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writingsitcom · 6 years

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Horror questionnaire

I was sent a questionnaire by a fan in NZ, for his doctorate or something. So, in conjunction with the fact that WRITING THE HORROR MOVIE (Bloomsbury) is now to be reprinted- I publish my answers.

What is the greatest difference between a horror movie made in the 20th century as opposed to one made in the 21st century?

Combining this with your final question, the difference is in the ubiquity of Technology. Pre-1999, when we had a glut of ‘pre-millennial angst’ movies, there were no smart phones, less CCTV and/or continual surveillance, and of course less CG. What there was back then was rarely convincing. ‘The Mummy’ was the first to attempt frightening scarab beetles, but they just looked plastic. Even in Cabin in the Woods, once the monsters get loose, they are frightening because of their power to destroy, but because we know that they are computer enhanced drawn images, we are not actually scared.

The best Movies (Cloverfield, The Mist, The Void) use CG so well and sparingly that we are terrified. Thus, the Horror Movie of the 21st C, has so much at its disposal, but conversely, so much to hold it back. Every Teen Slasher has the issue of ‘no reception’ and lack of Internet (which would enable them to escape). You have to show so much less now, make a virtue of hand held shaky-cam and the growth - since Blair Witch- of found footage.

There is a desire, moving away from the Universal Monsters (Dracula, Frankenstein, Wolfman, etc.) to make horror real, suburban, in your face, and thus we have had amazing franchises such as Saw, Final Destination and Hostel (Torture porn or gorno) and ghosts with Paranormal Activity, as well as Slashers with Wrong Turn, to name but a few.

To summarise there is a demand for actuality (as in the Conjuring/Sinister/Exorcism franchises). The teens in Get Out or It Follows must, as with Halloween (Carpenter 1976), strike at the heart of a middle-America teen audience and the Asian market. I could make more points about Asian horror but we’ll leave it at that for now.

What subgenre of horror do you believe has been the most consistent throughout the years?

I’m not sure if you mean consistently successful or continuously made and remade? It’s easiest to start with Zombies, as, since the remake of Dawn of the Dead (Zack Snyder 2004) and 28 Days later, (Boyle, 2003) plus the long running The Walking Dead, there has been a glut. Sean of the Dead pastiched the genre, which usually sounds the death knell. There are so many zombie movies out there now: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Zombeavers, Zombie strippers and World War Z plus Train to Buzan. There seems to be no end (certainly with low budget filmmakers) to these genre pieces. The symbolism is overt: we have become blind to our crass commercialism and it will eat us. We are destroying this planet and the End is nigh. This is a common trope of turn of the century angst, but it was very much around in the post-war era as seen in all the 1950s Sci -Fi monster horrors.

Tech, in particular digital cameras (rendering film stock redundant) has been a transforming miracle. You can correct your mistakes in the edit. You can shoot and shoot until you are happy. This has opened up every subgenre. Nothing is impossible anymore. I would say that “found footage horror” and “the undead” have thus far been the predominant modes, but also that their time will soon pass.

In your opinion what makes a good horror remake?

Some movie remakes The Hills have Eyes, Dawn of the Dead, Evil Dead even, are better than the originals: slicker, quicker, gorier, more effective. A remake works best when the tech is much improved but so has the characterisation and plotting. Halloween (Rob Zombie) didn't work because he focussed far too much on the asylum years – on how a monster was made. We no longer care about that (because we have been told the narrative so many times) but we want to see the plot developing. A good horror remake pays tribute to the narrative of its progenitor but is not encumbered by it. Thus, you might lose a weak story strand or cut out a character if they were thinly written in the first place. There are some movies that are so unique (Hellraiser) that I think you cannot remake them effectively.

Finally, almost without exception, the prequel and sequel are just a cash in (be it the Exorcist or Hannibal Lector) and should not trouble us.

In your opinion, who was the most iconic horror character of the 20th century?

Hannibal Lector, an update of the evil genius that goes all the way back to Charlie Chan films. He is utterly charming and completely ruthless. Although Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, got there first, Hopkins portrayal is more attractive and deeper. It has influenced all subsequent attempts at portraying serial killers, who in real life are dull lone gun nuts (e.g. The Las Vegas shooter) Hannibal and Buffalo Bill are far more compelling.

How has the increase in studio produced blockbusters impacted the horror genre?

That’s also a hard one to define because it’s more the distributors, such as Lionsgate, plus Sony and Warner’s. Studios wants franchises – Final Destination, Saw, etc. but they also want stars in them. Tom Cruise’s Mummy remake in 2017 was a total flop. They are better at Super heroes and fantasy and we ought to leave them to it. Horror is best left to the Indies. Having said that, in the UK, Hammer is producing great work, as are Irish funded films such as In Fear and The Hallow.

What horror movies are most notably a product of the political climate?

Horror is more social than political. We have had plenty of right wing governments and leaders but there has been no overt demonization of Thatcher or Gorbachev or Berlusconi or Trump in movies. Maybe they are demons enough already? There are issues that are addressed in horror, such as global warming/overcrowding, poisoning of us and the oceans, and most have been addressed as Zombie/Undead movies. I would suggest that we are moving backwards and failing to learn from history. Horror tends to accept that we are ruled by the vile and the greedy and puts that aside in order to find and deal with the horror that is inside all of us.

What must a horror movie do to be considered “good” in your opinion?

For me it must certainly scare, subvert, violate and chill. I want it to be open-ended and ideally make me look over my shoulder in the night. Few movies do this. I have been through gore and disgust and you reach a point where you are sated. This is in evidence today in obesity and reality TV but sadly, we are so greedy now that it's just going to go on until it bursts. I prefer my horror to be of the mind, of dark corners, of unease and dread. I prefer the build-up to the climax, which usually disappoints. For me, the greatest horror movies are Martyrs, and Raw, no coincidence both European (France. Belgium). The French really know how to do horror.

What decade was most prolific for horror films?

That is hard to say but I’m going to say a dead heat between the 1980s with the advent of video and Pay TV plus cable, which meant that there was a massive flood of poor quality crappy horror movies. That and the last decade (2000s) with the proliferation of the found footage movies- likewise, easy and cheap to do. The first thing, it seems with new technology, is create porn. Perhaps the second is the low budget horror flick.

What was your favourite horror movie of the last decade?

Martyrs is the best. I am also a big fan of in no particular order. Sinister. Raw. Eden Lake. Kill List. The Awakening. The Babadook. American Mary. Banshee Chapter, 10 Cloverfield Lane. Don't Breathe. The Orphanage. Old Boy The Witch and What We Do in the Shadows.

The best TV horror is American Horror story volumes 1, 2 and 3.

Where do you see the horror genre going in the near future?

Impossible to say. CG has provided us with all manner of monsters and there seems nowhere to go now with all those Cthulhu types. Frankenstein and Dracula are sleeping lightly right now, but they are bound to return – they always do. It’s all in a very healthy place right now, after all there is so much horror out in the real world that it can easily be realised in film.

Long form TV streaming services are also beginning to catch on with American Horror story. Stranger Things and The TV adaptation of the Mist. It is hard to sustain the threat for ten episodes but these are superb. There will be more there and I think horror will decamp to Netflix (because that is where its world-wide audience is (95 million and counting). One caveat. With the exception of AHS, you don’t really re-watch the box sets so they have a limited streaming life, but that won’t stop Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, Sky and others from buying them in bulk. I hope.

Axman – my psychological thriller (now in postproduction) will hopefully be out in 2019.

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