The Horror!

Halloween is my favorite time of the year. One reason is that the cold weather is a welcome sensation to the burning of the summer sun. Another is the horror. Oh yes, the horror. Horror films show us the dark side of humanity. They show us lunatics in masks that kill because they were made fun of. They show us the fears of old. They give us social commentary. The gritty, realistic ones truly scare, while the over-the-top ones give a genuine chuckle. Films like Hellraiser, exposed many of us to the underbelly of sexual perversion, that delicate line between pleasure and pain. Pinhead is one of the most fearsome characters to be placed on the screen. His blatant disregard for humanity is what scares. John Carpenter introduced us to the slasher genre with Halloween. Michael Myers hides behind a Captain Kirk likeness of William Shatner mask. He could be anyone. We don’t get to see his face until the sequel. He looks normal enough, except for his eyes. They are wild and sunken. He scares because he hides in the dark and stalks his prey silently. He could be behind you anywhere. Jason Voorhees, of hockey masked Friday the 13th fame, is almost invincible. He has been deemed “too stupid to die.” This does not mean he is not creative in the ways he disposes of stereotypical camp counselors year after year. A film of the silent era, Nosferatu, gives a face to Bram Stoker’s 1897 classic Dracula. His are the eyes a child can see through the window of your home in the dark if you look hard enough. He is the stuff of nightmares, a fiend in black, thirsting for blood to keep him alive. It takes life to give life. The Wolf Man is the stuff of legend, a star crossed as well as cross bred man-beast. He scares because who has not seen or believed they have seen a large animal in the woods at night? Some characters are based on actual people. Leatherface in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Norman Bates from Hitchcock’s Psycho, and Buffalo Bill from The Silence of the Lambs are all based on Ed Gein, the killer of Plainfield, Wisconsin. These characters scare us because they could unsuspectingly be your neighbors; neighbors who wear other’s skin because they do not like their own, neighbors who developed a taste for flesh fighting in a foreign land, neighbors who seem normal, but lurking below their façade is pure insanity. When the police raided Gein’s home after report of a strange stench, they found human skulls used as bowls, furniture composed of bones, skin used as lampshades, and hanging bodies in his garage. He was the mild-mannered guy that was quiet and kept to himself. Sound like one of your neighbors? Starting in 1968, with Night of the Living Dead, George Romero has used zombie movies to criticize America. In Night, it was the horrors of the Vietnam War along with the strained race relations in the wake of integration. The hero of this film is black, which was away from the norm during this period. He survives the zombie attack only to be killed by white policemen who only “thought” he was a zombie. In the 1978's Dawn of the Dead, the setting of the mall highlighted America's brain-dead, blind consumerism. Some classic films are attributed to the genre, but it is often overlooked. Some recommendations: If you want to get sick, Cannibal Holocaust or Zombie provide plenty of stomach churning action, not for the weak stomached; If you want a good movie that just happens to be a horror film, watch any of the Universal classics or The Omen, The Exorcist, or Jaws. American Psycho is one of my personal favorites. On TV many channels show the Nightmare on Elm Street(s), Friday the 13th(s), Halloween(s), and any other well recognized franchise. Another gem is The Evil Dead. John Carpenter's The Thing is excellent and features an all-star lineup. Dario Argento's Suspiria is another vivid tale in technicolor. Enjoy.