WRITER'S NOTE: This post contains references to violent and disturbing content, and is not appropriate for children.
Those of you who've read my blogs in the last few months are probably aware of my position on horror movies. Up until a few months ago (specifically, the release and surprise success of the intriguing and creepy racial thriller Get Out), I've mostly found the horror genre to be not just very scary, but also very exploitative and morally damaging. And yet, I've strangely been examining it, for better and for worse, and have come to a better understanding and discernment of it.
First and foremost, what is horror? If you google the term itself, the first definition that appears is "an intense feeling of fear, shock, or disgust." It's also described as "an overwhelming and painful feeling caused by something frightfully . . . terrifying, or revolting; [in other words] a shuddering fear." To sum it up, horror is a physiological reaction involving escalated heartbeats, fears (including those of the unknown), nightmares, and even intrusions (i.e., a home invasion).
Let me rephrase that one more time. Anything that scares us, shocks us, disgusts us, terrifies us, or revolts us.
If we go back to literature through the likes of Edgar Allan Poe, Bram Stoker, and Mary Shelley, they tell tales and stories--fictional, that is--involving murders, immortal vampires, and monster creations respectfully. (The latter two, Dracula and Frankenstein, would go on to become classic films in the early 1930s.)And it isn't just these books. Other works, including Greek texts and most certainly the Bible, contain horrific elements of violence, war, decapitations, and crucifixions that are unspeakable, perhaps even more than the stories and writers of today.
Speaking of which, today's writers, like Stephen King, and filmmakers, like John Carpenter, Darren Aronovsky, and the late George Romero and Wes Craven, have evoked these same aforementioned elements (fear, shock, disgust, terror, and revolt), while amplifying them, from Freddy Kruger to Michael Myers to Pennywise and pretty much every zombie, for that matter.
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| Bela Lugosi in 1931's Dracula |
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| Boris Karloff in 1931's Frankenstein |
I want to talk about the most common subgenres often associated with horror, specifically SUPERNATURAL, SLASHER, SPLATTER, and PSYCHOLOGICAL, as well as at least five examples of films and/or franchises in each, and finally what they really stand for. Now, I haven't seen all of these movies, mind you. And I don't plan to, for that matter. (Personally, I can't even watch vampire movies without feeling nerve-wracking; the trailer for 2008's Let the Right One In is enough to make me feel this way.) About half of the following excerpts are based on my research alone.
Lastly, while these films and subgenres may be important to talk about and highly discern, the real question is their meaning or lack of it. That is, are they really worth watching? I've somewhat asked myself at times, why do we watch these movies, even though we know they (or, a large majority of them) are graphic and immoral? What do they say about our humanity or lack of it? Or are they just made for their own sake to scare, shock, disgust, terrify, and/or revolt us?
SO, without further ado, here's the breakdown.
SUPERNATURAL
From ghosts to spirituality to exorcists, this aspect of this genre leaves more than just a mark.
Director William Friedkin's take on William Peter Blatty's bestselling novel about a 12-year-old girl who is possessed by the devil, and whose mother calls upon two priests to rid her daughter's body of the demon. Such a take on this topic has never been so raw, wince-inducing, and controversial since. The Reverend Billy Graham stated, "The Devil is in every frame of this film" (read here). This notion of making the innocence of children look frightening would resurface in 1976's The Omen, about a demonic child. In the mean time, witchcraft, demon-possession, and levitations would find their way in such period films as The Conjuring (2013) and its sequels and spinoffs, as well as the Satanic Temple-endorsed The Witch (2016).
Perhaps Steven Spielberg's only other involvement with horror besides Jaws, this special-effects, spook-filled nightmare from Tobe Hooper (1974's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre) finds a suburban family that experiences strange and ghoulish phenomena in their quiet home, from clowns in kids' bedrooms to dead corpses in the backyard pool, and a sweet little girl announcing, "They're heeeere." How creepier can you get? Oh, and did I mention that meat-in-the-kitchen scene?
M. Night Shamalayan's successful thriller about a lonely boy (Haley Joel Osment) who sees ghosts, with Bruce Willis as the child psychiatrist who tries to help him, and who tries to figure out his own personal agenda. A rare suspense-drama, as well as a rare Best Picture nominee in the genre.
