 PM on May 9, 2009

I think that the movie, Blindness, contains lots of images of humans resorting to animalistic behavior. It's one of the film's major themes. It's not the greatest movie; it's a little obtuse. And some of it is pretty difficult to watch.
posted by dchrssyr at 8:27 PM on May 9, 2009

THX 1138, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, a couple of scenes in Escape From New York, (start the clip at about 4:18 and run to 5:40)...
posted by EnsignLunchmeat at 9:49 PM on May 9, 2009

Bruno Dumont does this kind of thing in his films. see L'humanité in some scenes as I recall, also Twenty-Nine Palms (which I find rather unwatchable.. at least extremely uncomfortable for this reason.. long stretches of nothing much happening & then it just goes completely off the rails at the end).

aha - Trouble Everyday in which.. the wonderful Beatrice Dalle sort of chews some guy's face off.. that scene goes on longer in the film.. rather.. intense. I'm surprised this is on youtube, it's a bit graphic, also beware the last 2 seconds suddenly cuts to an earlier scene in a science lab with a humain brain in a vat.. I've seen the film twice but that shocked me just now showing up when it did. you've been warned.

Gaspar Noe's Seule contre tous has quite a few scenes of this kind of stuff. It's brutal. I couldn't watch more than a third of it.

The truly upsetting thing about Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer is that he behaves this way.. very flat affect. ugh.
posted by citron at 12:02 PM on May 10, 2009

some of this Justice video: Stress
posted by citron at 12:12 PM on May 10, 2009