Presentation of Evil Cynthia Freeland is a seminal film critic and philosopher within the context of modernity whose main work concentrates on feminism as it pertains to the horror film genre. She has authored several books and articles that critique the ways in which the female character becomes portrayed in the horror movies. Some of her most famous works include “Feminist Frameworks for Horror Films,” “Philosophy and Film,” and a landmark work entitled “The Naked and The Undead.” Freeland, a cognitivist film theorist, seeks to discursively frame the horror genre of film in a way that audiences take seriously for its form and content. Her unconventional approach to a horror film is vividly outlined and discerned in “The Naked and the …show more content…
Undead,” as she explains to the audience how the figure of the monster undergirds the horror. It diverges from other works on fear as a result of its cognitivism as well as its orientation towards feminism and film criticism; filtering film criticism via abnormal psychology, according to Freeland, is reductive and help petite in fully comprehending horror movies. “The Naked and the Undead” discusses various types of evils present in contemporary films, as the author eschews the precise analysis of the films that only focus on the nature of the monsters. Rather, she analyzes the issue of feminism in horror movies and expounds on people’s fascination with and love for the grotesque and horror and made her conclusion. Ultimately, Freeland posits that certain manifestations of graphic violence are so dexterously theatrical that they convey a so-called perverse sublime. The extreme nature of these horrific variations creates enough intangible distance between the audiences and the horror they discern for them to enjoy the ghoulish bloodbaths and murders they become witnesses to with regards to the films. It is unequivocal that the preponderance of films in the horror genre are scary and haunting in the sense that they limn bloodbaths, murders, and other terrifying events.
In “The Naked and Undead,” Freeland declares the audience cannot stop watching the horrific film, regardless of how horrible a movie because the preponderance of horror films force spectators to reflect on the nature of evil. They also allure and create emotions, and define the purpose of a movie (Vincent 5). Freeland notes that horror films are both scary and addictive because they make viewers reflect on the evils and the monster in an actual movie scene. However, these are reasons why no matter how scary a horror film is, the audience does not stop watching horrific movies but instead is captivated by it. Freeland draws attention to the ways in which audiences of horror films are drawn into the pleasures and spectacle presented vis-à-vis cinematic texts; indeed, audiences are captivated by both the humor shown in them as well as the horrifying elements. However, Freeland additionally seeks to postulate that the public’s cognitive and emotional response to horror films “prompts [the audience] to ponder themes about the nature of good and evil” (Freeland …show more content…
257). Moreover, Freeland uses the genre to explain why people love horrific films, thereby proving those who complain that horror movies are scary and disturbing wrong. Freeland further contends that horror films are a genre of the cinematic medium that is quite similar to the views of Noel Carroll on the horror film. Carroll states that the reason the audience cannot stop watching horror movies no matter how scary a movie is because members enjoy getting scared and are both repulsed to and shocked by the horrific scenes they are witnessing. However, the approach deployed by Freeland is feminist in nature because of her beliefs and thus adds nuance to film criticism and the horror genre. Freeland believes that it is essential to have a trenchant comprehension of the horror film because everything in the movie can be traced to the notion of the desirability of the spectacle. Indeed, Freeland’s approach is to proffer an interpretation of cinematic texts that draw her in and demonstrate how those particular horror films fit within her paradigm. Most importantly, a feminist analysis as a result of Freeland’s background is discerned throughout “Naked and The Undead” so that the readers can understand how different horror films represent the feminine on the stage.
