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Posted on March 16, 2015

AHS Freak Show & Its Depiction of Societal Normality

Gwen

Season 4 of FX’s American Horror Story premiered October 8, 2014, with Freak Show. Set in 1950s Jupiter, Florida this season rethinks the truths behind post-war “normality” that still permeate society today. Frequently people reflect upon the 1950s with nostalgia or through the lens of the television set, with shows like Father Knows Best (1954-1963) and The Donna Reed Show (1958-1963). What they tend to see is the grey flannel suits, the Levittowns, and pearl-clad housewives who find fulfillment through vacuuming and raising children. Freak Show takes the images and prescriptive behaviors from the 1950s and recasts normality in the spirit of Grace Metalious’ Peyton Place (1956).

Posted on March 13, 2015

The Last Winter: The Revenge of….Fossil Fuel?

Dawn Keetley

The Last Winter, a 2006 film by Larry Fessenden, offers a provocative spin on the “revenge of nature” sub-genre of horror. The monster is . . .oil? Well, maybe. Set on a base in the “untapped” Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in northern Alaska, a group of environmentalists and oil company workers are mapping the region for locations for drill sites and access roads. Strange things start happening, though, and it’s precisely in the very strangeness of its events that The Last Winter gains much of its compelling force.

Posted on March 12, 2015

Seeing and Slaughtering in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

Dawn Keetley

Horror films have long been recognized for their ability to reflect troubling social and political concerns: it’s one of the many things that makes horror films valuable, makes them more than just a reveling in shock and gore. The most powerful horror films, moreover, continue to engage with social issues well after their particular moment of production. Tobe Hooper’s 1974 film, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, does exactly this. While the film is certainly on one level about the cataclysmic events of the late 1960s and early 1970s, it is also about the politics of meat-eating and industrial slaughter, both of which remain compelling issues in 2015.