Midyette1

Hannah
Olivia Rines
UWRT1101
1/9/2015
Youre curled up in a ball on your best friends couch. Its nighttime and there is
darkness all around you. Youre tense, your body is shaking and your palms are sweaty.
Your only protection is a pillow covering half your face so that when you get too scared
to watch you wont have to look up at the television. Our eyes widen at the image of
horror, taking it in, feeling awe at the awful. Those momentswhen we must look at
what we dread to imagine or think we cannot bear to seeare the pulse of the genre,
moments of revelation and clarity (Kawin5). Horror is defined as an intense feeling of
fear, shock, or disgust.As something that is meant to recreate a nightmare, why is it that
we as humans are so drawn to horror movies? What is it about this genre that pulls all
ages towards the unimaginable and unknown?
A well made horror movie will complete its goal of frightening and revolting the

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 10:26 AM

Comment [1]: I really liked your intro, it
dragged me right in.

audience and include a number of cliches. It tells us that our belief in security is a
delusion, that the monsters are all around us, and that we, the inhabitants of this collective
nightmare, are just so much meat awaiting the slaughter. (Prince4). Such movies narrate
stories or real-life experiences. In horror movies there are many reoccuring factors that
access a core of fears we share as humans; one of the biggest being the fear of death.
However there are also others such as the fear of being alone in the dark; something that
usually goes away as we get older. Whether

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:30 PM

Comment [2]: I dont think you need a
semi colon here. I think if you just say
which is it might flow a little better
instead of getting chopped up and because
you just used the semi colon above.

Midyette2
or not youve noticed, there are lots of reoccuring factors in horror films. Blood and gore
is one of the most used and are often associated with death. Monsters (whether human or
not) are also a reoccuring factor. Loud noises, soft whispers, screams, and eerie
background music also play a factor in provoking our fears.
In The Shining, (Stanley Kubrick, 1980) a psychological kind of horror is used to
entertain the audeince. The movie is rated R for strong terror, distrubing images,

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:34 PM

Comment [3]: Me and you both forgot to
add information about discourse modes
used for our genres so I think you can easily
put them into this paragraph somewhere.

language, sexuality, and graphic nudity; making it intended for an audience of 17 and up.
Disturbing images are used throughout the movie. The physicality of the images and the
use of music truly makes this a horror film. There is a constant connection to the
paranormal. The dead are trying to tell the main characters their stories. Gore ranges from
blood spilling all over the lobby to a naked rotting old woman in a bathtub. Eventually
the fear of the insane works its way into the ending of the film. The anxiety at the heart
of the genre is, indeed, the nature of human being. (Prince3). The creation of a human
monster; a psychopath is made. There is a crazy killer on the loose, the family is
succluded because of a blizzard, there is no way out. You end up wondering if this is
something that could happen to you.
In the film, a reality of a perfect family is created. To outsiders, the father, Jack
works and provides for the family, while the mother, Wendy takes care of her son.
Throughout the movie, Wendy is at the mercy of Jack suffering both physical and
emotional abuse. The feeling that men are superior to women is created. Throughout the
movie, women are sexualized. At some point in the film we hear Jack even call Wendy a
sperm bank. Most people in media

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:42 PM

Comment [4]: A little choppy but I dont
know if that was the affect you were going
for..I liked it but I dont if a teacher looking
for a flowing paper would.
Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:46 PM
Comment [5]: I would add something
after ..happen to you like because.. and
add examples of a horror film to .

Midyette3
know that sex sells. These scenes make the director seem sexist towards women but we
must keep in mind that this film was created in the 1980s.
The Possession (Ole Bornedal, 2012) plays with humans fear of the supernatural
and paranormal. The plot starts off with a seperated family. The father takes his daughters

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:48 PM

Comment [6]: I think this is a good
paragraph describing the movie but maybe
add a few more things about it being a
horror film because thats why your topic is
about.

home and they stop at a yard sale. Emily becomes interested in a wooden box that wont
open. She takes it home and that evening she finds a tooth, a dead moth, a wooden figure,
and a ring inside the box. Her behavior starts to become increasingly malevelont until she

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:50 PM

Comment [7]: A little choppy.

