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Clip description
Daniel (Tom Long) awakes in chains, with the sound of a music box and the lapping of water outside. He is terrified, but unable to move. Later that night, the three women show themselves and begin to caress his body.
Curator’s notes
This is the beginning of Daniel’s physical ordeal. It’s shown as both an act of pleasure and an act of aggression for the women – which contradicts to some extent the conventional thinking about rape, that it is always an act of aggression rather than pleasure. The confusing thing for Daniel is that his body responds automatically to their stimulation, despite his desire not to. This connects to another aspect of conventional wisdom – the idea that men can’t be forced to perform a sexual act requiring an erection. In this scene, Kokkinos appears to attack both ideas about rape – the women actually say that they are doing it for their pleasure, when Daniel demands an explanation. And a great deal of his frustration and guilt stems from the fact that he is unable to control his body’s response to their provocation. Later, they throw this back at him, accusing him of enjoying it. The fact that he’s a dancer may be part of his frustration: dancers are experts at controlling their own bodies, yet he finds that he can’t. He is powerless, which is probably a new sensation for him.
