Essay on Genre in Film Horror films are defined as “Unsettling films designed to frighten and panic, cause dread and alarm, and to invoke our hidden worst fears, often in a terrifying, shocking finale, while captivating and entertaining us at the same time in a cathartic experience ”. http://www.filmsite.org/horrorfilms.html Horror films tend to use the theory of ‘Uses of Gratification’, which suggests that, instead of the media forms injecting ideas into our minds, we as as an audience decide what we do with what we consume, and what we do with that ‘information’ afterwards. Other theories such as the ‘Hypodermic Needle theory ’ can also be used within horror films, with the idea that it is injecting
ideas into our minds. Over the years, horror films have adapted to involve certain codes and conventions which make them horror movies. Depending on the sub-genre of the horror film, the codes and conventions are usually the same within that sub-genre. For example in a slasher movie, it usually involves someone getting killed in the opening sequence, a group of teenagers, weapons, blood, power cuts and phone lines cut, the group splitting up, and usually one or two survivors. Other typical codes and conventions include the way the camera is shot, for example if the camera is following a character around a house on their own, and it ’s an over the shoulder shot and they are moving around a lot and they open a fridge for example, then when they close the fridge the audience knows that the killer will be standing behind the fridge door as it closes and then that c haracter will die. This research shows that this genre attracts a quite mixed audience in terms of gender. It shows us that 42% of the audience are men, and 58% are women. The vast majority of this target demographic are under the age of 25. Horror films tend to aim at the younger audiences more, as they enjoy the thrill that you get out of watching scary movies. This is also a reason why a lot of the characters in horror movies are usually under the age of 30 so that it will appeal to this target audience more.
Horror films started becoming popular as early as the 1930 ’s, with Dracula and Frankenstein which were developed out of folklore and myths. The vampire myth began to surface during the time that writer Bram Stoker ’s 1897 novel Dracula was written. In the 1960’s, the classic Psycho became “the “mother” of all modern horror suspense films” , and with the famous shower scene storyboarded by Saul Bass but directed by Hitchcock. Hitchcock broke all film conventions in Psycho, by displaying the leading female protagonist having a lunchtime affair in revealing undergarments in the first scene, also by showing the toilet flush on screen (which was a first in American film), and killing off its major star Janet Leigh. http://www.filmsite.org/psyc.html
In the 1950’s and 1960’s monster movies such as Creature from the Black Lagoon, Tarantula, and were all monster movies that became popular at this time, and they The Thing from another world were were created to try and take away some of the nation’s fear during the Cold War and allowing them to escape the reality of the real world. Movies such as Godzilla were also produced during this time. In the 1980’s, slasher movies were introduced, for example Silence of the Lambs was the th
introduction to this sub-genre. Films such as Nightmare on Elm Street and and Friday the 13 made slasher movies popular in the 80 ’s. This was also the start of the use of special effects, for example where a child ’s toy (Chucky) turns into a serial killer, prompting a fear of dolls for the Child s Play where ’ ’
audience. This technique has also been brought into the present day, for films such as Annabelle and The Boy .
In the 1990’s psychological thrillers were introduced. Silence of the Lambs and Se7en are rated as the top two for psychological thrillers . The Blair Witch Project became became a sensation, which even today has been remade and is popular within the same audience - people who watched it back then and enjoyed it would also, most likely, watch the remakes. Also, the start of the famous horror franchise, ‘Scream’, which changed horror movie stereotyping and also became the influence of a few crimes.
