Essay on Theorists

The horror genre has evolved over many years since its beginning; and there are theorists that not only pushed the development of the horror genre further, but also other film genres too, not just horror films alone. In this essay, there are five theorists that will be reconnoitred and the way they morph and apply to my trailer. The first theorist I’ll talk about is Altman, who suggested that horror movies offers its audience a set of pleasures: emotional pleasures offers the audiences of genre films are particularly significant when they generate a strong audience response, for example, movies from the j horror genre. Visceral pleasures are gut responses and are defined by how the film's stylistic construction elicits a physical effect upon its audience. This can be a feeling of revulsion, kinetic speed or a 'roller coaster ride'. This applies to my film trailer as the sub-genre I want to make a trailer from is a slasher, as I want produce jump scares and some scenes of gore like in “A Nightmare on Elm Street” or “Halloween” where my inspiration comes from. Another pleasure is that of intellect; genres such as the thriller offer the pleasure in trying to unravel a mystery or a puzzle. Pleasure is derived from deciphering the plot and forecasting the end or being surprised by the unexpected. The second theorist is Metz, who came up with the idea that there are four stages of development within a film genre; experimental, classical, revisionist and parodic. These four stages made horror films what they are today, which is the postmodernists period; where ideas are being taken from films and are recreated into something new, questioning everything that’s been done within the genre since its beginning. Without Metz, I wouldn’t have all the building blocks from each stage of development to create my film trailer. For example, “Psycho”, which is from the experimental stage of the slasher subgenre, relates to my film trailer because it provides a sense of the use of phallic objects being used, and also the convention of masks to hide the identity of the antagonist. Chandler’s theory is very short and sweet. He states that there all genres have subgenres, which is correct as the horror genre has nine subgenres in total. The subgenre that applies to me and my trailer is slasher, which justifies Chandler’s theory. Steve Neale is another theorist, who argues that pleasure is derived from repetition and difference as it expands the genre to match the constant changing palettes of the audience. This also applies to my film trailer, as I’m drawing all sense of inspiration from different films within the slasher subgenre. For example, the concept behind the antagonist from “Friday the 13th” is where the inspiration behind my antagonist comes from. The use of a phallic object in “Psycho” (the knife) was acknowledged and so I will also be using a phallic object in my film trailer (and axe). This highlights Neale’s theories and justifies it, as my film will still be giving the audience some sort of pleasure as its different and new, but repeated. Last but not least, Burton is a theorist that implied that everything to do with conventions and the characters within a novel. He said that there is always a protagonist, stock characters, stock situations, icons, background and themes in a movie. These factors all apple to my film, as the protagonist is the final girl, who goes to summer camp with the rest of her group of friends; which happen to be the stock characters – the cool jock, the ethnic minority, the slut/cheerleader, the nerd, and the3 final girl herself. The stock situations you’ll see in my film trailer: the curious person that wants to find out something or looking for trouble or believes that whatever the situation nothing will happen to them. This is normally the person who says ‘I’ll be right back’ but they end up being killed. This applies to Burton as they’ll be included in my horror trailer, likewise the icons that’ll be used, for example, the axe/knife, the mask, the use of blood, as well as the settings/backgrounds used in typical slasher films, e.g. the woods, a suburban area – showing that my trailer applies to his theory.