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Posted on August 18, 2015

Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986) Review

Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer | 98 min | 1986 | John McNaughton | X[i]

Synopsis: Henry is an unrepentant serial killer who forms a murderous bond with another man.

Review: Michael Rooker’s chilling tour de force performance is perhaps the greatest serial killer characterization ever committed to film.

Grade: A

Viewing Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer is not for the faint of heart. Stark and unyielding, the film is a deeply unsettling look into the mind of an unrepentant murderer. The film centers on pathological murderer Henry, who discovers a kindred spirit in his roommate, Otis. The two engage in vicious murders as Henry schools Otis on the finer points of evading capture. Their relationship is tested when Otis’ sister Becky comes to visit and becomes enamored of Henry. Based on the life of Henry Lee Lucas, the film is both a psychological exploration as well as an explicit foray into gore.

Posted on August 12, 2015

Menstruation in Popular Culture: Part 1

Elizabeth Erwin

The spectre of menstruation in horror films has long been problematic. From the shameful and mocked first period of the titular character in Carrie (1976) to its role as the trigger that leads Ginger to sexually assault a boy in Ginger Snaps (2000), menstruation in horror is often used as a visual identifier of the threat women and their sexuality pose to society. With that in mind, I have been interested in looking at how this threat plays out on television and whether the perceived horror is any different from that found within horror films.

Posted on August 1, 2015

Horror Rewatch: The Blair Witch Project (1999)

Elizabeth Erwin

Love it or hate it, there is no denying the impact The Blair Witch Project had upon the horror genre with its 1999 release. Not only did the marketing campaign utilized by its distributor take a page from the Hitchcock playbook in building up audience expectation, but it also reframed the horror trope of “recovered footage” as a means of accessing the horror. As the story of a group of filmmakers who embark on an ill-fated journey into the woods in an attempt to discover proof of a witch, this film is most remembered for its shaky hand-held visuals and reliance upon its audience to create a sense of horror using their own imaginations.
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Posted on July 27, 2015

Horror Rewatch: Ringu (1998) and The Ring (2002)

Elizabeth Erwin

Unlike many horror fans, I was not too impressed with The Ring (2002). As the story of a possessed video that once watched curses the viewer to death by a demonic spirit, the film is more interested in conveying a sense of dread than it is in creating bloody spectacles. And while I’m not necessarily against that approach in horror, I just never found the essential horror being explored all that compelling. And so it was with very little expectation that I went into a viewing of Ringu (1998), the Japanese film that The Ring remade. What I discovered is that watching these two films as companion pieces instead of as individual films yields a much more interesting commentary on the connection between community and monstrosity.

Posted on July 22, 2015

Cat People (1942): Coding Lesbianism Via Otherness

Elizabeth Erwin

For every lesbian horror victim, such as Brandy in Hallow’s End (2003), there exists a murderous lesbian, such as May Canady in May (2002), to remind us of the perversion traditionally associated with lesbian desire. Previously we looked at how Dracula’s Daughter coded its lesbian narrative in order to escape censor from the Legion of Decency. This week we will take a look at how Cat People (1942) established markers of “otherness” in order to code its queerness.

Just as in Dracula’s Daughter, the main character of Cat People, Irena Dubrovna, struggles against a part of her true identity she fears will render her an outcast. Irena, a Serbian immigrant, believes she is descended from a cursed tribe in which any woman who has her passions aroused will shape-shift into a killing panther. Irena’s life is complicated when she impulsively marries Oliver, a New York architect. Unable to be intimate with him for fear of the curse, Irena is sent to a psychiatrist in search of a cure. The audience is left guessing whether Irena’s paranoia is the result of sexual repression or whether her fears may be well founded.