Exploding into a paroxysm of martial arts that could be some nutty frontier version of French kick-fighting, they beat the living daylights out of the would-be rapists in slow motion so dreamy it borders on the fetishistic.
12.
The idiom is now generally used only as part of a wider expression to express intensity in a negative manner, most commonly in the form " to scare the living daylights out of someone " or " to beat the living daylights out of someone . " It has even taken on a far more humane, even affectionate tone in the phrase " hug the living daylights " ( out of someone, passionately to the point of presumed asphyxiation ).