It is unequivocal that the preponderance of horror films give females a strong character or a power role to play. However, there are some films in which the feminine is disregarded and treated unfairly. In “Naked and the Undead,” Freeland examines how women are treated in society as a whole within horror films, discursively framing the female as miserable, grotesque, and monstrous; such framing can be perceived as anti-feminist rather than granting girls any agency. In horror films, according to Freeland, women do possess “the gaze” as they are always the first characters to see what is about to transpire and when the monster is about to appear at the scene. For example, in her “Feminist Framework for Horror,” Freeland points out that Janet Leigh sees a vague shadow of a man trying to kill her through the shadow of a curtain; however, she is unable to take any action. As a result, Janet is portrayed as weak and unable to fight back and defend herself, thereby intimating clear signs of anti-feminism. In this scene, the audience directly looks at the victim’s restless body while the camera focuses on the eyes of the victim’s body. The male investigator is called to take charge and find the murderer (Freeland 744). The treatment of female victims in some
horror films signals a clear indication of male jingoism, which Freeland tries to address in the horror genre. Freeland further asserts in “Naked, and the Undead” readings of feminist movies and discusses the ways horror films represent artifacts.This norm is done to accomplish this endeavor; it is important to explore a vast array of video features, including its editing, plot, soundtrack dialogue, a point of view, symbolic representation, narratives structure and use of rhetoric (47). Indeed, Freeland’s feminisms spawns a litany of generalizations regarding the genre of horror film. Recurrent questions about the gendered traits of heroines and heroes and victims and perpetrators germinate in horror movies. In some horror movies, violence waged against females is discursively framed as monstrous, while in other horror movies, it is the female heroine who aids in restoring order and justice vis-à-vis the combination of both feminine and masculine strengths. Freeland further remarks about male-dominated institutions such as science, religion, and law in a way that sounds like a radical brand of feminism despite not being espoused as such (Freeland 4). Furthermore, Freeland waxes poetic about the notions of good and evil in a conservative manner by examining the film Hellraiser. In the movie, the male protagonist, Pinhead, is punished as a rapist, a murderer, and a seducer, which evokes a far more conservative rather than a radical view of good and evil. In this sense, Pinhead is a sympathetic character because he has both good and bad in him, which connects to the spectator; temptation made him cross over to evil, although it is unequivocal that Captain Spenser is both pensive and intelligent. In this film, monsters, or evil persons, are punished, and their evil vanquished. However, the audience becomes emotionally invested in the monster they are witnessing surviving (Freeland 267). As such, the monster’s male nature according to Freeland represents particular powers that ae “stereotypically coded as men. In particular, the monster is male because he is, like the filmmakers, a magician who makes the visual spectacles possible. The monster is associated with the creativity behind the numbers that constitute the aesthetic pleasures of graphic horror” (Freeland 267). Interestingly, this feminist reading of Hellraiser starkly contrasts from another gendering of power in which a pure, immaculate yet strong, young woman becomes the victor (267). As such, the male monster becomes intrinsically linked with the male filmmaker, according to Freeland. Freeland further poses a slew of tough questions regarding how it is essential to examine whether the female characters can facilitate the development of core ideas of cinematic texts or whether they become particular targets of violence because they signify to grotesque and the monstrous. If most female characters are used in horror films to indicate the horror of villains, then it remains okay to assume that female characters lack depth and only play the role of spectacle, which therefore grafts anti-feminism into the readings of these horror films. In the “Naked and the Undead,” Freeland examines Jodie Foster’s portrayal of Clarice in the seminal film Silence of the Lambs, whom the audience does not respect despite the fact that the original villain, Hannibal Lecter, recognizes her. She notes the way the film purposefully underscores Clarice’s femininity vis-a-vis her small stature on the stage surrounded by men in a small elevator. Clarice time and again emerges as the primary focus of the male gaze because she is the sole female in the FBI working such a horrific criminal case.
Too many horror films provide scares and screams throughout their respective cinemas. Not many viewers follow what kind of model the films follow to appease their viewers. However, after reading film theorist Carol Clover’s novel, watching one of the films she associates in the novel “Halloween”, and also watching the movie “Nightmare on Elm Street” I say almost every “slasher” or horror film follows a model similar to Clover’s. The model is a female is featured as a primary character and that females tend to always overcome a situation at some point throughout the film.
The reading by Barbara Creed titled “Horror and the Monstrous-Feminine: An Imaginary Abjection”, is an in-depth examination on the role of women in horror films. Creed challenges the commanding patriarchal view, which frequently puts the woman in the position of the helpless victim. She argues that when the feminine is constructed as monstrous, it is frequently done in conjunction with its mothering role and function. Creed’s main thesis supports that the prototype of all cinematic definitions of monstrosity related to the feminine is linked to the woman’s reproductive body. Creed elects to use the term “monstrous feminine” instead of female monster, because for Creed it is the “femininity itself that is monstrous” (41). It has been unfairly
Clover, Carol J. Men, Women, and Chainsaws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film. Princeton: Princeton Publishing, 1992.
The article Why We Crave Horror Movies by Stephen King distinguishes why we truly do crave horror movies. Stephen King goes into depth on the many reasons on why we, as humans, find horror movies intriguing and how we all have some sort of insanity within us. He does this by using different rhetorical techniques and appealing to the audience through ways such as experience, emotion and logic. Apart from that he also relates a numerous amount of aspects on why we crave horror movies to our lives. Throughout this essay I will be evaluating the authors arguments and points on why society finds horror movies so desirable and captivating.
In his essay, “Why We Crave Horror Movies” King attempts to bring understanding to the phenomenon of the horror film genre. He states “sanity becomes a matter of degree” eluding to the theory that sanity is relative and that all humans are relatively insane. Jack the Ripper and the Cleveland Torso Murderer were the examples of humans on one extreme of the spectrum of sanity; saints represent the other safe end of the sanity spectrum. He illustrates the thought that in order for human kind to stay functionally sane there needs to be some sort of outlet for our violent “mad” thoughts. In King’s view horror movies provide a stable outlet and mental relief for innate madness. King argues that his insanity/ant civilization emotions are ingrained
“Why We Crave Horror Movies,” an essay by the legendary Stephen King, explains two challenging concepts to understand: why people like gory horror movies and how people are able to control their darkest desires. “I think that we’re all mentally ill; those of us outside the asylums only hide it a little better – and maybe not all that much better, after all.” King opens the essay by addressing the hard truth- we are all insane. People have dull lives, and often it’s the little bit of crazy within in us tha...
