Description:
Sado-masochistic iconography has long exploited Nazi imagery bylinking sex with power and violence. By using the 1974 sexploitation filmIlsa, She-Wolf of the SS as a case study, I explore what happensto Holocaust memory when the Holocaust is eroticized. Based on a closetextual analysis of the film, in-depth interviews with the film's directorand stars, and a content analysis of a representative sample of 508 websites related to the film, I analyze the production and reception of thefilm in light of the controversies surrounding Holocaust representationin popular culture. I describe how cultural content, historical trauma,and aesthetic form interplay in the film, and question why Holocaustmemory is being eroticized, genderered, and profaned.