CREATING FEAR: THE EVOLUTION OF THE HORROR GENRE IN THE 20th CENTURY

Horror has played an enormous part in traditions of literary and oral storytelling and, in turn, has played a key generic role in the Hollywood film industry.

Today’s contemporary horror film’s forms and conventions owe a lot to previous horror arts; folk-tales, literature, theatre, paintings, as well as taking inspiration from other horror films of the 20th and early 21st century. Freddy Kruger of Wes Craven’s ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’ (1984) is clearly inspired by Heinrich Hoffmann’s traditional German folk-tale of Struwwelpeter for example, whilst Norman Bates, Leather-Face and Buffalo Bill take inspiration from real-life monster, Ed Gein.

Along with Westerns, musicals, and gangster films, horror is one of cinema’s basic genres, one that emerged early in the history of the medium... but unlike some... have retained their popularity into the present period. (Prince, 2004, p3)

The fact that horror has remained a key genre compared to any other is intriguing. What appeal does the horror genre have to retain its popularity? Obviously, a horror film has to be scary but how has the genre kept people scared for nearly 80 years?

To answer questions such as these would be impossible as these studies would need to be based on information gathered from cognitive psychological testing and would be problematic due to gender, cultural, social and generational differences.

So how do horror films attempt to create horror? The main focus of the next few blogs, will be to analyse how horror films attempt to create horror. In order to do this I will be looking at visual and audible elements for comparative information. This information has been collected from studying the generic conventions of the films, including visual styles, the use of sound, themes, mise-en-scene and of course the monster. Due to the fact that we are also looking at the horror genre’s retained popularity (its ability to keep audiences scared) it is important to consider the social context and technological advances that would affect a film.

‘I always felt that scary films are both for the filmmakers and the audience, a sort of exorcism of fears that are really there, underneath the surface.‘ (Wes Craven, Scream and Scream Again, 2000)

Before we can to answer this question we need to know what a horror film is and what key ingredients it must have in order to be categorised as a horror film. This will be a question that I will explore in Part 2 using generic analysis from Stephen Neale (2001) as well as forms and conventional theories put forward by film theorist Noel Carroll (1990) and a mathematical formula (Whitaker, 2004) created to find the scariest horror film.

To write on such a vast subject within the limits of these blogs, I have chosen to focus my historical and conventional analysis on a specific time-frame and international area. Although, Germany, England and Japan are well known for their horror films, I am going to focus on the American horror genre.

This due to a number of reasons; American horror films are made for commercial mainstream cinemas with the chief aim of making a profit. This being so, successful American horror films are usually franchised with their forms and conventions being repeated to recapture the success of the first film.

“Debra Hill and I were forced into making the two Halloween sequels for financial and business reasons. There was going to be a tremendous lawsuit if we didn’t, and our business manager said, ‘If you don’t do this, you’re stupid.’ So we did it, and the idea was to give young directors a chance to make their first film and maybe want different stories. Well, we found out that the audience didn’t want different stories. Halloween II was similar to the first one but Halloween III was not. What they wanted was just the same old thing over and over again”. (John Carpenter as sited in Jones, 1997, pp.65)

European films on the other hand, do not franchise their horror in this manner, usually letting each film be an isolated item. American films, including horror, because of the English language, are also the most widely distributed and are designed to appeal to a wider audience.

It would also be almost impossible to look at all types and all distinct periods (or cycles) of the horror genre. I am therefore breaking the history down into two key areas, as put forward by Andrew Tudor in “Genre and Contemporary Hollywood” (Neale, 2002).

The “Secure (Classical) Horror” period is from the end of the First World War up until the end of the 1950’s. The Classical Horror name is really an umbrella name for a number of key cycles; Silent Horror, Gothic Horror and Nuclear Horror. I will look at these key cycles more closely in part 3, where I will identify the forms and conventions developed during the Classical Horror period and the social factors that were reflected within the films.

Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960) is referred to by Reynold Humphries (2002) as a turning point in the horror genre and this will be my main focus in part 4. Although argued by theorist Noel Carroll (1990) that Psycho isn’t a horror film, many other writers have commented on the influence the film has had on the Paranoid Horror cycle.

I will be analysing how the codes and conventions of this style of horror differ from that of the Classical period and how the new structural conventions of Paranoid Horror reflect society’s developing fears.

My final part will critically analyse the codes and conventions of two specific texts, Tod Browning’s Dracula (1931) and Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992), and compare how each film uses visuals, sound, mise-en-scene, story and choice of actor to attempt to create horror. I have chosen these two specific films as they are both based on Bram Stoker’s novel and therefore, story wise, both films should be identical. I have also chosen them as the 1931 version is firmly placed in the Classical Horror period, whereas the 1992 version is firmly rooted under the Paranoid Horror umbrella. There have been other interpretations of the vampire myth on film, but these two offer a clear contrast in approaches, reflecting the evolution of the horror genre across a significant period of cinematic history.

What is a Horror Film and What are its Key Conventions?

Before we can begin to look at the conventions and techniques of the genre, we need to know what a horror film is. This task of defining the horror genre is not as easy as it may seem, as many horror films seem to incorporate other generic identities. This is not a problem just for the horror genre; it’s a complication that is continuously encountered when doing any genre study.

Peter Hutchings, in his book ‘The Horror Film’ (Hutchings, 2004), rightly acknowledges that the more one thinks about genre, the more it becomes apparent that many of a specific genre's films appear to sit on a ‘generic border’ (Hutchings, 2004).

The more one thinks about the horror genre, the more one comes to realise how many films there are which appear to exist on generic borders and which can be classified in one direction or another (Hutchings, 2004, p2)

Hutchings adds that the fact that many classic horror films, such as Dracula (1931) and The Phantom of the Opera (1925), were originally placed in an alternative genre category and that science fiction films of the 1950s have now been reclassified as horror, demonstrates the flexibility and retrospective change in these generic borders. In other words, the generic classification of a film is not permanent but can change when looking retrospectively at that film in a historical context. Referencing Andrew Tudor, Hutchings makes note that the debate of genre classification is a “chicken and egg type of problem” (Hutchings, 2004, p.6) of what came first, the genre or the definition of genre?

How can one decide which films belong to a particular genre without a definition of that genre, and yet how can one form such a definition without knowing in the first place which films belong to that genre. (Hutchings, 2004, p.6)

With regards to classifying the horror genre by conventions, Hutchings proposes that horror films can be set in an endless array of different locations and in any historical period, including the future. He adds that the horror genre’s stylistic approach has also altered greatly, although certain styles (such as expressionism in the 1930s and realism in the 1970s) may have dominated the genre for periods, they cannot be applied to the stylistic identity of the horror genre as a whole.

Horror films have no distinctive iconography to bind them all together. They are not limited to any particular historical or geographical setting... So far as the genre’s stylistic identity is concerned, while one can detect stylistic approaches that are popular and even dominant at certain moments in the genre’s history... such approaches are not common across the whole genre. (Hutchings, 2004, p.6)

So if horror cannot be classified with regards to filmic style, location or time setting, how do we, the audience, know that we are watching a horror film?

A number of genre theorists (Neale [2001], Bordwell [2001]) have all agreed that a horror film’s main characteristic is its ability to horrify its audience and that it is this emotional reaction that forms and shapes the genre’s distinctive techniques to scare.

While the Western is most clearly defined by subject, theme and iconography, the horror genre is most recognisable by its intended emotional effect on the audience. The horror film aims to shock, disgust, repel – in short, to horrify. This impulse is what shapes the genre’s other conventions. (Bordwell, 2001, p102)

Whereas the Western genre’s key characteristic is its setting and time period, these theorists suggest that the horror genre’s key characteristic is the intended emotional effect on its audience.

Although this theory may be broad, it is also the most obvious and audience-based understanding of classification, as it defines horror by the audience’s reaction.

