Chasing the Dragon and Different Ways to Appreciate Horror

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I wasn’t a horror kid. I liked a bit of spooky and I enjoyed monsters, but it took me a while to really grow into the genre.  I remember specific TV commercials for horror movies really freaking me out.  One of the Hellraiser films, a Phantasm, Poltergeist III, a Nightmare on Elm Street, and very specifically, Child’s Play.  The trailer for Child’s Play really got to me to such an extent that I took my beloved talking Alf doll (Hey, no problem!), tied him up, put him in a sack, tied the sack with ropes, put it in another sack, taped it up, and then put it in a box with books on top of it. I mean, I didn’t really think it would come to life and kill me, but why take chances, right?

These days, it takes so much more to get me to falsely imprison a childhood toy. I’ve grown to love horror and I’ve seen a lot, and as a result, it’s harder and harder to actually get scared. There are probably only a handful of films since I became a fan that have really rattled me, giving me that delicious tremble, leaving me in a new state. But I keep looking.

Elric Kane, the co-host of the Colors of the Dark podcast, of which I’m a regular listener, often terms this ‘chasing the dragon,’ drug lingo referencing the “elusive pursuit of a high equal to the user’s first in the use of a drug, which after acclimation is no longer achievable.”

And maybe it isn’t achievable. Maybe I’ve built up a tolerance. Maybe I’ll never again feel the way I did after the first time I watched Black Christmas (1974) when I felt compelled to lock the doors to my apartment, turn on all the lights, and check that there were no surprises hiding in any closets or under any beds (mind you, I was in my 20s when I saw it – what some might generously term an ‘adult’).

So does that mean that I’m doomed to be disappointed by everything I see from here on out? I don’t think so. I think there are different ways to appreciate a horror film, different ways to love one. Herein, I plan to present a few with some examples.

The Elusive Deep Scare

This is the above mentioned classic scary movie experience.  A film takes you in completely and keeps you in a heightened state for the duration, such that when complete, it stays with you, and for some time at least, you inhabit the ‘real world’ differently.  And really, this is what I always want from Art. I want the art experience to change me, even if temporarily, to leave me in a different place, looking with different eyes, at least for some time.

Most examples that come to mind are classics from early in my Horror fandom. After watching Candyman for the first time, I really needed to pee, but that sure wasn’t going to happen any time soon. I wasn’t willing to go near the bathroom until at least an hour later (after watching an episode of 24).

There was one episode of Twin Peaks. No idea which episode it was, but I remember I had been watching it on dvd on my laptop while lying in bed getting drowsy, and there was this sequence when Bob climbed over a sofa and started approaching the camera and, especially in my half-awake state, it really felt like he was coming directly at me. This was helped by the persistent quality of unreality, of the uncanny that pervaded Lynch’s series.  

I think a feature of a good ‘deep scare’ is that it is somehow enriched.  It is not only about getting startled, but that first you are unsettled for an extended period and that there is something else to the horror – not only some scary moments.  There is some horrific idea beneath it all (that even if you realize it’s only a dream, you still aren’t safe, that some toy you love, something innocent and soft, could have it in for you, that the home space could be so permeable, so vulnerable, and that therefore, there is no safety anywhere). There is some substance to the film in addition to the scariness that lets it get its claws into you. And, of course, it is scary.  Of course, this is the hardest experience to come by the longer I watch these movies.

The Enveloping Horror

Whereas Deep Scares are few and far between, this next experience is far more available. These days, if I see a horror movie and love it, this is what it’s probably delivering.  Some films can just take you in, holding you completely in their space, such that when they’re over, you take some of that space with you.  This is mainly distinguished from the category above by the fact that you don’t exactly get scared, but the horror on offer still satisfies in a deep way. 

Ironically, the emotion I often take away from this is delight.  I remember watching the 2018 Suspiria remake and just loving the feeling of the world, of the mystery, of the threat and ultimate rise to power, and that whole bloody, musical, ritualistic, stylized end sequence, the smile on my face spread from ear to ear. I danced home that night, just feeling magic in the night. And the feeling persists.

