[As with so many
of my AmericanStudies contacts and colleagues, I met Ariella Archer through Twitter,
where she’s one of the most consistently compelling voices on American history,
social studies education, and more. She teaches in Texas, has an MA in History
and will soon be pursuing a PhD, and is a great example of the best of
AmericanStudies—and thus a voice I’m very excited to feature in this Guest
Post!]
The first scary movie I ever watched was The Wizard of
Gore. I was eight or nine at the time and was not supposed to see it. My
parents thought I was in bed asleep, little did they know, I was peeking around
the corner of our hallway, watching Montag the Magnificent disembowel people on
stage. I was terrified. Paralyzed with fear, I watched it through to the end. I
have been a fan of horror since that day. The culmination of special effects,
music, jump scares, suspense, and wondering if you are brave enough to continue
watching makes the movie going experience worth viewing for die hard horror
fans like myself. Horror has been around as long as people have been telling
stories around a campfire. Urban legends, myths, ghost stories, monsters, and
demons are all things that fill the darkness when our imaginations run wild. When
moving pictures came on the scene, people no longer had to use their
imagination, they could see the worst of mankind played out before their very eyes.
Horror movies have always been an important part of
Hollywood. Pop Culture has turned horror into a big business. The Numbers don’t
lie! Countless subgenres have flooded the market, which include but are not
limited to Slasher, Zombie, Supernatural, Monster, and Found Footage. These
give a variety of choices to even the pickiest of horror fans. My favorite is
the Slasher subgenre and my first choice for a Slasher feature is Friday the
13th. Jason Voorhees makes a great horror hero. The audience roots for him,
just as they root for the lone survivor at the end. Voorhees was not the first
horror hero in a Slasher movie; however, that honor can be given to
Leatherface. Each subgenre can be traced back to a single movie that changed
the future of horror. A movie that was so profound, writers and directors
continued to create movies in response to the original’s success. Horror
subgenres carry with them a distinct history, which makes them interesting. I
pay good money to feel the frights of my favorite subgenres, which themselves
have their own interesting backstory. So, in keeping with the spirit of the horror
movie lists (and there are plenty), I have created my own that includes my
three favorite subgenres, the groundbreaking movies that started them, and how
they have evolved over the years.
SPOILERS AHEAD!
1.
Zombies
The 1968 movie that started it all was
George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead. Romero’s movie brilliantly houses
a group of strangers together and pits them against hordes of zombies. Knowing
they are trapped, the main character, Ben, tries to rally the group, with
little success. In the end Ben meets the same fate as the other house guests, but
unfortunately, it is at the hands of search and rescue. They mistakenly thought
Ben was one of the undead and shot him. This ending was not without
controversy. It is hard to ignore the fact that Ben was an African American male
trapped in a house with white people that were unhappy with him in charge. In
the end, McClelland, the white sheriff, shoots Ben, killing him. Romero
insists that he was not tackling a race issue, but instead he hired Duane Jones
(Ben) because he gave the best audition. Zombies stem from Haitian folklore
that is rich in African
religious customs. The word zombie first meant, in general terms, spirit or
ghost but was later used to describe a person brought back
from the dead, and used as a slave. There are tales with zombie themes that
have been around for a long time; however, Romero laid the groundwork for
today’s popular zombie. Over the last 50 years the dead have taken on many
different forms. Romero’s zombies are mindless, slow, and represent the worst
of humanity. Slow zombies were a staple in the subgenre for quite some time. In
an interview, George Romero said slower
zombies are scarier, easier to escape, and more fun to work with. On the
flip side, fast zombies, or zombies that run, climb, and jump, are relatively
new and have become quite popular. Movies
like 28 Days Later and World War Z have made it difficult for
humans to elude the zombies. They include an endless amount of inventive ways to
escape precarious situations. The look of zombies has also changed. In Night
of the Living Dead, zombies were subtle and hard to distinguish from the
living. They almost looked like everyday humans wearing regular clothing. Nowadays,
they are rotted, disgusting, dirty, and even look like they smell bad. The more
current movies have a backstory exploring the origins of zombies. Some claim viruses
and bacteria are the culprit. In Night of the Comet, an opportunity to
witness a rare comet creates the violent flesh eaters. One of the scariest
things about zombie movies, and even television shows like The Walking Dead,
are the people that are trying to survive. They lose their humanity along the
way, become desperate, and eventually must kill to survive. It becomes a post
apocalyptical world where survivors turn on each other for their most basic
needs. This loss of self is terrifying and forces the question; to what lengths
would I go in order to survive?