Hutchings comments in ‘The Horror Film’ (Hutchings, 2004) that the problems encountered by the critics in defining specific genres are not those experienced by audiences, who seem to distinguish between the genres with less difficulty. Could this be because critics and other genre theorists deliberately detach themselves from the films' emotional effect and instead look for visual evidence within the genre? Is this why horror is popular with audiences but not with critics?

To carry out an objective study into defining a genre that isn’t affected by gender, cultural or individual factors, a theorist must seek visual information, in this case visual styles and conventions.

They [Horror films] provoke a physical response, if they don’t then they’re like comedies that don’t make us laugh, and what’s the point in that! (Mark Kermode, Scream and Scream Again, 2000).

Defining the Characters of Menace

As mentioned earlier, Bordwell (2001) claims that the horror film’s emotional intent forms and shapes the genre’s conventions. As many of the genre theorists agree, horror’s key generic convention is a central figure or object of menace.

At the rotten core of any horror lies the monster, the perpetrator of the dread and fear that elicits an emotional response to the film. The monster need not be the obvious lumbering killer and neither does it follow that a killer in a film must be the monster, the purpose is to provide a reason for the chaos inflicted on the portrayed society. (Le Blanc, 2003, p.8).

Like defining what a horror film is, it is equally as difficult to define what a figure of menace is? Michelle Le Blanc (2003) defines the figure quite broadly, accepting that the monster need not be a physically distinguishing creature but a being that breaks down normal, moral, social order.

Certainly if one wishes to see scary monsters per se as a defining feature of horror, one has to deal with the fact that other types of films – science-fiction, fantasy, crime... also have scary monsters in them. (Hutchings, 2004, p7)

This does raise two key questions; are science-fiction films horror and do fairy-tales fit into the horror genre too?

As has often been noted, it is sometimes very difficult to distinguish between horror and science fiction... if there are areas and instances of hybridity and overlap, there are also areas and instances of differentiation. (Neale, 2001, P92)

Although Neale (2001) and other writers on the genre acknowledge that a horror-science-fiction hybrid exists, Noel Carroll (1990), a leading horror theorist, argues that certain films are mis-categorised as belonging to a specific genre.

Carroll’s theory claims that horror and science-fiction genres do not mix together and that certain themes, the inclusion of a figure of menace and the setting of the film can cause difficulties in definition. We must also remember that Bordwell (2001) claimed that horror is distinctive by its intended emotional effect and not by its setting or themes.

Science Fiction explores grand themes like alternate societies or alternate technologies whereas the horror genre is really only a matter of scarifying monsters. (Carroll, 1990, pp.13, 14)

Using Carroll’s theory, a film such as Alien (1979) would be classified as a horror film set in space, whereas War of the Worlds (1953) would be science-fiction as it deals with new technology and alternate society.

Carroll also makes note that fairy-tales are not part of the horror genre due to the response and attitude to monsters by the human characters within the story.

In works of horror, the humans regard the monsters they meet as abnormal, as disturbances of the natural order. In fairy tales, on the other hand, monsters are part of the everyday furniture of the universe. (Carroll, 1990, p.16)

Carroll’s Theory of Horror

Carroll’s theory of the genre breaks horror down into two forms; Natural Horror and Art Horror. (Carroll, 1990, p12)

Natural Horror is, for example, the horrific events that we witness on the news or in our own world.

...the sort that one expresses in saying ’I am horrified by the prospect of ecological disaster,’ or ‘Brinksmanship in the age of nuclear arms is horrifying’ or ‘What the Nazi’s did was horrible!’ (Carroll, 1990, p.12)

Art Horror is horror embodied in fictional images, horror that which we find in film, television, fine art, the theatre, etc. Art horror is that created for entertainment and that attempts to achieve a desired emotional effect from its audience member.