In 2000’s a mix between slashers and fantasy horrors were popular within this decade. American Psycho and Scream 3 were popular slasher movies and Scream was described as a "very good source
to learn how to kill someone." Scream was also the prime motivational factor of the death of A lisson Cambier in 2001, who was stabbed 30 times and the killer had told the police that it was premeditated and motivated by the cinematic f ranchise, Scream. http://www.oddee.com/item_99479.aspx Since 2010, religious connotations with implications of an evil entity has become very popular in horror films, with movies such as The Last Exorcism, The Conjuring and Sinister . All of these subgenres have made their way into the present day and are still very popular within the horror/ thrill seeker audience. However, now a lot of producers tend to aim to make a successful horror film, and they tend to use the same or similar codes and conventions, which usully end up with similar
plotlines. These are called ‘Twin-films’. An example of ‘twin-films’ are films such as The Cave (2005) and The Descent (2005). These two films follow extremely similar plot lines in order to c reate a sense of horror. In the early stages of horror films, women were usually represented as ‘the damsel in distress ’ as they were seen as more vulnerable and were often seen as the ‘blonde-bimbo’, and usually attacked by the killer f irst (as well as the black person), because they were seen as t he weak ones, whereas the male, hero protagonist usually contrast to this, and are portrayed as the strong and heroic characters that always win and survive over the antagonist. The idea of having the female character play the lesser role has been a typical stereotype for generations, and can even be recognised on front covers of earlier horror movies such as Creature from the Black Lagoon (1950), where the cover involves the monster
carrying the hopeless female character, as well as on Frankenstein (1930), where the female is laying on the
bed on the front cover. However, these representations came from when women had fewer rights and men were superior and dominated. But due to the rise in feminism and cultural changes, the roles and representations changed. In the 90 ’s is when we really started to see the rise of women being portrayed as more superior and strong, for example, Scream (1996) changed this up a bit with instead, having the main protagonist - hero and survivor be played by a female character, Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell). In terms of the male representation, we were used to seeing the male character strong and superior to the women and playing the heroic role in the movies, and again this is because of the lack of rights women had before this changed. This has changed in the modern films, as well as the racial stereotypes of ‘the black person always dying first’. For example in The Purge where the white, male protagonist is seen as the strong father who is protecting his family, but then is one of the fir st family members to die, whereas the black male tramp is the one who rescues the family when they are on brink of dying. In the early day of film, we have always seen male characters as being the villains and the ones we should be afraid of, for example in Dracula. However, some films attempt to steer away from the idea of the females always being the victims, for example in the film Jennifer s ’ ’
Body we we see all the male ’s that she comes in contact with becomes her victim.
The film Final Girl (2015) (2015) shows a clear representation of how horror movies have developed in the sense of stereotyping, etc. and in this film it lives up to the title of the film. It is about four guys who seduce and take women into the forest to then make them run so they can hunt them down, but the main protagonist in the movie, Veronica (played by Abigail Breslin), fights off the guys and survives. Zillmann & Weaver (1996) conducted research to find out if the audience preferred the women in the films to be fearful towards the antagonist and the males being the heroic character. As time changed, this has not been the case as much anymore, and a lot of the time now, we see women being the protagonist and outsmarting the males or antagonist, or even women being the ones to be afraid of.
Racial stereotypes as well, such as ‘the black person always dying first ’ has also changed since early horror films. In Scream 2, Phil Stevens dies in the opening scene of the movie in the toilets of a cinema, and in I Still known what you did Last Summer , Karla Wilson (Brandy) dies nearing the end of
the movie as she is running from the killer. In Scary Movie 2, which is almost like a parody/ spoof of different horror movies, the director has noticed this as there is a scene where three black people say that they always split up and then the black people die first. This stereotype has almost become a ‘token minority’ and audiences have become more aware of the fact that, if there ’s a black character in a slasher movie, he or she is usually destined to be the first victim to the killer. However, this stereotype and representation has changed over the years, and especially in 2017, the newest thriller Get Out involves a black guy who has a white girlfriend, and she brings him home o her parents which is all part of the plan, and they hypnotise and kill black people, but the main protagonist, Chris Washington (Daniel Kaluuya) gets out of the hypnotism and kills the whole white family and survives. A lot of films nowadays want to ty and stray away from all the representations and instead have the men and women working together in order to overcome the issues. An example of this is the Saw films, where we see a variety of people being victimised by the antagonist ‘Jigsaw’, and they have to work together as a team in order to escape. A typical character we tend to see a lot nowadays in horror movies, are young college students. They are very distinct stereotypes and they ar e characters that were brought in to represent today ’s youth. They usually consist of a dumb blonde, the jock, the couple, the intelligent one and the unintelligent one. By having all of these characters it would appeal more to the younger audience and allow the viewer to feel like they can relate to it more, as some young people will feel like they can relate to some of these personalities/ characters. An example of this is the movie Detention (2011), where characters similar to the
typical college student characters are used, and they have to figure out who the killer is between them.
