Thursday, May 6, 2010

Conclusion

I’ve learned a lot about horror films through this blogging experience. Though I’m not quite a convert, I definitely have a new appreciation for the themes and patterns that I learned about. I just want to take one minute to talk about some of the themes that I wrote about that I noticed while watching The Shining.
The first one is the body. I wrote my second blog about the horror film’s disregard for the human body. Though the mind and the body are, arguably, two separate entities, the hijacking of the father’s mind throughout the film was, obviously, the main motivator. In many ways, Jack Nicholson’s character lost control of his body as the hotel spirits gained control of his mind.
Obviously the theme of the destruction of the family is also portrayed in The Shining. The father turns on his wife and son, attempting to kill them for these mysterious hotel spirits. As the son becomes more and more distraught with the premonitions he is having, the wife tries to go to her husband for help. He turns on her, under the influence of the spirits, and the family is destroyed.
I already talked about the ending a little bit in my last post and there weren’t really gender role issues that I noticed. One topic I didn’t blog about but that is definitely prevalent in horror films is the “token black.” The Shining follows the predictable horror movie theme of having one black (or in some cases Asian) person who is always among the first, if not the only, to die.
I’m really glad I did my blog on this topic and, as much as I hate to admit it, watching The Shining was not only a really great way to tie everything together, it was kind of fun! Maybe I should take on a slasher film next... we’ll see!

My Experience - WARNING Spoiler Alert!!!!

So, since this blog is about cross-culture experiences, I decided to have an experience of my own with a horror film. I really wanted to see one of the classics, so after receiving advice from a few friends who are scary movie fanatics, I decided to watch The Shining. Made in 1980, this movie is based on the Stephen King novel of the same name. For anyone who doesn’t know, the movie is about a family who goes to spend the winter in an isolated hotel. The son has visions of past and future violence in the hotel and the father succumbs to violence under the influence of violent spirits haunting the area.
I can’t say that I enjoyed watching The Shining, but it was definitely a learning experience and I’m proud of myself. I know a lot of people who say that it’s not even scary, but I’ll admit to being pretty freaked out towards the end. One of the things I didn’t like about the movie is how it’s so easy to attribute the events to the people being “crazy.” Talking to people that aren’t there? That seems pretty crazy to me...
My one major disappointment with the film was the ending. The entire movie builds up to the father murdering his wife and son, but then... nothing. The two escape, unharmed for the most part, and the father freezes to death. It was all pretty anti-climactic. All in all, I’d say it was a pretty good movie and I’m definitely glad to have seen it. So the list of horror movies that I’ve seen has grown to three: The Sixth Sense, The Exorcist, and The Shining.

Horror After Terror - Horror Films in Guatemala

The enjoyment of a horror movie is contextual and means very different things to various viewers. In her book Reckoning: The Ends of War in Guatemala, Diane Nelson devotes a chapter to the meaning of horror films to Guatemalans. She explores many of the same themes as researchers such as Glenn Walters, but applies them to people who gain a very different sense of enjoyment then many Westerners.
One of the main themes she talks about is how Guatemalans have a unique sense of connection with many characters because of the fluid identities that they have, in many cases, been forced to adopt. The dichotomy of victim/perpetrator does not function very well in relation to the Guatemalan civil war. Many people were forced to kill in order to save their own lives or were driven to kill because of losses they had suffered. An example that Nelson offers is that of a girl who joins the guerilla movement because she is upset with losing her mother (Nelson, 2009: 109). She is both victim and perpetrator, both killer and one who has lost someone due to the killings. This same sort of fluidity is often found in horror movies when the victim turns and kills the monster or whoever is chasing him/her.
In the United States, many teenagers turn to horror films for mere entertainment or to help shape identity. In Guatemala, people turn to horror films because, in the words of one young man, “This is what happened in our country. We have to watch this so we don’t forget” (Nelson, 2009: 89). After the terrible events that occurred during Guatemala’s 36-year civil war, perhaps horror films even provide a sense of normalcy. Maybe it is too much to ask men and women who lived out their teenage years hiding in the mountains to sit back and watch a comedy.

Works Cited
Nelson, Diane M. Reckoning the Ends of War in Guatemala. Durham, N.C.: Duke UP, 2009. Print.