2.
Slashers
Slasher movies are known for their
memorable villains turned horror heroes. Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers, Freddy
Krueger, Jigsaw, and Ghostface are extremely popular, and marketable even after
all these years. Action
figures of these and other horror evildoers are available year-round. The
movie given credit for laying the groundwork of the subgenre is the 1974 movie The
Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Directed by Toby Hooper, The Texas Chainsaw
Massacre was brilliantly marketed as a true event. Audiences flocked to see
a family of cannibals terrorize 5 friends on vacation. Although the idea is
loosely based on the serial killer Ed Gein, the movie
plot was fiction. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre led to other very
successful Slasher films. Halloween, Friday the 13th, A
Nightmare on Elm Street, and Saw each have a very similar formula
that makes for successful Slasher flicks. Those ingredients include: the
murderer with a disturbing past; dark settings; a group of deviant and
unsuspecting teens; foreshadowing musical scores; death (lots of it); a number
of cheesy sequels; and of course the final girl. The
final girl is the last person alive to deal with the villain. She is usually
the opposite of every other person in the movie. While the wild teens are off
doing drugs and having sex, the final girl is saying no, and rebuffing a
prospective boyfriend’s advances. She is seen as strong, smart, and virtuous. The
first final girl was Sally Hardesty in Texas Chainsaw Massacre. After
her, there are other iconic lone survivors including Laurie Strode in Halloween,
Alice from Friday the 13th, and Nancy Thompson in Nightmare
on Elm Street. Some say the final
girl trope is a misogynistic approach to writing horror. Slasher movies were
just gaining their popularity in the 80’s, and since then, studies have shown
that a nod to the final girl confirm how adults viewed young people in society
at the time. Teens were viewed as rotten and audiences got pleasure from seeing
the hooligans meet their end. The final girl has since developed over the past
thirty years into a character that is no longer shamed for having sex or
enjoying the same indulgences as her counterparts. The movie Scream was
a game changer for the horror genre and the final girl. Wes
Craven’s masterpiece broke all of the Slasher film rules and is credited
for breathing new life into the horror movie brand. Scream was one of
the highest grossing horror films and was successful with the critics. The
characters were well versed in the rules of horror. As events happened in the
movie, they applied those rules to figure out what was next. Their knowledge of
the genre is what makes the movie different. There are no unsuspecting teens
wondering what is going on around them. The audience is made aware of this
early on in the movie when main character Sidney Prescott is speaking to
Ghostface on the phone. She claims her dislike for horror is due to “some
stupid killer stalking some big-breasted girl who can’t act, who’s always
running up the stairs when she should be going out the front door. It’s
insulting.” This was a breath of fresh
air for audiences that were used to seeing clueless teens being picked off one
by one. Sidney Prescott rebelled against the final girl rules as well. Sidney was
a virgin but chose to have sex with her boyfriend. This is usually a death
sentence for a character. She does the opposite of what other females in Slasher
movies would do as well. She locks doors and chooses safer routes to get away
from the killer. Scream has had many sequels, just like any good Slasher
movie. Further, the success of Scream led to other satisfying but less
successful movies like I Know What You did Last Summer, and Urban
Legend.
3.
