Wes Craven (1939-2015)
Wes Craven was an American film director, writer and producer from Cleveland, Ohio. Unfortunately, he died in August (2015), he was well known for his work in Slasher films. Some of his work includes A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) and Scream (1996). Wes Craven has become famous fro his horrors that challenge the audience with his bold visions and ideas. His first feature film was produced in 1972 - The Last House On The Left. Since then, he has shown he is a filmmaker with plenty of imagination that he pours into his films, television and literature.
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Wes Craven believed that horror films are scarier when there is an absence of authority/parents because there is lack of protection. The main target audience is age 15-25 years due to it being easier to appeal to that audience as they are the age range that predominately watch the genre. Horror movies are also scarier when its set in a safe place - e.g. a hospital or school.
Wheeler Winston Dixon
Wheeler Winston Dixon is an American filmmaker and scholar. He is an expert on film theory, history and criticism, and his scholarship focuses on American experimental cinema and horror films. He is the author of around thirty books and more than 100 articles on film, and appears regularly in national media outlets discussing film and culture trends. He is (obviously) more well known for his books but has been known to make short films as well.
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Wheeler Winston Dixon believed that "Women and men in horror films are sites of activity". This means that you do not get to know the character, they generally die within the opening title sequences.
Carol Clover
Carol J. Clover is an American professor of film studies, and has been widely published in her areas of expertise. She is well known for the books she has written which includes Men, Women and Chainsaws. In it she investigates gender in slasher films, the appeal of horror cinema, all from a feminist perspective. We've have used some of the information from that book and analysed it below.
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Carol Clover believes that everyone has a small amount of masochism or sadism within them. These characteristics are brought out in horror films through the characters.
Sadism Definition: the tendency to derive pleasure, especially sexual gratification, from inflicting pain, suffering, or humiliation on others.
Masochism Definition: the tendency to derive sexual gratification from one's own pain or humiliation.
"Sadism has its place, but masochism dominates." - this means that people prefer to be in pain rather than to inflict it; this is why people like watching horror as they put themselves in a place of vulnerability and fear.
Killers
"Killers in horror tend to have issues relating to childhood or are sexually disturbed." - this means that the killer has an abnormal obsession with children or childhood memories, they may be stuck in their own past and rein-acting scenes of their childhood.
Terrible Places
This contradicts Wes Cravens views on horror, Clover believes that horror films are films are scarier when set in terrible place - i.e decaying and haunted mansions. "The places are terrible not just because of their physical state but by the terrible families and histories inside of them." An example of this would be the mansion in the Woman In Black Movies.
Victims
Clover believed that beautiful women were generally the people that died first and were the main targets of the killer. "Even when male and females are killed in the same numbers, it is the death of the female that lingers on screen" - This is due to women being seen as the more vulnerable sex, supporting the stereotype of gender.
Final Girl
The final girl tend to be a virgin or someone who is not sexually active, we see her from the start (in slashers specifically) and get to know her character. She tends to be resourceful, intelligent and some times paranoid.
Shock
The audience tend to react to a gruesome scene, not by cringing or feeling sympathy but instead reacting in a way of repulsion.
Sadism Definition: the tendency to derive pleasure, especially sexual gratification, from inflicting pain, suffering, or humiliation on others.
Masochism Definition: the tendency to derive sexual gratification from one's own pain or humiliation.
"Sadism has its place, but masochism dominates." - this means that people prefer to be in pain rather than to inflict it; this is why people like watching horror as they put themselves in a place of vulnerability and fear.
Killers
"Killers in horror tend to have issues relating to childhood or are sexually disturbed." - this means that the killer has an abnormal obsession with children or childhood memories, they may be stuck in their own past and rein-acting scenes of their childhood.
Terrible Places
This contradicts Wes Cravens views on horror, Clover believes that horror films are films are scarier when set in terrible place - i.e decaying and haunted mansions. "The places are terrible not just because of their physical state but by the terrible families and histories inside of them." An example of this would be the mansion in the Woman In Black Movies.
Victims
Clover believed that beautiful women were generally the people that died first and were the main targets of the killer. "Even when male and females are killed in the same numbers, it is the death of the female that lingers on screen" - This is due to women being seen as the more vulnerable sex, supporting the stereotype of gender.
Final Girl
The final girl tend to be a virgin or someone who is not sexually active, we see her from the start (in slashers specifically) and get to know her character. She tends to be resourceful, intelligent and some times paranoid.
Shock
The audience tend to react to a gruesome scene, not by cringing or feeling sympathy but instead reacting in a way of repulsion.
Kaminsky
Weapons
NO GUNS! Kaminsky believes that the killing of a character should be up close and personal, a gun disconnects the killer from his victim. In some cases, characters may get a gun but it never works; this links to other props such as telephones and car engines never working as they provide a means of escape which would conclude in a bad horror film. Weapons used would be knives, scissors, blades, hammers, ropes, screwdrivers, etc.
NO GUNS! Kaminsky believes that the killing of a character should be up close and personal, a gun disconnects the killer from his victim. In some cases, characters may get a gun but it never works; this links to other props such as telephones and car engines never working as they provide a means of escape which would conclude in a bad horror film. Weapons used would be knives, scissors, blades, hammers, ropes, screwdrivers, etc.
Dika
Dika talks about the narrative of a standard stalker film, speaking about past and present events separately. The past events consist of the young community does something wrong and then the killer murders the guilty party - e.g someone may hit someone else with a car, the killer will find out about it and seek a gruesome form of revenge. The present events would happen (obviously) after the past event had occurred on screen. "The killer re-identifies the guilty parties, a member from the older community warns the younger community, the killer kills members of the young community." The heroine comes in, finds the killer and fights against him, defeats but does not kill him, survives but is never free. This means that the killer may return for the heroine at a later point in time.
Tudor
"It's true of course that female protagonists are more significant in the modern genre, and that they were permitted more autonomy and resourcefulness than were the heroines of earlier films." This means that these horror films normally have a female as the main character and that they have more awareness of themselves and what they have to do to get out of a situation, than women in the older horrors.
Linda Williams
Believes that slasher killers are like the monsters of classic horror. The killers are seen as repressed and can be seen like sexually repressed animals - instead of fulfilling their repression they kill to fill the void.
Barbara Creed
"the horror films obsession with blood, particularly the bleeding body of a woman ... suggests that castration anxiety is a central concern of the horror film." This means that the horror movies are trying to scare men more than women.
Carroll
"Responses of horror movie characters, serve as a mirror to horror movie audiences" This means that whatever is happening on screen will be mirrored in the audiences reactions to it. For example, if there is vomiting in the scene, it is not unheard of for people watching to either gag or throw up themselves. (Regan vomiting in The Exorcist caused audiences to vomit)