OUR STRANGE LOVE OF HORROR

OUR STRANGE LOVE OF HORROR
The surface of horror films continues to evolve and reflects our own image ever more clearly.

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It’s not surprising that the narrative foundations of recent horror films have begun to use a quite different type of fear-inspiring cement. The “monsters” of horror films – be they blood-sucking undeads, extra-terrestrial mind hijackers, or intangible psychological wraiths like drug-addiction, disease, or insanity – have fluctuated significantly over the years.

The first full-length horror picture was Alice Guy’s Esmerelda (1906), an adaptation of Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame, in which the monster is not Quasimodo himself, but the atrocities that occur when the populace of Paris fails to recognize his truth, selflessness, and heroics for his abhorrent exterior. The “horror” of Esmerelda was an intangible demon: misunderstanding.

Horror movies really launched in the early 1900’s as a symptom of German expressionism. The maiden voyage of horror was crewed by films like Wegener’s The Golem (1915), Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), and Murnau’s Nosferatu (1922). In all of these seminal films, there are monsters of sorts – the murderous Golem, the manipulative doctor, and the vampire, respectively – but the horror of these works comes not from the monsters themselves, but what they embody. The golem goes on a murderous rampage after its master’s wife refuses its love. Caligari absconds with the protagonist’s girlfriend, which leads to death and an ultimate twist-revelation of delusion. The well-known Dracula/Orlock character is drawn to the city by his love for Mina, which ends in both their deaths. In all three cases, the true monster is the heartbreak of unfulfilled desire.

It was American cinema and Universal Pictures which, for the most part, catalyzed the “creature feature” in the 1930’s and -40’s. A slew of films featuring vampires, werewolves, Frankenstein monsters, and RKO’s zombies and body snatchers. These films became known as Gothic pictures, and though entertaining and well remembered, they were quite straightforward.

The monsters of horror pictures continued to evolve when in the 50’s and 60’s the paranoia of the Cold War and the fear of Armageddon and global annihilation conjured films like Siegel’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), Hitchcock’s The Birds (1963), and Romero’s Night of the Living Dead (1968). More importantly, however, it was during this time that theorists began to examine the root of horror in horror films more precisely and more accurately. Scholar Charles Derry christened three sub-genres of horror: that of Armageddon, demonic, and the crux of this article, the horror of psychology.

The demise of the Production Code in 1964, the box office buffo of scare films, and a too-long-in-coming respect for the genre as an art resulted in American cinema’s churning out copious horror flicks, many helmed by respected auteurs. Notable films include Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby, Friedken’s The Exorcists, Stephen King adaptations including Kubrick’s The Shining, and the gore works of horror deities like Carpenter, Hooper, Craven and Cronenberg.

Gore remained popular up until recently with the incredible success of franchises like Saw and Hostel, but today, horror is growing more psychological again.

The highly anticipated scare flicks scheduled to bow this fall all seem to harness a single, potent fear that all people share; one which, as in the horrors of early last century, tears at our psyche and sends us trembling in it’s wake. What is this great terror? Isolation.


But who cares? Why does it matter? Why bother with examining the evolution of horror films?

To discover the answer, one must first consider why horror is an integral and indispensable part of cinematic art, and moreover, why audiences are drawn to it so.

“Returning to Aristotle for a moment, one must appreciate how his theory of catharsis really does address the paradox of [horror’s] pleasure. What would otherwise be excruciating if real is experienced vicariously in [cinematic] representations. Through the catharsis of the emotions of pity and fear, otherwise unpleasant affective states are valuable as outlets for excess emotions, which build up due to the pressures of daily life. Getting them out relieves one of an excess of such emotions, like opening a steam valve on a pressure cooker.”

Thus writes Daniel Shaw in his paper, The Humean Definition of Horror. In layman’s terms: Horror films are necessary and oddly pleasurable to most because they allow us to experience and exorcise our darkest emotions and impulses from the very safe distance of a multiplex. Mix this notion with Freud’s concept of catharsis between the conscious mind and the subconscious, and one concocts a psychological elixir of sorts – a panacea that offers to save us from ourselves by revealing our true nature.

Psychoanalytic critic Robin Wood helps to explain this.

“[Horror] represents 'the return of the repressed', embodiments of forces sealed up in the unconscious mind which arise only to be further repressed by the destruction of their embodiments... The Freudian stress on ambivalence embraces both horns of the paradox: our conscious mind is disgusted by the monster while our id would love to rampage, rape, pillage and destroy with the kind of power monsters wield.”


If horror serves the dual purpose of exposing the fears and compulsions that we as society repress, as well as exorcising them, then by scrutinizing the source of one’s terror in horror films, one can both enjoy the revelation of what truly frightens them, and perhaps the knowledge to combat it. This is why we should care about the evolution of “monsters.”