Many back then would call this one a suspension of disbelief. The birth of the found footage feature along with a successful marketing campaign (both of which were believed to be true back then) began here, as three filmmakers embark into the woods to find a legendary, supernatural, and supposedly unseen figure. But then, things start to take a turn for the worst, in both unexpected and profane ways. This strategy was revived in the latter-Aughts with Matt Reeves' contemporary monster flick Cloverfield (2008) and Oren Peli's home-shot Paranormal Activity (2007).
As Psycho made people afraid of showers and Jaws made people afraid of water, perhaps this American remake of a famous Japanese film (1998's Ringu) makes videotapes look bone-chilling. Naomi Watts plays an investigative reporter who learns about a mysterious tape that kills its viewers seven days after they watch it. Director Gore Verbinski unsettles audiences with disturbing images and a thoroughly cryptic vibe. Oh, and a scary girl that comes out of a television.
SLASHER
This is where things turn to graphic exploitation.
John Carpenter may have followed Alfred Hitchcock's suit with this chilling feature about a deranged mass murderer who returns to his hometown on Halloween night to bring back his reign of terror and bloodshed. The overall effect is silent and sudden, including images of the infamous Michael Myers in (of all things) his William Shatner-esque mask. Jamie Lee Curtis also became the "scream queen" of her generation here, while many criticized this film for creating the "sex-equals-death" notion.
Hockey-masked killer Jason Voorhees from Camp Crystal Lake may be the most nihilistic fictional killer of all. Compare his deadly and evil track record of eleven solo films to Freddy Kruger's eight (they both battled in 2003) and Michael Myers' ten.
Wes Craven gave birth to the infamous dream-killing boogeyman, Freddy Kruger, in this feature, and returned to the character ten years later (after less-successful sequels from other directors) with the ultra-meta Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994).
A feature that tarnishes the childhood innocence of playing with dolls (in this case, a "Good Guy" named Chucky), and throws a dark voodoo-serial killer in to terrorize a six-year-old boy. Countless nihilistic (and comedic-oriented?!?) sequels followed, before the original filmmakers returned to the first film's terror elements with two direct-to-video releases. For the record, this character scarred my childhood. Annabelle and the Poltergeist clowns ain't got nothing on this guy.
Just as he did with Freddy Kruger in the Eighties, Wes Craven left his mark on the genre with this clever-but-extremely-maddening, whodunit feature from the Nineties (written by Kevin Williamson) about an obsessive horror movie fan (dressed in an Edward Munch Ghostface mask) who goes on a killing spree. Craven and Williamson took meta humor and cliches to an ultimate level and put them in a setting that feels (sadly) palpably real. Spawned three sequels and an MTV series, while the teen horror subgenre would also expand to countless imitators and other features, such as the Williamson-penned I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997), the Final Destination series (2000-2011), and the sex-equals-death thriller It Follows (2015).
SPLATTER
A successor to slasher, with said exploitation turned up to 11 and beyond.
Also applicable in this subgenre are *Body Horror (very gross-out, repulsive and disgusting) and **Zombie Horror (the one that may say something about humanity, or just bite into its flesh)
The late George A. Romero is credited for (pretty much) defining the zombie movie, which began here with a horde of undead citizens who hose in on survivors in a farmhouse. Romero returned to this world (and defined it again) with his shopping mall-centered and gory sequel Dawn of the Dead (1978) and its successors. Dawn was remade by Zack Snyder in 2004, while zombies would find later success on T.V. ("The Walking Dead") and in a couple of cleverly-made-but-equally-gory comedies (2004's Shaun of the Dead and 2009's Zombieland).
The premise is simple: a group of road travelers pick up a hitchhiker and soon encounter an estate run by a family of merciless cannibals, including the skin-wearing, chainsaw-weilding Leatherface. Perhaps the birth of torture porn, courtesy Tobe Hooper. Enough said.