Watching Cabin in the Woods the first time was also joyful. I can’t claim it was scary, but the reflexive approach it took regarding horror fandom and specifically, what a fan wants to see, the play with genre tropes, and especially, the decision taken by the protagonist at the end all satisfied so deeply (it’s really not the direction most films would have taken) and left me elated.

Both of Robert Eggers’s films, The VVitch and The Lighthouse delivered the same high. And both left me smiling rather than fearful (really, who wouldn’t want to live deliciously?). And yet, I feel both of these, and all of the above listed films, are certainly horror.  A key element of this rapture consists in the pinch of the horrific, in this case quite similar to the dramatically satisfying pinch of tragedy. The awfulness of the thing, in juxtaposition with its own beauty (a parallel perhaps to Hegel’s definition of tragedy as the occurrence of mutually exclusive goods), is an essential ingredient of this envelopment.

While Deep Scares represent the dragon, ever chased, rarely caught, these Enveloping Horrors actually make up most of my favorite horror films. For one thing, they exist—you can find them. Also, appreciation for them tends to deepen on re-watch.  This isn’t always the case with the first category, which having been seen once, will never be quite so scary again. The best case scenario is that, sapped of its ability to frighten due to familiarity, the Deep Scare can carry on as an Enveloping Horror.  Candyman won’t keep me out of the bathroom any more, but it is still a pleasure dwelling in its space.

Good Movies with Horror

So this final group makes up most of the horror movies worth watching. Maybe the scare isn’t so deep. Perhaps the experience doesn’t exactly envelope. But it’s a good movie.  The characters are enjoyable, or the plot is engaging, or the writing compels.  Maybe there are really impressive practical effects and you can see the passionate creativity that went into its production. Often, they are just fun. A good movie, but with at least some soupçon of horror.

Scream is a good example. It’s a horror movie – masked killer gutting teenagers one by one and all, but the horror is not the primary element.  Character and writing, rather, are dominant.  It’s funny. It’s entertaining. There is enjoyable mystery to unravel in trying to determine who the killer is. The music is good. The filmmaking is solid.  It is, all around, a good movie, with a horror idea at its core.

Or for a more recent example, just the other day I finally checked out Jakob’s Wife on Shudder, and I really liked it.  Basically, it is a domestic drama with comic elements about a preacher’s wife, long bored in her marriage and life, who wakes up and commits to start living more fully. Can her husband go along, and will the marriage survive, or will she have to go it alone and leave him behind to become the person she wants to be?  Of course the event that wakes her up is being bitten by a vampire and living her best life means drinking human blood.

The thing is, I think that had this just been the domestic drama described, it could have been a decent flick.  Barbara Crampton is great in it as the titular character – I think it’s the best thing I’ve seen her do – and Larry Fessenden’s Jakob manages to be such a bore, while not veering into caricature. I believe them as people and as a couple. Plus, it’s often very funny, without exactly being a comedy. The comic elements all grow quite naturally out of the dramatic, and sometimes horrific, context (there is a surprising amount of gore that can elicit a startled laugh in just how far it goes).

But if it had just been that relationship drama, I probably wouldn’t have watched it.  Adding the vampiric element lifts it up.  Everything is quite literally life and death.  You know, it adds stakes…(sorry).  But seriously, the supernatural horror element really allows for an extremity in the story that might not have been possible otherwise and just makes it all more fun.  It’s a good movie with horror. And that horror makes it better.

Of course, there are many other ways to enjoy a horror movie.  I make no claims at exhaustive taxonomy, but I think these three cover much of the field.  

How can you not Love this Witch?

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When I first saw this one advertised, it sounded interesting, but something about the stilted style in the trailer just didn’t pull me in. I’m so glad I eventually gave it a chance. I’ve now watched it at least 4-5 times and I think it’s just great.