Let’s return to the horror films of the German expressionist period. As mentioned before, the “monsters” of these films were not really the wrongdoers themselves, but the cataclysmic results of unfulfilled desire, of disenchantment.

Now consider the social landscape of Germany during the same period. It is post World War I, and the country is suffocating beneath demands for reparation from the rest of the globe, successfully disintegrating its economy. The German “Front Generation” – those that served on the front lines of the War and constituted a quarter of the country’s electorate and community leadership – wanted merely to return home after the hostility to a normal life. Sadly, this generation felt stabbed in the back by a government that failed to take care of their families in their absence, and hurled them into destitution upon their return. German society suffered the most appalling apnea of contentment as an overwhelming pall of disappointment knocked the wind out of their communal lungs.

Thus, the advent of expressionist horror films, which, if recognized as a reflection of and catharsis for the German disposition, may have made less effortless the Nazi take-over of the country shortly thereafter.

The glaring connection between societal temperament and the horror genre continued through the century. The Cold War brought us horrors of global destruction, paranoia, and the enemy-next-door. The Vietnam and Iraq Wars – two examples of rare occasions when real-life images of ferocious violence inundate American homes – conjured the slasher and gore flicks (from Freddy and Jason in the 70’s to Hostel and Saw in yesteryear), clearly indicating a disgust with war and gruesome conflict.

But today, as illustrated by the most highly anticipated scare flicks of the fall, the horror genre returns to its roots, and reconnects with the most terrifying monsters of all: loneliness, isolation, and abandonment.

Italian horror luminary Dario Argento’s much-anticipated The Mother of Tears centers on a young American art student who "unwittingly opens an ancient urn that unleashes the demonic power of the world's most powerful witch. A scourge of suicides plague the Rome and the student alone must stop the ‘Mother of Tears’ before her evil conquers the world.” The fate of the world seems to rest on this forlorn student’s failure or success, and by empathy, such isolation will terrify the audience.

Zev Berman’s Borderland (September 28) follows three Texas University seniors, on a road-trip to a Mexican Border town for a weekend of debauchery. Their vacation becomes a living nightmare as the trio runs afoul of an ancient blood cult looking for human sacrifice. This plot, at first glance, might seem to be at odds with the theory posited here; however, glance again. It is dissimilar in that three people are cut-off from the world, from safety. But the root of the horror is the same: to what lengths would you go if the only people keeping you from being abandoned and alone were in the grips of death? The dread of this film derives from one’s recognition that the panic at the mere thought of absolute seclusion might drive one to grotesque, ghastly behavior.

Finally, In David Cunningham’s long awaited The Dark is Rising (October 5), starring Deadwood’s Ian McShane, Will Stanton, a boy whose life is turned upside down when he learns that he is the last of a group of immortal warriors who have dedicated their lives to fighting the forces of the dark. As he uncovers mysterious clues, Stanton discovers that with the dark once again rising, the future of the world rests in his hands.

So what does this re-genesis of lonesome horror reflect about us? The war in the middle east has become commonplace in our daily lives, and we would likely be more shocked if we split open the paper and didn’t read anything about the casualties or terrorism. Actually, nowadays, it’s shocking to see anyone crack open a paper to inhale their news at all, rather than sucking it out of the liquid crystal display of their computer monitor or Blackberry.

We are becoming increasingly terrified by loneliness, isolation, and abandonment because that’s the direction in which our true condition heads. Sure, technology allows us to reach out and touch someone in Sri Lanka if we can afford the long-distance bill, but today, most of us are more likely to know a chat-pal half way across the globe, and less likely to know our the neighbor halfway across the street.

We are increasingly connected, but somehow also increasingly lonely, and technology seems to be the impetus for this ever-mounting subconscious fear. Indeed, it’s no coincidence that the genre has recently embraced a new breed of horror film: the techno-horror.

The recent stream of Hollywood techno-horrors (mostly remakes of Asian films, which consistently seem to be a step ahead of us on the path of evolving anxiety) proves this, and Tom Cruise is even reportedly set to produce a remake flick about a corneal transplant gone awry, The Eye. These Asian films, like their American progeny, all terrorize us with the perils of ubiquitous modern technology—cell phones, computers, and handheld devices.
These are the new anxieties of our subconscious, and the “animation” – the humanization of these lifeless devices, albeit with malevolence, peril, and horror – is somehow cathartic, allowing us first (if we look close enough at the genre) to vicariously face our fear, and second (if we are brave enough) to combat them.

This is why we are attracted to something that is inherently repulsive.

This is why we love horror.