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March 22, 2005

Horror Business

Posted by nerdling | March 22, 2005 12:55 PM

From an interview with horror comic illustrator Stephen Bissette:

Each generation finds the language that it prefers or that it's most comfortable with. Once you become comfortable with certain artifacts associated with horror, they cease to function as horror, because you're comfortable with them; the whole premise of true horror is discomfort. You're not supposed to be comfortable with it.

It's fascinating to me to see all these remakes right now. My son and I went and saw "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre," the remake. It was interesting on the one hand in that it was as mean-spirited as it was. It did pack a punch, it was a very suspenseful ride. I was certainly grabbed from beginning to end. But it's also interesting to look at all this work and there's no real teeth to it. These are rich men's fantasies. I'll focus on 'Texas Chainsaw' for a minute. The original film that Tobe Hooper and Kim Henkel put together with a bunch of their Texan friends back in 1973 (it was released in 1974), that was a genuinely angry, insane, frightened and frightening movie. It was fueled by the very real hunger and desperation of the film makers. The same was the case with 'Night of the Living Dead.' The same was the case with 'Last House On The Left.' The same was the case with Michael Reeves "The Witchfinder General" which was released here as "The Conqueror Worm." All those key films that thrust the gothic horror movie tradition into what I consider "the modern horror film," which all came out between '68 and '75, they were harsh reflections of their time. They were made by young, hungry, angry, frightened people -- and all that was poured into their films.

What we tend to be permitted to see in the cinema these days are films created by rich, comfortable people. So, the trappings or horror components are there. Certainly 'Texas Chainsaw" the remake still functions as a survival story, but there's no cannibalism element to it. It's no longer about these desperate, crazed, jobless clans that have reverted to cannibalism to continue to feel like they're working and to feed themselves. It's now a story about Leatherface, who we see unmasked at one point; he has a degenerative skin condition, so it's suddenly a movie about cosmetic surgery! (laughs) He's no longer killing travelers and hanging them on meat hooks to feed on them. In fact, when we see the family's house, it's crawling with pigs and chickens; there's plenty of food around.

All these current remakes are made by rich people and their fears are not particularly primal. All the trappings are there referencing the horror films of the seventies, but none of the bone and gristle and spine is there. They're not films that are being made by angry, frightened, desperate people -- now, those folks create the best horror films!