stabs her father in the hand with a fork during dinner. She speaks of a woman who lives
in the box and starts speaking to the woman herself. Her father takes it upon himself to
find the reason behind her behavior and discovers that the box was used by a jewish
community to trap a demon. Bornedal is using religion to face our fear of the unknown.
Exorcisms appear in a lot of horror films because of this fear. This movie was based on a
true story which can make an audience a little uneasy unless they look at the how much
of the real story was put into the film (The Possession and its True Story). The
Possession is rated PG-13 for violence and disturbing material. The film is not inteneded
for immature minds as it would be hard to handle some of the scenes.
Religion plays a big role in the world and making of desicions. Although not
everyone is religious, most people wonder what happens after you die. Horror is part of
our response to the world. It runs through and determines many of our oldest tales as well
as our movies. Suspicions about the supernatural are as old as religion if not older.
(Kawin3). The family in this movie is not Jewish, but they must believe in order for the

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:50 PM

Comment [8]: Good description of the
movie because I have never seen in a now I
want too..
Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:51 PM
Comment [9]: What does that mean?

demon to be rid of Emilys body. Which poses the question What should I believe? to
the audience.
Midyette4
The original of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Tobe Hooper, 1974) movies made

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:52 PM

Comment [10]: Your quote flows great
with what you said. It proves what you said
is valid.

its debut in 1974. Known as a slasher film the use of gore comes in masses. Although
more realistic scenes could be made in this day and age, the thought behind the film is
utterly horrifying causing some theatres to shut it down due to the use of violence. This
film is about a group of teenagers who go to explore an abanded house and instead are
being followed and killed off one by one. Since this film, a cliche has been developed in

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:54 PM

Comment [11]: Abandoned

the horror movie genre where a group gets seperated and one by one they all dissapear.
Hooper plays with humans fear of death and being alone.
Like other genre movies, any given horror film will convey synchronic
associations, ideological and social messages that are part of a certain period or historical

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:58 PM

Comment [12]: Maybe make this last
sentence a little stronger for it being your
closing sentence of your paragraph.

moment. (Prince2). The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was based on Ed Gien, a seriel killer
and cannibal who kept his victims body parts and used them to make household objects.
Gien was thought to have taken several victims in the 1950s. Leatherface who is the
main antagonist in this film wears a mask made of human skin and kills his victims using
a chainsaw. Gien also created and wore a mask from human skin, but never used a
chainsaw to murder anyone. There have been several movies made using Gien as a muse
in order to provoke fear out of an audience as it was his reality that the rest of the world
didnt understand. Again, things that we do not comprehend are unknown, and the
unknown is scary.

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 12:59 PM

Comment [13]: Throw a comma in after
audience.

Audiences never tire of being frightened because they never stop feeling
frightened about their fellow human beings and the world they collectively
inhabit.(Prince3) This is why the horror movie genre will never die. The genre of horror
keeps changing to fit the fears of the

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 1:02 PM

Comment [14]: I like how you opened
with the quote.

Midyette5
modern world. Modern horror films are more often about human monsters and not
fictional fairytale creatures. In a way, horror movies can teach us never to be too careful
in our own worlds. Around every corner there is a possibility that something could go
wrong. All horror movies play with the fear of death because this is something that we as
human beings will always be afraid of.
Genres in the modern world are often based on the society around them. Every
genre explores social problems and issues of a time period because we as humans are

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 1:01 PM

Comment [15]: I would maybe add like
although these teach us never to be to
careful, a lot of horror films come from a
wide imagination of writers and directors
and that a lot of it is make believe.

interested in how society around us functions. There is much more exploring to do, but
content will continue to change as the world around us does.

Tommy Doctor 2/9/2015 1:04 PM

Comment [16]: I thought your paper
wasd really good! Your examples were my
favorite part because they were interesting
and I was intrigued to read more. The words
I highlighted were just the grammatical
errors but other than those and just the few
other things I hinted on I really think your
paper is good. Im by no means a professor
but I really enjoyed it!

Midyette6
Works Cited
A Brief History of Horror. FilmmakerIQ. n.d. Web. January 25, 2015.
Kawin, Bruce. Horror and the Horror Film. London; New York: Anthem Press, 2012.

eBook.
Prince, Stephen. The Horror Film. New Brunswick, N.J. : Rutgers University Press,
2004. eBook.
The Shining. Dir. Stanley Kubrick. Warner Bros.Inc, 1980. Film.
The Possession. Dir. Ole Bornedal. Lionsgate. 2012. Film
The Possession and its True Story. Rhinos Horror. Horror News, n.d. Web. February
8, 2015
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Dir. Tobe Hooper. 1974. Film
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre: Questioning the Story. Chasing The Frog. CTF
Media. 2003.

Web. February 9, 2015.