Between the smell of death and stumbling against a corpse - Thoughts on the politics of horror

"What scares me is what scares you. We're all afraid of the same things. That's why horror is such a powerful genre. All you have to do is ask yourself what frightens you and you'll know what frightens me." - John Carpenter

It is through politics that affairs are governed, and order and justice are expected. However, the word “politics” often connotes corruption and abuse. Politics involve power, and power implies its own misuse. The double bind of politics is in its very inescapability. Politics serve to organize, yet simultaneously produce dishonesty through the abuse of power.

The word “horror” is connected to painful emotions, deep, dark fear, and intense abhorrence. The power displayed in the horror genre is intense and evil first and foremost, taking hold of innocent lives and turning them inside out. Our everyday routine is suddenly disrupted by something that “cannot be”, something outside of the terms of reality.This power seizes us, controls, and makes escape impossible. When the politics of the Real combines with the politics of fiction, namely that of Horror, the outcome is polarizing.

How do we react when are confronted with radical changes and life-altering events? Do we rejoice that our platitudinous day-to-day will abate, do we look forward to a new beginning? Or does a spontaneous cataclysm of our regular subsistence scare us senseless by bringing disorder into our acquainted, explicable world? Our highly rational mindset is shattered, as horror “might be seen as the return of the Enlightenment’s repressed” (Carroll 56). These questions can be applied to most, if not all, situations in our lives. They are equally applicable to the horror genre in general: a force, human or not, enters our sphere of existence, reversing all we know into chaos. Horror affects us, it touches us in places where we have forgotten we could be touched, and it confronts us with our worst fears. Since it is so close to our innermost fears, it is also a perfect vessel for a concrete subtext. With its “choice of objectionable subjects” and by “making an agreement with an aesthetics of bad taste and pre-Enlightenment ethics” (Brittnacher 11; translation by me), the horror genre is a genre of transgression as well as regression, deploying both progressive and reactionary directives, similar to politics with its broad spectrum of tendencies.

The horror genre is a child of crisis; horror productions flourish when times are rough, and the box office grosses reach unforeseen heights. This may be due in part to the direct invocation of our fears in the shape of the onscreen events as well as the indirect appeal by the plot’s inherent meaning. Moreover, traumatic events of our time are incorporated into the realm of the horrendous. The 9/11 terrorist attacks for instance have had a great influence on the genre, as several of the articles in this dossier also intend to prove.

The sensations of horror and terror within fiction have been associated frequently over the course of the last centuries: Ann Radcliffe proposed her own distinction as early as 1826. Commonly, horror and terror are separated as techniques by distinguishing “between the smell of death and stumbling against a corpse”, as Devendra P. Varma explains. Terror is the sensation of dread one experiences before the terrible event, whereas the feeling of horror strikes afterwards. With the addition of the visual sphere through horror cinema, horror and terror are no longer mere sensations; the viewer is visually confronted with undeniable phenomena. With the rise of international terrorism, ‘terror’ has become manifest (not least by the inflationary use of war and torture imagery) and thereby a steadfast influence on the genre, supplying many films with a political edge.

The typical human fear of the unknown, both that which surpasses comprehension (i.e. metaphysical objects, or Immanuel Kant’s ‘terrifying sublime’) and that which is merely strange and alien, is unmasked in the horror genre. More often than not, a deep seated conservatism is exuded by this genre’s installments, an affirmation of the status quo produced by the defeat of the force disturbing the natural order.

In the face of horror, the protagonist freezes, become incapable of reacting, all defense mechanisms become inane. Since horror as both a technique applied in fiction as well as a discrete genre is targeted on the recipient’s affect, he or she is equally appalled and paralyzed upon this vicarious encounter with the horrific. We are chilled to the bone by it, whether it is inexplicable and otherworldly as a revenant, indescribable and brutally callous as Leatherface, or incomprehensible and very real as any traumatic historical event that takes our breath away with its beastliness.

The politics of horror are as diverse as the politics of real life, and it seems futile to attempt a categorization of the genre’s political stance. The fall of an empire by revolutionary upheaval cannot be considered progressive regardless of the consequences, and neither can the destruction of order in the face of paranormal chaos be interpreted as purely conservative.

Works Cited
Brittnacher, Hans Richard. Ästhetik des Horrors. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1994. C
arrol, Noel. The Philosophy of Horror, or Paradoxes of the Heart. New York: Routledge, 1990.
Varma, Devendra P. The Gothic Flame. New York: Russell & Russell, 1966.

Originally published in Jura Gentium Cinema

Monsters in America

Monsters in America: Our Historical Obsession with the Hideous and the Haunting



I don't know if this is any good but it sounds interesting. Oh, I'm sorry... were you looking for a review? ;-)

Reality Bites ... not so much

Dear Diary,

I'm sorry to say that 15-year old me would be disappointed in the following findings. My generation has turned from disillusioned slackers to overambitioned family people!