Justification in Horror Movies

One theme that has continuously come up during my research is that of justification and the monster/killer as an object of pity. While watching horror movies, look at who is killed first and who survives. There is a moral code that, to a certain extent, dictates which characters survive.
Glenn Walters is quick to point out that chaste girls are among the least likely characters to be killed during horror movies. Our own popular culture notices this to. The popular website “ Texts from Last Night” features this quote, “(219):I'm in a trailer park. But I'm not scared. The virgin always lives.” Though sex has become a much less taboo topic in recent years, our culture still encourages girls to remain virgins.
Wilson even draws attention to a theory known as the dispositional alignment theory, which hypothesizes that a person’s reactions to an event during a horror film can be traced back to the feelings they have for the person involved. If a viewer thinks the character deserves punishment, they will look at the violence in a much more positive light.
Robin Wood also notes this phenomenon saying, “Few horror films have totally unsympathetic Monsters” (Wood, 1985: 205). Saw, for example, features Jigsaw, a man who is choosing to kill people he thinks don’t appreciate life. It is revealed in the second film that Jigsaw is also dying from advanced brain cancer. The audience is able to sympathize when they realize that, despite the horrors he has committed, this man is going to die. His choice of victims also makes him more sympathetic. He is not killing “innocent” people. Instead, Jigsaw kills a man who cheats on his wife, a drug dealer, and a rapist just to name a few.
Though audiences are still afraid of killers such as Jigsaw, they understand his motivations. Identifying with the killer and feeling a sense of justification in the violence committed seems to correlate in some way with higher viewer satisfaction.

Works Cited
Walters, Glenn D. "Understanding the Popular Appeal of Horror Cinema: An Integrated-Interactive Model." Journal of Media Psychology 9.2 (2004).

Woods, Robin. "An Introduction to the American Horror Film." Movies & Methods (1985).

Gender Roles in Horror

Teenagers make up a large, if not the largest, percent of horror movie viewers (Walters, 2004:6), leading many researchers to ask what about this genre draws them in. One theory, proposed by Glenn Walters, is that since independence and identity play a large role in many horror films, teenagers who are dealing with these same issues are able to relate to the characters they encounter. Walters points out that the settings for many horror movies are in high schools, homes, and neighborhoods. High school is obviously a time during which a lot of self-discovery takes place and both the home and neighborhood are seen as conflict zones as teens struggle to gain more independence.
In 1986 a study was done in which college students watched a clip of a horror film with a member opposite-gender who was instructed to act distressed, comfortable, or indifferent. The study revealed that the men enjoyed their viewing experience more in the presence of a distressed female while the women enjoyed their experience more when accompanied by a man who seemed in control and didn’t display fear (Walters, 2004:10). Many movie critics have also noted the gender roles played by the characters in movies. Feminists often criticize the traditional “...man as subject and the female as object of his gaze” (Nelson, 2009: 111).
Media is, in many ways, how people develop their sense of identity. We read magazines and watch movies to figure out what clothes to wear, how to do make-up, and what the cool places to shop are. It’s easy to forget the potential influence that horror movies can have on those ideals, but scary movies are a huge source of entertainment for many teenagers. If the movies are telling us that men are supposed to chase after women, whether it’s to love or to kill, we are still learning that women are passive objects. Of course there are exceptions to every rule, and there are horror movies featuring female killers, but the norm is the male monster/killer lusting and chasing after the innocent female victim.

Works Cited
Walters, Glenn D. "Understanding the Popular Appeal of Horror Cinema: An Integrated-Interactive Model." Journal of Media Psychology 9.2 (2004).

Nelson, Diane M. Reckoning the Ends of War in Guatemala. Durham, N.C.: Duke UP, 2009. Print.

