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Posted on October 6, 2020

Deconstructive Nostalgia in Clown in a Cornfield

Guest Post

Adam Cesare’s first YA horror novel Clown in a Cornfield delivers exactly what it promises from the title. High school senior Quinn Maybrook, a city girl from Philadelphia, moves with her father to the rural town of Kettle Springs, Missouri, after a family tragedy. They’re looking to move on from this trauma, and so it’s ironic that they settle in Kettle Springs, a town rooted in the past. Quinn quickly assimilates into the surprisingly vibrant youth culture in the town, but she soon learns that not everyone is so fond of the town’s teens. The majority of the novel takes place over the course of one night, as a group of killer clowns attack Quinn and her new friends.

So, why killer clowns? As Brandon Cornett’s article on creepy clowns claims, clowns are terrifying because of their inherent unknowability. Their true emotions are hidden through the use of a painted-on facial expression that’s often overly exaggerated. Clowns fit well within the realm of the uncanny valley: they look one way, but, in the case of horror films, commit acts of violence that don’t always add up with their outward appearance – cheerful and animated. Read more

Posted on September 30, 2020

October: 31 days, 31 horror movies from all over the world

Guest Post

What I like about horror is the versatility of the genre: it can be appropriated and reworked in a million different ways. Every country and every culture has unique approaches and unique stories to tell through horror, and we’re missing out if we’re not opening ourselves up to them.

But opening ourselves up means authentically to predispose ourselves to accept and appreciate foreign horror movies in their particularity. Especially when it comes to countries in what’s usually called “the Third World”–countries with radically different cultures, histories, and perceptions of what qualifies as horror. And, also, countries in which filmmakers more often than not work with limited budgets and have only recently started producing horror movies.

The last decade has helped these local industries take off: video-on-demand services have made these movies easier to access internationally, and new producers (like Netflix and Shudder) have begun investing in foreign projects. As viewers, the best we can do is watch these movies–show our support so they can keep growing and enriching the film industry, horror included.

For all these reasons, for anyone’s potential October watch-a-ton (either this year or the ones to come), I’d like to suggest a theme: horror movies from all over the world. And, if you’re interested in knowing major content warnings for these movies, you can check this Letterboxd list. Read more

Posted on September 17, 2020

Is The Invisible Man What It Seems?

Guest Post

Based on the 1897 H. G. Wells novel, The Invisible Man (2020), written and directed by Leigh Whannell, involves a woman who believes she is being stalked by her now invisible wealthy ex-boyfriend following his suicide. However, things may not be as they seem in this modern tale of trauma and psychological terror.

On the surface the film’s synopsis sees Cecilia Kass (Elisabeth Moss) leave violent boyfriend Adrian Griffin (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) and subsequently suffer the traumatic after-effects of a violently abusive relationship. She goes to stay with childhood friend Detective James Lanier (Aldi Hodge) and his daughter Sydney (Storm Reid) to make a fresh start. But it does not end there: even after Adrian’s supposed suicide, Cecilia believes she is being hunted by an invisible Adrian, and she struggles to convince her friends and family of her unseen torment. After suffering further at the hands of the invisible man, Cecilia is eventually admitted to a mental hospital following her sister Emily’s (Harriet Dyer) murder in a restaurant; Cecilia claims she is being framed for the murder by the invisible man. She manages to escape the hospital after confronting her unseen attacker, but he takes the fight to her friend James’s house. After Cecilia shoots the invisible man, he is unveiled as Adrian’s lawyer brother, Tom (Michael Dorman), and Adrian is discovered imprisoned in his home. Not convinced it was Tom taunting her, Cecilia arrives to have dinner and ends up adopting the invisible suit herself and murdering Adrian, making it appear to be suicide. Cecilia is free at last.

Posted on September 10, 2020

Us & the Horror of the Class System

Guest Post

Privilege and classism are vivid themes of Jordan Peele’s second feature, Us (2019), both working as accompaniment to the core subject of social separation: topographically, physically and ultimately, by a drastic act of metaphoric self-restriction, mentally. By re-imagining an eerie scenario nearly as old as horror cinema itself (dating back to the earliest expressionist films like 1913’s The Student of Prague), Peele exposes the concept of social advancement as a fairy tale, established to silence the conscience of the advantaged and to denounce the frustration of the disadvantaged.

Although exploitative structures are less obvious than in Peele’s astute debut Get Out (2017), the Tethered’s puppet-like subjection to their upper-world doubles indicates the underprivileged’s subordination to the actions of the prosperous. In this world of Us – or ours, as Red’s declaration “We are Americans“ emphasizes – decline comes as easy as stepping on an escalator. However, the only way up from mind-numbing deprivation is hostile acquisition. Red turns out to be the little girl who entered the hall of mirrors in the prologue and now reclaims her place from an imposter.

Posted on September 3, 2020

The Evolution of Mental Illness’ Monstrosity in Horror Films

Guest Post

Horror cinema’s engagement with mental illness has evolved tremendously from the 20th to the 21st century. These periods of growth are in conjunction with the growing understanding and awareness of mental illnesses within the professional field of psychology, as well as the general population. The increased knowledge reinforces the concept that people with mental illness are not innately monstrous – something taken up in contemporary horror films.

In his essay in Monster Theory, Jeffrey Cohen explains that the purpose of a monster’s existence is to represent a fear rooted in the attitude and culture at the time of its creation or revival.[i] Fear of disease was captured with zombies; fear of immigration was represented by extra-terrestrials; fear of nuclear weapons created Godzilla; the list goes on.[ii] I propose that the fear of the unknown, the “other” or an alter ego to society’s normal state of being, is explored through mental illness – a disrupted state of being.

Unknowability creates a fascination that can be described through the idea of privacy. Psychoanalyst Josh Cohen, the author of The Private Life: Our Everyday Self in an Age of Intrusion, says that the “guiding principle of our culture might be formulated not so much as ‘I should know everything’ as ‘nothing should remain unknown to me.’ It’s not, in other words, a question of wanting to know so much as a fear of what might remain unknown, inaccessible, in the dark.”[iii] Mental illnesses, however, are not an easy concept for general audiences to wrap their brains around. Nevertheless, cinema provides an opportunity to explore mental illnesses visually – making the unknown known. “Nothing should remain unknown to me”; therefore, if it won’t reveal itself, the cinema will make it so.[iv] Mental illness has always produced fear, but how has cinema in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries represented this fear to capture the cultural temperament? How has this fear changed from one century to another? Read more