...that associated with reading something like Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein... with seeing something like the Hamilton Deane and John Balderston stage version of Dracula, movies such as James Whale's Bride of Frankenstein... and operas/musicals like Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Phantom of the Opera. (Carroll, 1990, p.12)

Carroll expands on this further by claiming that Art-Horror aims to create a feeling of agitation (agreeing with Neale with regards to the genre’s emotional characteristic) in its audience with the presence of a monster, a figure of menace.

This agitation is needed to produce fear but can only be achieved when the monster consists of three key elements; Physical Impurity, Threat and Possibility.

Physical Impurity and Monster Classification

The first key element is that the figure of menace must be physically repulsive and impure. Carroll expands on this statement by breaking the type of monster down into four clear areas:

Fusion Monsters, such as the Zombies in George A. Romero’s ‘Night of the Living Dead’ (1968) and Freddy Kruger in ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’ (1984) are a combination of two or more different natural forms and therefore transgress ‘categorical distinction’.
They are [Fusion Monsters] single figures in whom distinct and often clashing types of elements are superimposed or condensed, resulting in entities that are impure and repulsive. (Carroll, 1990, p.45)
In other words, Fusion monsters can be dead but alive (Zombies), insect but human (The Fly [1986]), human but machine (Frankenstein’s Monster), etc.
Fission Monsters can be broken down again into two distinct types; Temporal Fission and Spatial Fission. Whereas fusion monsters are a combination of two or more natural forms with only one personality, temporal fission monsters are formed by two or more identities sharing the same body at different periods of time.
Werewolves, for example, violate the categorical distinction between humans and wolves. In this case, the animal and the human inhabit the same body... however, they do so at different times... the body, inhabited by the human, is turned over to the wolf... the two identities – and the opposed categories they represent – do not overlap temporally in the same body. (Carroll, 1990, p.46)
Spatial Fission monsters are the occurrence of different identities sharing separate but identical bodies at the same time. This method of multiplication of a character, allows each creation to represent an aspect of the original character that is often self-hidden or socially repressed.
Examples here include the portrait in Oscar Wilde’s ‘Picture of Dorian Gray’ [1915]... and the doppelgangers in movies like ‘The Student of Prague [1926] and ‘Warning Shadows [1923]. (Carroll, 1990, p.46)
Magnification monsters are everyday, natural creatures enlarged and/or presented in a large quantity. Films such as Arachnophobia (1990), Anaconda (1997), Jaws (1975) and King Kong (1933) all use enlarged/overpopulated natural creatures as their figures of menace. However, Carroll points out that these monsters must be creatures of a general phobic nature that we, as an audience, commonly find repulsive, a factor comically proven in ‘The Attack of the Killer Tomatoes’ (1978) and Night of the Lepus (1972). By enlarging or increasing their population size, the repulsion already attached to such phobic creatures such as spiders, snakes and rats is increased and magnified. “Such creatures already disgust, and argumenting their scale increases their physical dangerousness.” (Carroll, 1990, p.49)
Finally, Meteonymy Monsters are figures of menace that are associated, or surrounded by, a high population of physically repulsive creatures or objects. For example, the central character in Willard (1971/2002) lives his life surrounded by rats which fulfil his every, self- beneficial command. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974/2003) also presents a family of mass murderers who live in a slaughter house and are continuously surrounded by bits of rotting animal and people.
Horrific metonymy is a means of emphasising the impure and disgusting nature of the creature – from the outside, so to speak – by associating said being with objects and entities that are already reviled. (Carroll, 1990, p.52)

Carroll continues by claiming that the audience’s feelings of impurity and repulsion are not only achieved by the physical representation of the monster but are also heightened by the reaction of the central positive characters in the film. The audience parallels the emotions expressed by the protagonist who does not want to be touched by the impure monster and because the audience is relating to the protagonist, that character’s own fears heighten the audience’s fears.

