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