The Love Witch (2016)

This is a visually arresting film that is more than a little difficult to process.  One part early 70s pastiche melodrama, one part satire of persistent gender expectations, and one part art house flick, with just a dash of occult sexploitation, it is an exercise in deep criticism and deeper irony, asking us to both identify with its protagonist’s tragic tale of loves lost and loves murdered, and to question the often (self) destructive ways of thinking that she has come to espouse. It’s a heady, gorgeous, stylized piece of work that calls for critical response.

Written, directed, produced, costume designed, set decorated, art directed, scored, and edited by Anna Biller, this is a true piece of auteur cinema. It is clear that absolutely nothing appears on screen accidentally and that everything, from the hemming of a dress, to a musical quotation in the score, to the hint of discomfort on an actor’s face is fully intentional, often carrying consciously chosen meaning.  It invites the viewer to analyze what is presented, but it offers few obvious readings. 

Characters sometimes speak very explicitly, presenting ideas that sound like authorial voice, but the choice of the mouthpiece for those very ideas sometimes undercuts the sense that they should be trusted.  The narrative and focus on Samantha Robinson’s Elaine draws the viewer into her cool, love obsessed mania, but at the same time, other characters directly call out her seemingly patriarchy perpetuating views and much of the course of the story shows that this way to lead to madness—plus, she also comes across as quite the sociopath (as in the scene where she meets with a friend to theoretically comfort her after her husband’s lovesick suicide, but is cold as ice and unwilling to engage with any emotions that are not her own), so maybe not the best person to choose as a role model, even if charming and perfectly coifed. 

It feels so clear that Biller knows exactly what she wants to communicate, but at the same time, there is a constant irony, casting any interpretation of even the most seemingly on the nose symbolism into doubt.

The story follows Elaine as she relocates to a new town from San Francisco, following her husband “leaving her” (by ceasing to draw breath). 

A friend of a friend, Trish (Laura Waddell), shows her the house she’s arranged to stay in and takes her out for lunch at a tea room that seems to exist inside whatever it is that wedding cakes dream about.

 We learn of Elaine’s obsession with being loved by men and her insistence that the only way to find satisfaction is to give them whatever they want (food, beauty, sex, ect.) so that they will love her as much as she loves them. 

She uses “sex magic to make love magic” but that love magic never ends well, generally killing the targeted male by overwhelming him with emotions he’s incapable of coping with.  This plays out with a couple of men she sets her sights on, including the local professor/self-styled libertine, Wayne (Jeffrey Vincent Parise) and Trish’s husband, Richard (Robert Seeley), before locking firmly onto the particularly manly (toxically so) detective who’s investigating Wayne’s murder, Griff (Gian Keys). 

Unlike the others who have cracked, becoming blubbering messes in their newfound feelings for her, thus turning her off by being weak “like a woman”, Griff maintains a certain disdain for Elaine and her desire, both satisfying her with his overt masculinity and crushing her with his rejection.  In the end, claiming him for herself, she stabs his heart out, mirroring a tarot-inspired painting adorning her bedroom wall.

The story is fairly straightforward, but this short summary does it little justice, especially without presenting a sense of the overall style and stylization of the picture.  The whole film is made to look as if it were filmed sometime in the past (mid 50s, late 60s, early 70s perhaps—it’s never exactly clear), though the presence of cell phones situates it in the more or less present, resulting in the story feeling somehow outside of time, but rooted in old fashioned mores of masculinity and femininity. 

This presents itself in the technicolor-approximating film stock, the 50s era hard lighting, the sumptuous costuming and makeup and set dressing, and of course, the stilted, presentational acting choices.  This last aspect could certainly turn off a viewer, but is probably one of the most effective aspects of the film, allowing a clear analytical distance between spoken text and filmmaker intent, and underlining the absurdity of character relationships, such as the hyper-masculine, square jawed Griff being served constantly by other officers in his precinct who happen to be female or people of color (you can help him in this murder investigation by getting him a sandwich—you know how he likes it). And it is often very funny. 

