When Philip Brophy coined the term “body horror” in 1983, in the article ‘Horrality: The Textuality of the Contemporary Horror Film’, it was with concern to a then-palpable trend in horror cinema in which “the fear… [and] destruction of the body” was the primary source of terror. Body-assimilation masterwork The Thing (1982) and metamorphosis classic An American Werewolf in London (1981) – in which “torture and agony [is] wrought upon a body devoid of control” – were named as cornerstones of the movement which, as with gut-churning AIDS allegory The Fly (1986), emphasised graphic imagery as an audacious tool of discomfort. 

But despite the impact of these male-centric benchmarks, the sub-genre has always been most effective as a metaphor when the female form is its subject. From the disturbing sexual violence undertones of Alien (1979) to the lycanthropy-menstruation relationship depicted in Ginger Snaps (2000), body horror has long served as a powerful allegory for the most distressing facets of the female experience, from the traumatic physical transformations of puberty and pregnancy to societal pressures to conform to unrealistic beauty standards. 

The Substance is a grisly example of how contemporary, female-focused body horror has been turning heads and twisting necks at film festivals in recent years. As the movie now hits UK cinemas on wide release (in what is undoubtedly the most vom-inducing cinematic event of the month), we explore a wider pool of contemporary films incorporating disturbing body horror into female stories of cosmetic transformation, body dysmorphia, and blood-soaked self-discovery. Check out five queasy highlights below.

THE SUBSTANCE (CORALIE FARGEAT, 2024)

“Have you ever dreamt of a better version of yourself?”, asks the mysterious corporate entity that lurks in the shadows of Coralie Fargeat’s 2024 film festival sensation. As the old saying goes, be careful what you wish for. 

The Substance arrives in UK cinemas off the back of a flood of acclaim (and disgust) for Demi Moore’s no-holds-barred central performance as ageing TV star Elisabeth Sparkle. After being dropped from her long-running aerobics show by lecherous network head Harvey (Dennis Quaid), Sparkle makes a grave error of judgment: she begins to misuse a dubious miracle drug, having become addicted to its miraculous youth-reviving effects. By the time she realises the morbid consequences of her actions, it’s already too late.

Imagine a jacked-up hybrid of Cronenberg classics Videodrome, The Fly and Scanners with the body-fetishising visuals and bass-heavy music of Benny Benassi’s 2002 hit ‘Satisfaction’ and you’ve got a good starting point for what to expect in this gross-out showbiz satire. The movie allegorises our dangerous fixations on unattainable beauty standards – and then takes it to the most gag-inducing endpoint. 

SICK OF MYSELF (KRISTOFFER BORGLI, 2022)

A decidedly different take on cosmetic enhancement is presented in Sick of Myself, the Norwegian black comedy from writer-director Kristoffer Borgli (who would direct Nicolas Cage in A24’s Dream Scenario a year later). A stinging satire of vanity and the culture of relentless fame-seeking during the age of social media, the movie was partly inspired by the director’s experiences living in Los Angeles, where opportunistic and even narcissistic personality traits were “bumped into more frequently”.

The film follows pathological liar Signe in her attempts to garner attention from friends and peers in the shadow of her successful sculptor boyfriend. After observing the reactions of her coffee shop’s patrons when a woman is mauled in a vicious dog attack, Signe decides to begin abusing a dangerous Russian anti-anxiety drug knowing it will afflict her with a nasty skin disease. What begins as a mild rash soon leads to severe facial lacerations – and as Signe’s condition reaches the point of no return, her self-centred fantasies spiral out of control.

Sick of Myself is as darkly funny as it is repulsive, with blunt dialogue and ultra-naturalistic filmmaking elevating a brilliantly unhinged central performance from Kristine Kujath Thorp. 

RAW (JULIA DUCOURNAU, 2016)

After enrolling at a prestigious veterinary school, meek vegetarian Justine (Garance Marillier) is subjected to a series of cruel hazing rituals that force her out of her comfort zone. After being forced to eat a raw rabbit kidney one day, she develops a severe skin rash and, even more alarmingly, an appetite for raw meat and primal, animalistic sex, with violent confrontations defining her academic experience once she acquires a taste for human flesh.

Blood-drenched and saturated with vivid red lighting, Raw analogises a young woman’s coming-of-age in truly morbid fashion. And while the campus setting – marked by deformed animal foetuses and corpse dissections by day, and raucous parties by night – is a constantly gut-churning environment for the virginal Justine, it’s her own body that’s the source of the movie’s most visceral shocks. 

Raw would see French filmmaker Julia Ducournau hailed a body horror luminary in the years following its release. This reputation would be cemented via the director’s gruesome follow-up feature: Cronenbergian psycho-thriller Titane, about a mechanophilic woman with a titanium plate in her head who embarks on a journey of self-discovery during a killing spree, won the Palme d’Or at Cannes 2021.

SWALLOW (CARLO MIRABELLA-DAVIS, 2019)

In an idyllic home in upstate New York, doting housewife Hunter Conrad (Haley Bennett) is demeaned and alienated by her new upper-class family. She’s forced to recount embarrassing personal stories by her husband at dinner; cut off mid-sentence by his CEO father (Succession’s David Rasche); and receives back-handed compliments from her mother-in-law. After becoming pregnant, she begins to engage in disturbing acts of self-sabotage in an attempt to regain her autonomy – swallowing marbles, drawing pins and other inedible objects until a medical scan sparks outrage.

Through its unsettling but non-sensationalist exploration of the real-life medical condition ‘pica’, this feature debut from writer-director Carlo Mirabella-Davis delivers a refreshingly unique take on a well-trodden theme: the repression of women through conservative gender stereotypes. Produced by a largely female crew, the film was notably inspired by the director’s own grandmother’s experiences with OCD, which were brought on by experiences of powerlessness during an unhappy marriage, resulting in her being institutionalised, subjected to electro-shock therapy and unwillingly lobotomised.

WOMAN OF THE PHOTOGRAPHS (TAKESHI KUSHIDA, 2020)

Woman of the Photographs caused a stir at genre film festivals a few years back through its confrontation of widely relatable form of body dysmorphia: the editing of photos for social media.

The movie concerns a mute photographer whose work is derived from retouching photographs for vain photo lab patrons. A chance encounter with a social media influencer with a grisly collar injury initially ignites a conducive working relationship – and even the possibility of romance. But when the latter realises that her followers better value a more “honest” portrayal of her physical condition, a new question arises: what happens when her wounds heal for real?

As photo manipulator Kai (Hideki Nagai) stretches flesh, sharpens jawlines and swells eyes on a digital display, the uncomfortably loud whirrs of a photo-printer augment the sinister undertones as this minimal psychological drama serves up some discomfiting food-for-thought throughout its lean runtime. Greater thematic depth, meanwhile, is provided by recurring images of a pet praying mantis who rabidly munches on insect corpses; the female of the species is known to cannibalise the male during copulation.