Friday, April 2, 2010

Endings

As many fans of horror films know, there are two typical endings in this genre: the traditional ending – when good beats evil and everything returns to normal – and the teaser – when the evil survives. I read a study about this subject conducted by psychologists Cynthia M. King and Nora Hourani. Their goal was to try and determine which of the endings audiences preferred and whether their preferences were determined by their incentive for watching the films.
Regarding incentive King and Hourani cite a 1995 study that specifies two main categories of horror movie viewers: thrill and gore-watchers. Thrill-watchers, according to this study, “...enjoy being scared by horror via their empathy for film protagonists” (King and Hourani 4). The two then hypothesize that thrill-watchers will prefer more traditional endings because of their empathy for the victims. Gore-watchers, on the other hang, exhibit less compassion for the victims and instead watch horror movies because they enjoy “...graphic portrayals of blood, death, and even physical torture” (King and Hourani 4). For this type of viewer, the psychologists hypothesize that a teaser ending will be preferable because it leaves open the option of a sequel and, thus, further destruction. At the conclusion of the experiment, King and Hourani’s first hypothesis was supported while the second wasn’t. They found that, as an overall rule, viewers prefer traditional endings.
This article really stuck with me. As a non-viewer of horror films, the limited knowledge of their plots that I have comes from my friends and their opinions. The majority of the films that I’ve heard about are either the classics, like The Shining, or the series, such as the Saw and Scream films. Based on my knowledge, I would have expected teaser endings to be much more successful and enjoyable because they leave room for future films. The article also really interested me because it provided summaries of various theories as to why people enjoy horror films, a question that I have always had. I really want to do further research on the subject for another blog.

Works Cited
King, Cynthia M., and Nora Hourani. "Don’t Tease Me: Effects of Ending Type on Horror Film Enjoyment." Media Psychology 9.3 (2007): 473-92.

An Interview

For this blog I decided to ask my friend, Kenna Graziano, her opinion on horror films. She is an avid movie watcher and loves scary movies. Here are a few questions that I asked her:
1)What is your favorite horror film and why?
“Scream... cause it satirizes the horror genre while still being a horror movie, so there’s still plenty of tension and suspense and gore... but there’s like... the kids kind of know that a murderer is out there and that they should follow the rules of a horror movie.... so it picks up patterns of other horror movies that are actually true.”
2)Why do you enjoy scary movies?
“... I started out watching scary movies as like a challenge to myself, [because] I used to be like terrified of them... so my friends and I were like ‘okay we’re gonna start watching.’ And we did. And it is less about being scared now because you’re so desensitized, and it’s more about the adrenaline rush... I dunno, it gets your heart beating and you get really into it.”
3)I’ve always wondered if people are actually just not afraid of what goes on in horror films or if they just enjoy being scared... can you comment on that? Do these movies actually scare you and you like that, or are you just desensitized to the material you’re viewing? Or something completely different?
“Well... there are some movies that like really scare me (i.e. Amityville Horror)... um... well you don’t get desensitized to the suspense but you get desensitized to the gore... so it’s still scary but it’s not unwatchable...”
4)Do you enjoy being terrified?
“Yeah, I guess... if you’re with other people its kind of like a group... I dunno.... you don’t feel like scared cause you know it’s a movie and like Freddy is not going to jump out of the next corner... part of it is like it could happen... but when you’re watching it your heart starts going and you get really amped up.”

This interview was actually extremely helpful for me. I have never really understood why people would ever want to watch scary movies, but after listening to my friend talk about her reasoning behind enjoying them they don’t sound as bad. Also, it’s one thing to do research and read about the adrenaline rush that many people experience at the end of horror movies, but to listen to a friend talk about their own experiences made it all seem a little bit more real. I sometimes find it easy to disregard things I’ve read if I have no personal experience with that subject, but listening to a friend who I trust talk about overcoming her own fears made it seem more legitimate. Listening to her talk about becoming more desensitized to the material was also really interesting and that’s something that I definitely want to try and do some research on for another post.