This style allows for moments or scenes that in any other film would stand out as unrealistic, such as the scene in which Elaine meets Wayne and, in under two minutes of dialogue, has him eagerly take her to his remote cabin for dinner and sex.  It’s quick work and a nice spot of whimsy.

This style also lets Gahan (Jared Sanford), the leader of Elaine’s coven, spend nearly 4 minutes lecturing girls at a burlesque club on the importance of reclaiming and harnessing feminine sexuality in order to exert real power in life and have men finally see them as human beings while in the background, the men in the club go crazy over the performer on stage.  This is a great example of the dialectic of the film between spoken and visual text.  On one level, the words he speaks seem like they could reflect the filmmaker’s views, that the reclaiming of female sexuality and desire is empowering, but the fact that it is a man speaking them, and particularly this man, whose touch we see Elaine shrinking from and who elicits a cringe when he kisses her in greeting, who it seems might just have gotten involved with witchcraft because it grants him authority over a bevy of often naked girls who he can have sex with, because, um magic and stuff, really undercuts his words and, while aspects ring true, the dubious motives of their speaker makes them seem suspect.

And the style also makes it possible to include a fairly long scene at a Ren Fair hosted by the coven where Elaine and Griff are taken through a fairytale mock wedding after which voiceovers of their conflicting views of love (her: in time, a woman loves all of a man’s little foibles more and more and a love grows stronger and more grounded; him: love makes you weak and in time, any woman becomes irritating and trapping) overlaying scenes of their newlywed bliss. It’s a strange, funny, pretty-if-kinda-silly-looking, and it lays bare how doomed they both are in this relationship.  We know she will be hurt and we expect he won’t survive it (though I think we also don’t feel particularly bad about that).

Ultimately, this is an intriguing watch.  Especially on first viewing, the film’s approach provides a really novel experience, and it can be hard to know what to make of it. Some will be irritated and some will be enraptured, but it is inarguably unique and clearly expressive of a creative, thoughtful, and singular mind at work.

The Imp of the Perverse

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It’s a busy time for me right now. I’ve started this blog and besides writing, I need to stay on top of self-promotion. I’m working on a new show and there are texts to write and learn, rehearsals to organize and run, and tentacles and monsters to stitch together (more on that in another post). And of course, I also have to work (preparing and giving classes and doing proofreading) and earn money to keep myself in bandwidth, liquid latex, and fake fur. And yet, the other night I watched four episodes of a TV show that I don’t even really like that much. Argh.  Why? Why would I do something so pointless?

I think good old Poe put his finger on it in his 1885 story, The Imp of the Perverse, which puts into words so clearly, a human tendency at the heart of so much of his writing, a tendency which may often go unconsidered. The overwhelming urge to perform an act precisely because it is the wrong thing to do:

“I am not more certain that I breathe, than that the assurance of the wrong or error of any action is often the one unconquerable force which impels us, and alone impels us to its prosecution. Nor will this overwhelming tendency to do wrong for the wrong’s sake, admit of analysis, or resolution into ulterior elements. It is a radical, a primitive impulse — elementary.”

Perverseness

The story is an odd one, but I love it.  For the first half, it comes across as a treatise on this psychological element, its narrator (who I had first assumed to be Poe-as-essayist) expounding upon history’s failures to account for irrationality before describing and naming this drive and giving three familiar examples: the urge of a usually succinct and generally kind speaker to irritate his or her listener by blathering on in a circuitous manner (an urge which my wife could attest I sometimes indulge in—though, to be fair, I could never claim to be laconic to begin with), the temptation, when standing on a precipice, to take the plunge, and the penchant to put off till tomorrow that which we most want to do today.  His characterization of this procrastination is, perhaps, most striking in how true it rings.

