Week 5 - Aesthetics of Horror Research

1)
Bruce Fletcher, director of the San Francisco Independent Film Festival, is preparing for his annual horror festival called Another Hole in the Head. Fletcher’s festival lasts about one week and is attended by several kung-ho horror aficionados. The festival is dedicated to show horror cinema from all over the world.
Since Fletcher was a child, he has been passionate about horror, “He admits to an uncontrollable blood lust for celluloid depicting ghouls, zombies, aliens and other grotesque beings…” In Noel Carroll’s essay “Why Horror?” she asks the reader, “Why are horror audiences attracted by what, typically (in everyday life) should (and would) repel them?” Throughout “Why Horror?” Carroll explains horror to pleasurable because the narration is suspenseful. The audience is involved with the plot because it awaits the entrance of the big, bad, ugly monster. On page 279, Carroll states, “...the horror story is driven explicitly by curiosity. It engages its audience by being involved in processes of disclosure, discovery, proof, explanation, hypothesis, and confirmation.” Point proven. The narrative is the foundation for the horror. The grotesque horror becomes more acceptable when the story is well established. Fletcher too believes in the same concept, “The point I’m trying to make is that horror and sci-fi lend themselves to daring, experimental, subversive and potentially transgressive filmmaking within a narrative context.” For the hardcore horror film geeks such as Fletcher, take his advice, “The bloodier the movies, the better.”

Stanley, J. (2006, June 4). Oh, horrors! [Electronic version]. San Francisco Chronicle, pp. PK-39.

2)
In this short article, Wes Craven spoke to a film audience about the Starz horror documentary “Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film.” Craven discusses his perspective on narrative within horror films, and how the audience can get a rush from a plot with a thrilling narrative and powerful monster. The newspaper reporter, Tim Goodman, said this:
He (Wes Craven) contemplated how fear of irrational violence makes people seek out a release in scary movies. People don’t go to movies to be scared. They go because they’re scared of something else already, and the horror film when shared with an audience (and, generally, a hero who may win out in the end) gives everyone collective relief.
Berys Gaut, author of “The Paradox of Horror”, refutes Carroll’s theory that there is a paradox of horror. The paradox states, “We enjoy intrinsically unpleasant emotions.” Gaut’s position is to persuade the reader that the “most straightforward explanation of the phenomenon of horror is that sometimes people enjoy being scared.” Gaut and Carroll have interesting theories regarding horror and they use different evidence to support their ideas. After reading both essays, Gauts' reasoning was more convincing.

Goodman, T. (2006, July 12). Listen up, bub. Wes Craven is onstage – let him speak! [Electronic version]. San Francisco
Chronicle, pp. E-1.