When a group of friends travel to a remote cabin in the woods, they open an ancient book and unleash a horde of evil-possessing spirits. This low-budget splatterfest put director Sam Raimi and B-movie legend Bruce "Groovy" Campbell on the map (while avoiding an official rating from the MPAA then, for distaste purposes). They followed suit with the splatter-comedy-sequel Evil Dead II (1987) and the medieval-themed Army of Darkness (1992). The 2013 remake was advertised as, "The most terrifying film you will ever experience." Writers Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard may have paid tribute to Raimi and company with their aptly-named The Cabin in the Woods (2012).
John Carpenter's special-effects yuck-fest, about an alien lifeform found in the frozen tundra, is certainly not for the squeamish. And neither is David Cronenberg's chilling mad-scientist thriller The Fly (1986), where Jeff Goldblum tragically (and disgustingly) turns into an insect.
James Wan's low-budget mystery, about a twisted psychopath named Jigsaw who places his victims in deadly puzzle games, is cleverly-paced. But its torturous violence made me say, "That's enough," and NO to the endless sequels it's spawned, including the recent Jigsaw (2017), and especially to Eli Roth's Hostel (2005).
PSYCHOLOGICAL
Here are stories that try to get into the minds of its subject characters. (Or, is it they who try to get into ours?
Alfred Hitchcock also established the slasher film here, with his infamous take on the equally-infamous novel by Robert Bloch, partly based on serial murderer Ed Gein. Runaway Marion Crane spends the night in a hotel, run by the mysterious Norman Bates and his unseen mother. Of course, everybody knows the famous shower scene, as well as Bernard Herrmann's shrieking strings-only score. The year of this film's release, Hitchcock had theater owners place cardboard signs with strict instructions not to allow any patrons in after the film began, so as not to ruin any of the film's spoilers or twists. This only added to the film's success, after its initial controversy with the Ratings Code then, and its role in making on-screen murders part of "entertainment." (The new documentary 78/52 explores the cultural and cinematic effect of the shower scene.) My, how the system has changed.
All it takes is Jack Nicholson--as the caretaker of an isolated hotel in the winter--to peak through an axed door in Stanley Kubrick's acclaimed and controversial take on Stephen King's novel, and scare the living daylights out of you. Well, that and two dead twin girls at the end of a hallway.
An obsessive fan holds her favorite author captive in an isolated Colorado home, after rescuing him from a car accident and learning that he killed off her favorite literary character. Kathy Bates won a Best Actress Oscar for her chilling portrayal of psychotic nurse Annie Wilkes in Rob Reiner's film, which many consider another one of the best adaptations of Stephen King's work, along with Carrie (1976), Delores Claiborne (1995), The Mist (2007), and It (2017)..
In the only horror film to receive the Best Picture Academy Award-win, cannibalistic killer Hannibal Lecter (an unforgettable Anthony Hopkins) assists up-and-coming agent Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) in tracking down a more sickening and vicious skinning murderer, Buffalo Bill (a never-more-chilling Ted Levine). "Don't let Hannibal Lecter get inside your head."
Jennifer Lawrence and Javier Bardem play a couple whose quiet and secluded life is interrupted by strange, uninvited guests in Darren Aronovsky's controversial and appalling film. Perhaps both a modern-day allegory of celebrity obsession and an anti-Christian parable. (Read my review here.)
WRITER'S NOTE: You can also read my full reviews (as follows) for this year's Split (here), Get Out (here), and It (here).
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The problem with a lot of these movies and characters (as iconic as they may be) is there's no sense of redemption or salvation--unless one may count certain characters' survival instincts. Instead, they wallow in pools of violence, anti-socialism, and nihilistic "survival of the fittest" damage. And I, and many others, are all the worst for it--whether from the actual movies or just from clips via WatchMojo.com. To be a little more specific, they run contrary to war films and historical films, which, according to author Brian Godowa, "portray equally graphic brutality, but their contexts are ultimately redemptive," in terms of self-sacrifice, heroism, and hope.
And yet, perhaps I'm strangely all the better for it, now that I have more of an understanding of the genre and its sub-categories. Don't get me wrong, having an understanding is fine. But there has to be a line that shouldn't be crossed in terms of making sure we're not indulging what the world considers "entertainment," including slaughter, sexuality and profanity, not to mention a lack of morality and humanity.
Nevertheless, it's a very provocative area to be in.
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