There are a few theories related to the horror film industry. The Uses of Gratification theory encourages the audience to be active. When watching a horror, we sometimes get a good feeling after feeling like we have experienced an unexplained event. It allows the audience to seek out answers if the film is then still left unexplained. With the Uses of Gratification theory, the audiences aren’t just taking in the information they are seeking from the unexplained, they are taking parts of the film into their t heir day-to-day lives. This theory suggests that as a n audience, we seek out certain
media In order to fulfil our needs. For example, if we wanted to find a specific Drama genre film, that involves all codes and conventions of a drama, we would go out of our way to f ind one. This theory highlights that we all have our own reasons for seeking out specific medias. In terms of horror, we tend to seek it out as a way to escape from our own reality. The Hypodermic Needle Theory suggests we are directly influenced by what we consume. This theory can also be applied to horror films nowadays. The theory states that media injects ideas into our minds. Several horror movies have been blamed to influence and manipulate u and bring it into our real lives. For example, Wes Craven’s Scream became instantly popular and a classic back when it was released in 1996. As it provided us an ironic take on the Slasher ’s genres’ many clichés, and resulted in a highly original horror film. Despite its comedic elements however, the film also inspired several real life murders. Back in January 1998, 16 year old Mario Padilla and his 14 year old cousin became the centre of a media frenzy surrounding what was referred to as ‘The Scream’ murder. His cousin Ramirez confessed to helping hold down Padilla’s mother as Padilla himself preceded to stab her 45 times. They confessed to being inspired by Scream and its sequel, and planning a murder spree after purchasing two ghost face costumes and a voice changer like those used in the film. http://articles.latimes.com/1999/jul/02/local/me-52343 Horror films tend to follow a Three Act structure. This is a narrative structure where the first stage is the setup, where the protagonist is being introduced as well as the dramatic situation. The second part is confrontation, where the main drama occurs, the climax, and obstacles are thon at the protagonist. And finally, the resolution when the issue has been solved, but the audience is left wondering wat the aftermath of it all will be. Quite a few horror films are left with an open ending, such as Halloween and Scream, as this keeps the audience active and not just take in t he information. The intention of it all is for the audience to be left feeling puzzled and wondering of what could or could have happened.
Links Used:
Definition of Horror Films - http://www.filmsite.org/horrorfilms.html Over the Years - http://thehorror2010.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/how-horror-films-havechanged-and.html
Psycho - http://www.filmsite.org/psyc.html
Shower Scene - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atjhOhH-V3E
Blog on Stereotypes - http://rkmediab.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/representation-of-men-andwomen-in.html BBFC - http://www.bbfc.co.uk/education-resources/student-guide/issuesintroduction/horror Black Stereotyping - http://uk.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/10/black-characters-horrormovies/ Crime influenced by Scream - http://www.oddee.com/item_99479.aspx Zillmann & Weaver (1996) http://www.uky.edu/~dlowe2/documents/7.HoffnerLevine2005EnjoymentofMediatedFright and.pdf Zillmann & Weaver (1996) - http://mediaviolence.org/media-video-violence-addictionresearch/research-archives/zillmann-d-weaver-j-2007-august-aggressive-personality-traitsin-the-effects-of-violent-imagery-on-unprovoked-impulsive-aggression-journal-of-researchin-personality-414-753-771-retri/ The Scream Murders - http://articles.latimes.com/1999/jul/02/local/me-52343
