The Black Mass

Scenes of strong violence include the brutal battering of women with fists and a heavy object, the biting of flesh and stranglings. There is extensive bloodshed and strong aftermath injury detail, including brief sight of a slashed throat. A man imagines a woman gouging her flesh with her fingers and feeding on the gory viscera, culminating in a stylised self-decapitation. There are also verbal references to crimes of a violent and sexually violent nature.

There are strong and unsettling scenes of sexual and sexualised violence, which include the brutal violation of a woman with an object, although the assault lacks graphic detail and is shot with a focus on the victim's extreme distress rather than the mechanics of the assailant's actions, which remain off-screen. In a prelude to an attack on another woman, the assailant searches through the victim's underwear drawer and rubs panties over his face as he masturbates off-screen. In another scene, the killer imagines a woman acting as his proxy and mutilating herself as she looks at him in a provocative way and sexualises injuries, whilst he derives sexual stimulation from what he sees in his mind. Acts of sexual violence are accompanied by scenes of sexual threat in which the perpetrator stalks his intended victims and engages with them in the guise of a plausibly charming individual whose mask slips when his plans are thwarted.

This work contains flashing images which may affect viewers who are susceptible to photosensitive epilepsy.