Snuff film

A snuff film, snuff movie or snuff video is a type of film, produced for profit or financial gain, that shows, or purports to show, scenes of actual homicide. The victims are supposedly typically lured to their murders by false pretenses and their murder is then filmed and the video depicting it is sold to buyers.

The concept of snuff films became known to the general public during the 1970s, when an urban legend alleged that a clandestine industry was producing such films for profit. The rumor was amplified in 1976 by the release of a film called Snuff, which capitalized on the legend through a disingenuous marketing campaign. But the film, like others on the topic, relied on special effects to simulate murder. According to the fact-checking website Snopes, there has never been a verified example of a genuine commercially produced snuff film.^[1] Videos of actual murders (such as beheading videos) have been made available to the public, generally through the Internet; however, those videos have been made and broadcast by the murderers either for their own gratification or for propaganda purposes, and not for financial gain and thus do not qualify, by definition, as a "snuff film".^[2]