Found Footage
Found Footage are movies where a substantial
amount of video is filmed on handheld cameras, much akin to the cheesy family
home video of your first birthday that takes a sinister turn. The 2007, Spanish
movie [REC] scared me beyond belief. A reporter is tasked with shadowing
a fire department into an apartment building which gets barricaded after a
woman is infected with a virus. The claustrophobic feeling as the camera
searched the dark for some sort of answers was petrifying. Found Footage movies
can nauseate and frustrate. Nauseate because of the camera’s constate movements
and frustrate because you cannot see what is going on outside of the camera’s
view. The events outside the view of the camera can make the imagination run
wild with supposition which is sometimes creepier than what is going on in the
actual shot. The 1999 movie that put Found Footage on the map was The Blair
Witch Project. I did not find it nearly as unsettling as [REC];
however, there is something to be said about the dangers that lurk in the
outreaches of unexplored forests. The movie let the audience feel the fear that
the characters felt. No one could figure out if there was something out in the
woods or if the campers were just feeding off of each other’s fears. The Blair
Witch Project, just like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, marketed itself as
based on real events. Many wondered if the video footage from the movie was
real. One of the stars, Michael
Williams said his family got condolence letters when missing posters, used
to advertise the movie, were released. After the success of The Blair Witch
Project, many other Found Footage films have been made. These continue to
make big bucks for Hollywood. One movie worth mentioning, that I have not seen,
is Paranormal
Activity. The critics did not like it, however, on a starting budget of
$15,000, the movie grossed $193 million worldwide. Paramount went on to make
three sequels which garnered the same results. Found Footage movies are still
very popular to this day.
Final thoughts: True Crime Podcasts
A form of horror that is bone chilling and fairly new on the
scene are True Crime podcasts. Podcasts began to root themselves in the mid
2000’s but have recently taken center stage. True Crime podcasts are the new
water cooler topic for many. True crime stories about murder, missing loved
ones, killing children, and so much more are scary because they are based on
real crimes. Many of the podcasters research their work using a plethora of hair-raising
evidence and shocking interviews. A good podcaster can tell a story that
creates the same feelings as a good horror movie. My favorite true crime
series, To
Live and Die in L.A., still haunts me even though it has been months
since I have finished the podcast. The host, Neil Strauss, takes the listeners
through real time events and as he gets new information, his reactions are
sometimes devastating. You quickly learn that he is invested in the families,
and occasionally feels sorry for the killer. Listeners get closure in the last
episode when it is finally revealed who killed 21-year-old Adea Shabani. Strauss’
investigative methods and empathy remind me of Detective David Miller in the
movie Se7en. It is a roller coaster ride for Strauss, and he takes his
audience on the ride with him. I still think about this case, which I firmly
believe is the goal of any good true crime podcaster. Many of them hope that the
attention brought to unsolved cases will help families get some sort of
closure. The stories can be gory and disturbing while the ones that make you
sick to your stomach are the stories involving children. True crime podcast listeners
quickly learn that these stories hit close to home. Some of my favorite true
crime podcasts are Crime Junkies, True Crime Garage, Up and
Vanished, and Cold. True Crime could be considered unconventional horror;
however, when the feelings of shock, abhorrence, and terror are the same
feelings you would get watching a good scary movie, could True Crime eventually
be a sister to the horror genre?
Horror will continue to be a huge market for Hollywood, and
I could not be more excited about the future of the genre. The Witch, The
Autopsy of Jane Doe, and Heredity seem to be where horror is headed.
These movies have fared well at the box office. The writers leave the endings
up to the imagination of the viewer and this approach has resulted in mixed
reviews from the critics. History has shown when there is a slump in the market,
someone comes along to begin anew, and thus reinvigorates the horror genre.
Maybe these new intellectual horror movies will be the wave of the future.
Further Reading:
For a comprehensive history of the horror genre through the
decades: Horror
Film History
For a list of the scariest horror movies: Reader’s Digest Scariest Movies
List of popular true crime podcasts: 35 Best True Crime
[My Halloween
series starts Monday,
Ben
PS. Thoughts on
and responses to Ariella’s post?]
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