“We have a task before us which must be speedily performed. We know that it will be ruinous to make delay. The most important crisis of our life calls, trumpet-tongued, for immediate energy and action. We glow, we are consumed with eagerness to commence the work, with the anticipation of whose glorious result our whole souls are on fire. It must, it shall be undertaken to-day, and yet we put it off until to-morrow, and why? There is no answer…”

I can only assume based on my own experience of living, that this is a situation everyone has been in.  But maybe it’s just me and old Edgar…

Shortly after, the story takes a turn and becomes, well, a story.  The narrator is telling us all this to explain how he ended up in this cell, condemned to die.  Having committed a very well calculated and painstakingly carried out murder, which had gone off without a hitch, and after which, he had acquired a large inheritance and lived comfortably for years, the narrator had realized that the only way that he could ever be caught would be if he “were fool enough to confess.”  Following that epiphany, he could not stop thinking about it until he finally snapped and publicly declared his wrong doing.  Thus, it was this imp of the perverse that has led him to his doom.

First of all, it is a tasty bit of irony that our example here of the imp is not the drive that led him to kill, which had been fully rational, but rather, that which has led him to confess.  You might take for granted that a devil on the shoulder is more likely to needle someone into crime, into “sin,” but in Poe’s conception it is simpler and more broad.  Simply the wrong act.  The one for which there is no good reason, no motive.  The motive for the killing had been obvious—money. The motive for admission is not so clear—but it surely wasn’t guilt.

Broader application

In this, I think Poe captures a human truth which, to this day, can still go overlooked.  How often are characters in books, in films, on TV, written to be internally consistent, psychologically understood characters, driven by clear motivations.  We criticize the writing when that lapses. And yet, I don’t think that’s who we always are.  And it’s not merely a case of some kind of Freudian death drive, but that sometimes we act with no clear motivation at all. Sometimes we do something stupid, something cruel, something self-defeating, or just something odd or nonsensical simply because that is the thing that we do.

And this is not only a literary concern.  I remember circa 2010, reading an essay reflecting on the economic crisis at the time, which criticized modern economists’ continued reliance on an outdated and inaccurate figure from classical economic theory, Homo Economicus. First conceptualized by figures like John Stuart Mill and Adam Smith, this theoretical economic agent “acts to obtain the highest possible well-being for him or herself given available information about opportunities and other constraints, both natural and institutional on his ability to achieve his predetermined goals.”  A great deal of economic models have been based on this notion that en masse, people act out of rational, informed self-interest.

While people may be essentially self-serving, I think it unrealistic to state that we are, as a rule, rational or informed. Thus, forecasts, economic or otherwise, based on such expectations seem doomed to inaccuracy.  To be fair, there are many competing theories and Homo Economicus was already being criticized in Mill’s day, but the idea persists. We still expect ourselves and each other to have reasons for doing what we do.

Horror

So what about horror? This is a horror blog, after all.

Beyond the fact that this qualifies as a horror story (murder, madness, and what not), I think that any time that horror (film, writing, etc.) falls into being too rational, it can ring false. Or at the very least, it can feel flat. But when a taste of mystery is sustained, when we can’t see the whole thing, when it feels that there are depths we cannot plumb, it is that much richer; it has a chance of delivering that delectable shudder of the uncanny.

I mean, of course, there should be motivations. I’m not saying that we should abandon all sense of psychological causality and lazily just offer up any old thing without thinking it through, but if at the end of the story, a killer can honestly and exactly state their motivation, whether it be revenge, money, fame, or love, it often underwhelms, not doing justice to the staggering inferences of a word like ‘horror.’ In counterpoint, think of the final moment of The Strangers when the killers, asked why they have done these horrible things, simply answer, “because you were home.”  Chilling.

Horror is best when there is an element of not just the unknown, but the unknowable. And that need not mean abstract, tentacled, ancient, evil gods from another dimension. Rather, if a work brings us into contact with that which is unknowable within the human heart and mind, it can be most effective.