Works Cited
"Horror Films." MacKennan Graziano. Personal interview. 20 Mar. 2010

Horror and the Family

As I mentioned in my previous blog, horror films generally contain one of two themes: the body or the family. For this entry, I am going to focus on the family and the systematic destruction of it in many scary movies.
To begin this discussion, I am going to draw on a quotation from Robin Wood’s essay “An Introduction to the American Horror Film.” Though this work is older – it was published in 1985 – much of what was true then remains to this day. When the subject of the family emerged, Wood wrote “...the connection of the Family to Horror has become overwhelmingly consistent... whether the family itself is regarded as guilty...or innocent” (Wood 208). The family, in Wood’s view, then is either the creator of some awful monster or helpless victims.
Movies such as Night of the Living Dead focus on the theme of familial destruction. In this example, flesh-eating ghouls destroy a family. As each member is individually eaten and reanimated, the family slowly turns on each other with the daughter converting her mother, who, in turn, then converts her husband. Family, in our society, is the group of people with whom we are supposed to feel most comfortable. We turn to our families for safety and support. The modern horror film shows the crumbling of that support system during a time of immense fear when, one could argue, that it is most needed.
Philip Brophy also notes this trend in scary movies. Brophy does not comment on instances of the family being innocent victims, but rather on the group as “...the object of the horror and us being the subject of their demise” (Brophy 7). The audience, in Brophy’s stance, is afraid of the family, and thus takes pleasure in the destruction of it.
Whether seen as victim or perpetrator, the modern horror film has removed the sense of security that once came with the notion of family. The family is now something to be feared and destroyed rather than a sanctuary from the violence.
The destruction of the family seems to make more sense than the destruction of the self. Americans are becoming less and less concerned with family unity and more concerned with individual aspirations. The destruction of the family within horror movies seems to mirror, in many ways, the loss of family values that is occurring throughout our society.

Works Cited
Brophy, Philip. "Horrality – The Textuality of Contemporary Horror Films." Screen 27 (1986): 2-13.

Woods, Robin. "An Introduction to the American Horror Film." Movies & Methods (1985).

"Night of the Living Dead (1968) - Synopsis." The Internet Movie Database (IMDb). Web. 07 May 2010. .

Horror Films and the Body

Though there was the occasional horror film in Europe, the genre didn’t really catch on in the United States until the 1920s. From then on, Hollywood has continued to produce movies whose sole purpose is to terrify viewers with horrific plots, sickening twists, and gruesome violence. The themes and motifs found in these movies have shifted as new technology has become available and popularized, allowing for more realistic images. Several common themes have emerged from the progression of the genre: the destruction of the family and the destruction of the self. In this blog, I will focus on the later of the two.
Many horror films show a complete disregard for the human body. A key example of this is The Exorcist, one of the few horror films I can claim to have seen. In this movie, a young girl named Regan McNeil is possessed by the devil. Throughout the film, the viewer is subject to graphic images that feature complete disregard for the human body and its limitations. The well-known visual of the twelve-year-old twisting her head around in a complete 360-degree turn is just one such mind-boggling example.
Philip Brophy also notes this phenomenon in his essay “Horrality – the Textuality of Contemporary Horror Films”, using an example from 1982’s The Beast Within, when a creature literally breaks out of a young boy’s body, leaving his massacred body on the bed. Brophy states that “The contemporary Horror film tends to play not so much on the broad fear of Death, but more precisely on the fear of one’s own body, of how one controls and relates to it” (Brophy 8). These movies can take our small fears of possession, aliens, diseases, etc. and blow them up into full-scale nightmares.
In some ways that is the beauty of the horror film – it can take our worst fears and make them seem real. That’s also one of the reasons many people, myself included, so strongly dislike scary movies. We live in a society that is extremely focused on individuality and being strong. Americans are always focused with being the best, looking the best, having the best, while many modern horror movies are about the destruction of many of those values that we hold so dear. The ability of a movie to destroy something that is culturally so important is mind-boggling.

Works Cited
"The Exorcist (1973) - Synopsis." The Internet Movie Database (IMDb). Web. 07 May 2010. .

"Horror Film." Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Web. 06 May 2010. .

Brophy, Philip. "Horrality – The Textuality of Contemporary Horror Films." Screen 27 (1986): 2-13.

Sunday, March 28, 2010

Introduction

To start out, I would like to give a brief introduction to who I am and why I have created this blog. My name is Maisie Clark and I am a freshman at Wheaton College. For my Introduction to Cultural Anthropology class, we have to create a blog on a cultural phenomenon that we do not understand. I have chosen to blog about horror films because they are such a standard piece of American society and media. Personally, I have never enjoyed watching scary movies or experiencing any of the range of emotions that accompany being scared out of my mind. The majority of my friends, however, feel differently. Most of my friends could spend hours talking about their favorite horror film. Their conversations span from best plot, to best ending, to best twist. The very thought of some of the events they describe leave me cowering and wondering what kind of sane person would enjoy watching such torment. One thing that I really want to focus on is the “rush” that many people talk about experiencing during the conclusion of or directly after a film ends. I am also curious as to whether that “rush” is worth the two or more hours of fear that comes before it. Throughout this blog, I plan on using both research and personal interviews to gain a better understanding and appreciation of horror films.