One of America’s famous actress film director and producer Katie Aselton once said,” I don’t love horror movies with something surreal happening. That doesn’t work for me. What’s terrifying is something that could actually happen to me and what I would do. I don’t know how to throw a punch, and I’ve never had to do it.” This quote shows connection to King’s article. I’m starting to consider that everyone has a crazy side. Why We Crave Horror Movies explains the reason people want to go see horror movies. The average person enjoys the horror movies because they are in a safe environment knowing they can not be harmed. By discussing the argumentative strategies such as ethos, logos,
Often times I wonder if people go to see horror movies for enjoyment, or is it something much more than that? I have mixed feelings about the idea that, “the horror film has become the modern version of public lynching” (King 562). Horror movies do promote violence and can influence the mindset of the audience, but sanity people is not based on the excitement we receive from watching a horror film. Instead, it is based on what is already within us, not what we witness on a movie screen, but what we experience throughout our lifetime.
I have provided a clear evaluation of his essay in an organized way using the appropriate standards of evaluation. In understanding why humans “Crave Horror Movies” even when some people get nightmares after watching them we find the importance of our emotions and fears. We find those emotions and fears form a body of their own which needs to be maintained properly in order to remain healthy. We see how emotions can be controlled though viewing horror movies. Stephen King’s “Why We Crave Horror Movies” is a well written essay with convincing analogies, comparisons, and urban humor.
There has been a large variety of horror films produced throughout the last fifty years. People are always going to be frightened and scared by different types of horror films. But, what type of horror film scares more people, and were men or women more frightened by these horror films? Each one of the horror films had its own agenda to frighten its audience using several different methods of horror. Some of these methods were more so directed at the female audience than the male audience. Most horror movies show the female as being vulnerable, because in real life females are defenseless against monsters.
In many ways, feminist criticism has grown out of a creative synthesis of Marxist and Freudian approaches, liberated further by the insights of structuralist and post-structuralist readings of literature which have probed ever deeper into the hidden depths of texts. Feminist criticism has emerged as a school in its own right only during the last quarter of the 20th century; as recently as 1986 Mario Praz (in his introductory essay to three Gothic novels) was able to pose the question ‘why in the most polite and effeminate of centuries… should people have begun to feel the horrible fascination of dark forests and dismal caverns, and cemeteries and thunderstorms?’ and come up with the rather patronising answer: ‘just because of its feminine character.’
By dissecting the film, the director, Jennie Livingston's methodology and the audience's perceived response I believe we can easily ignore a different and more positive way of understanding the film despite the many flaws easy for feminist minds to criticize. This is in no way saying that these critiques are not valid, or that it is not beneficial to look at works of any form through the many and various feminist lenses.
Film scholar and gender theorist Linda Williams begins her article “Film Bodies: Genre, Gender and Excess,” with an anecdote about a dispute between herself and her son, regarding what is considered “gross,” (727) in films. It is this anecdote that invites her readers to understand the motivations and implications of films that fall under the category of “body” genre, namely, horror films, melodramas, (henceforth referred to as “weepies”) and pornography. Williams explains that, in regards to excess, the constant attempts at “determining where to draw the line,” (727) has inspired her and other theorists alike to question the inspirations, motivations, and implications of these “body genre” films. After her own research and consideration, Williams explains that she believes there is “value in thinking about the form, function, and system of seemingly gratuitous excesses in these three genres,” (728) and she will attempt to prove that these films are excessive on purpose, in order to inspire a collective physical effect on the audience that cannot be experienced when watching other genres.
Modern day horror films are very different from the first horror films which date back to the late nineteenth century, but the goal of shocking the audience is still the same. Over the course of its existence, the horror industry has had to innovate new ways to keep its viewers on the edge of their seats. Horror films are frightening films created solely to ignite anxiety and panic within the viewers. Dread and alarm summon deep fears by captivating the audience with a shocking, terrifying, and unpredictable finale that leaves the viewer stunned. (Horror Films)
We all have cravings, be it for snacks or sweets, there is always something we desire. We crave horror in the same way. In Stephen King’s essay, “Why We Crave Horror Movies,” he argues that people need to watch horror films in order to release the negative emotions within us. King believes that people feel enjoyment while watching others be terrorized or killed in horror movies. King’s argument has elements that are both agreeable and disagreeable. On one hand he is acceptable when claiming we like the thrill and excitement that comes from watching horror movies; however, his views regarding that the fun comes from seeing others suffer cannot be agreed with because the human condition is not as immoral as he claims it to be.