The Monster’s Threat

Secondly, Carroll claims that the figure of menace must present a serious threat to people, a society or a belief. Without this physical, social or moral threat then the monster will never create a sense of anxiety or fear for the protagonists and, in turn, for the audience. Although both physically repulsive, we are more likely to warm to E.T (1982) than to a monster such as The Blob (1958) as E.T presents no physical or social threat to society.

Horrific monsters are threatening. This design of horrific monsters is, I think, incontestable. They must be dangerous. This can only be satisfied simply by making the monster lethal. That it kills and maims is enough... It may destroy one’s identity... seek to destroy moral order... or advance an alternative society. (Carroll, 1990, p.43)

The Monster’s Possibility

Third, and finally, Carroll claims that neither element will be effective if the figure of menace or their actions are not possible. This doesn’t mean that the audience must believe that a monster exists but that a possible explanation for its existence is probable. For example, the Invisible Man’s powers may not be possible, but the fact that the powers occurred due to a failed science experiment make his new-found ability more believable.

Unlike the characters in such fictions, we do not believe that the monster exists; our fear and disgust is rather a response to the thought of such monsters. (Carroll, 1990, p.53)

Finding a Horror Formula

Carroll’s theory, due to the emotional intentions of the horror genre, focuses on the monster’s characteristics and avoids other characteristics and conventions used to attempt to heighten the audience’s fear.

In the summer of 2004, Anna Sigler (Whitaker, 2004) and a team of mathematicians working for Sky Movies in the UK calculated a formula to find the scariest film ever made. The formula takes a number of key conventions into consideration.

Whereas Neale (1990) claims that a horror film must horrify, the mathematicians break this down further into five key elements; suspense, shock, realism, safety and gore.

FIGURE 3 Mathematical Formula

To the key elements, suspense, realism and safety, specific forms and conventions are taken into consideration for each. The use of escalating music and sound (es), added to what is unknown by the audience (u), the number of chase scenes within the film (cs) and the sense of being trapped (t) are all used to calculate the overall suspense of a film.

The Safety element consists of conventions relating to characters and settings: How often a character is alone (a), whether the environment of the film is dark (dr), what kind of film setting it is (fs) and how many people are in the film (n).

The mathematician’s claim however that “a truly terrifying film must be ‘realistic’” (Whitaker, 2004, p.39) and therefore the element ‘realism’ is found by balancing true life (tl) with fantasy (f).

With this formula the mathematicians have pin pointed The Shining (1980), Jaws (1975), Psycho (1960) and The Exorcist(1973) as 4 of the scariest films, and judging by cinema box office takings for these films, they obviously appealed to, and scared, their audiences. But is this enough to show that these films are scary? The biggest problem with the formula is that it is, like many written theories, a subjective matter. Grades and amounts for each characteristic and convention in the film given in the mathematicians formula is given from a subjective opinion. Anna Sigler in the article states; “The optimum level of blood is in Jaws – allowing the viewer to see just enough to be scared of the shark, but not so much to be repulsed.” (Sigler as cited in Whitaker, 2004, p39)

The problem with most horror theory is that it doesn’t take into consideration individual differences. The blood in Jawsmay not be repulsive to some, but to others it could make them physically sick.

Individual Cognitive Evaluation

Carroll’s theory however does address individual differences by making reference to the fact that a horror film must consist of one more key element (as well as the monster being physically repulsive, threatening and possible) and that is the audience member’s own cognitive evaluation of the situation.

Carroll, in his book ‘The Philosophy of Horror’ (Carroll, 1990) simplifies this element by explaining it in terms of walking out in front of an oncoming car. Caught in the car's headlamps, the brain makes a reflexive evaluation of the situation based on your knowledge, beliefs and previous experiences and chooses the most possible outcome. In this case, if you stay where you are the car will hit you, injuring, if not killing, you. This results in the emotion of being scared.

So although Carroll does accept that individual differences are an important factor neither his theory nor that of the mathematician’s takes into consideration social context. Do our fears in the real world reflect our fears in the cinema? To answer this question and to continue exploring how horror films attempt to scare we need to look at the history of the American horror film.