Halloween approacheth

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Here we are in October. “Spooky season.” Pumpkin spice, if that’s a thing where you live. (I don’t think it’s quite so ubiquitous in Poland.) Let’s kick things off with a short look at one of the most iconic of the seasonal offerings:

Halloween (1978)

This is going to be pretty short—more of a blurb than anything else as I assume that everything that needs to be written about this one has already made it to print.  It may no longer have the power to scare me as I’ve seen it plenty of times, but it is surely a kind of comfort food, satisfying in so many different ways.

I like the characters.  I’m not rooting for them to bite it, as might occasionally be the case with the nameless casts of the many later imitators which would follow in Halloween’s footsteps.  I mean, they’re not exactly exercises in depth, but I buy them as people, as friends.  There are laughs to be had and their relationships are believable.  And at the same time, they are drawn with broad enough strokes that the dominant feeling when they die is the jolt of terror rather than the weight of mourning. 

The film making is confident and precise, while still operating on a tight budget, and makes economical choices that pay off in atmosphere and artistry. It’s really something how this movie, filmed in May in California, really evokes a midwestern fall.  Apparently it was too warm for real fallen leaves, so they scattered paper leaves around, which they had to collect after each shot so they could be reused. The score, while repetitive, is also relentless and so simple.  Both the film and its killer are playful with their scares, making it such a fun popcorn scary movie.

And, at the same time, it really contributed to placing horror in, and showing the lie of, a new setting—cozy, suburban, small town America, a place where your kids can feel safe walking to school and you don’t have to lock your doors, but when a teenage girl is screaming for help in the middle of the night, people will turn off their porchlights and pretend not to be home, rather than stick their neck out for someone else in need. 

Many things can be scary, but in this moment of seeing just how little these comfortable suburbanites are willing to go out of their way to help a terrified kid, it is really chilling, and it offers a moment of horror: the chilling comprehension that “this is probably true—this is how people would behave—I may greet my neighbors with a smile and a nod, but if I really needed help, there’s every chance that they’d close their doors, and if one is to be totally honest, if the situation were reversed, I may very well close mine.”  That realization—that confrontation with a terrible truth—is really the essence, I think, of horror as a concept and this is a good, simple, very effective example.

While this was certainly not the first slasher, it surely fixed the formulas, even when it did so inadvertently.  Laurie is the platonic ideal of the final girl archetype, down to and including the nigh Freudian way that she adopts a series of different sharp, long, pointy, penetrative objects to fight back with, but that all of them imply some kind of traditionally coded feminine element—the coat hanger, the knitting needle, even the kitchen knife—all of which can be read as markers of ‘women’s work’ and the domesticity that is being invaded by this very masculine-coded killer. 

And still, I take Carpenter at his word that he was not thinking about these things.  They just came out of the setting—out of the situation.  These are the available weapons in a home that doesn’t have guns.  Laurie doesn’t end up being the final girl because her friends are punished for being sexual.  Rather, she is alone, lonely, and paying attention.  They are distracted, having fun, fooling around and, therefore, easier targets.

And there are just so many standout moments: the opening tracking shot, featuring presumably the fastest off screen sex scene ever (the young couple leaves the living room to go upstairs and 85 seconds later, we see the boy coming out of the bedroom, putting his shirt back on—it’s fast!), so effective and chilling and clever; Dr. Loomis going on about “the blackest eyes, the devil’s eyes”; the growing irritation/comedy of Linda “totally” only seeming to know one word; the moment when the shape appears out of the shadows that Laurie had been backing into; Michael tilting his head to examine his handiwork after stabbing Bob to the wall; and of course, the final moments after the killer has disappeared and the camera shows us the empty hallway, the empty stairwell, the empty street—there are shadows everywhere and anything could be waiting in them—nothing will ever feel safe again. 

For all these reasons and so many more, this one is a classic which can really help set the tone any October.