According to this study, Generation X has "grown up to find out that reality doesn't bite as much it seemed". This is pretty funnny - but I'm not sure it matches our social reality. I'm torn between being glad about "our" positive world view that totally contradicts past notions of us being notoriously single, bad parents, and generally depressed, and finding it hard to fully identify with this. I too watched films like Reality Bites and Singles in my teens, and I pretty much always thought reality was a steaming heap of whatchamacallit. Right. What would our friends, the Constructivists think about this?

Isn't reality what we make it? I know the study doesn't go into detail about this at all because this is not its objective but I can't shake the feeling that the world view of some well-off Generation X-ers might not be representative of the general state of things. If we only look at their singled-out cases though, I guess it is. Sometimes it might be helpful to isolate a group of people from the general state of reality, as it was done with this study - so all social criticism aside, Generation X grew up to be awesome, balanced, and happy. I still don't buy the marriage thing, but hey, to each their own. It just goes to show that a social view of you does not create a social reality. So Generation X was said to be unambitioned and lazy - so? According to this study, we're all totally ambitioned. Maybe this generation has successfully escaped social expectations - or fulfilled them completely.
You decide.

P.S.: For those of you who are actually capable of reading studies, n=4,000.

On eating, pimping, and consumption

Very recently, I had planned on writing a paper on the strange world of food blogs, examining in how far the public display of disordered eating has suddenly become acceptable, and maybe even gained support. I never got around to it because, well, some people say "life got in the way" but that's just idiotic. In reality, I got tangled up in work and other research, and that didn't get in the way, it just outranked the paper in importance.

Anyhow, I had all these links lined up in my Google Reader to serve as a basis for my research, and just gave them a once-over. Somehow I felt the need to at least write something about the topic, if
not on an academic level, then at least "privately" on my blog.

I suppose this needs a disclaimer so that - in case anyone does read this - I will not be accused of making generalizations. I don't question nutrition data or anyone's choice of diet. I looked at the relationship between so-called weight loss blogs and their behavior towards their readers. To be more precise, I tried to understand the connection between severely restricting your food intake on the one hand, and advertising products like bars, nut butters, and chocolate by affiliated companies on the other.

This, however, I don't even want to get into because I might still endulge in it academically. <-- See how I can make academia sound like a piping-hot batch of brownies? Yeah, you bet.

I found quite an interesting angle within these blogs. I came across emaciated women with inflated silicone boobs, claiming that juicing kale saved them from being eating disordered. There are women out there who post images of these sugar-laden, fatty treats they assemble but don't eat (and openly admit that they only nibble a bite and then give the whole tray to the neighbors). Then there are women who publicly shame themselves for eating, or sometimes just for desiring, an extra piece of cake at a social event. Pouring salt or detergent on leftover indulgences so they couldn't have more. Running five marathons a month and rewarding themselves with an apple. And all the while, these women have adamant followers who will try to crush all criticism.

What does this say about our society? People who obsess over food have become icons, like they ever really do anything to change the world or seriously contribute to society by photographing their carrot sticks. Also, do you know of any men that do this kind of thing? The whole gender issue is probably another can of worms altogether, and I'm not touching on it now, but I might later.

During my research I also stumbled upon the website Get Off My Internets that features a forum where people can discuss, among other things, what they hate about healthy living bloggers. Aside from being massively entertatining, it shows that there is another side to the story. So apparently there are people who are put off by this state of food blogging. Good to know.

I'm obviously not trying to prove a point here, in fact, I don't even really have one. I just felt like talking about this topic a bit, more to do some personal brainstorming than to actually inspire debate.

Coming to think of, I will write a paper on it, minus the vicious personal edge at the end. Toodles.

Zombies: A Living History

"We've been afraid of the dead ever since we've been burying them."

Be sure to check out The History Channel's Zombies: A Living History.

It airs Tuesday, Oct. 25 and looks absolutely fantastic (hah, no pun intended...?). I found this on TheoFantastique and was immediately smitten. We'll see if it turns out to be as fun as I hope.

Here's a trailer:

The Good, the Bad, and the Infected - Survival by categorization in Álex and David Pastor’s Carriers (2009)

"The rules are simple. Numer One: Avoid populated areas at all costs. Number Two. When you come into contact with other people, assume they have it. Number Three: The virus can survive on surfaces for up to 24 hours, Never touch anything that’s not disinfected. And the last rule: take what you need and never look back. You break the rules, you die. You follow them, you live. Maybe."

Is man inherently evil as the Biblical concept suggests, or does society corrupt us, as Jean-Jacques Rousseau insists? Is evil really a state of being, or just part of a dichotomy introduced by religious thought? It is difficult to adhere to such categories as “good and evil” in a world as enlightened and often nihilistic as our own. In the diegetic world of Carriers, this categorization becomes even more problematic. Directors Álex and David Pastor gave this question some thought in their first feature-length film, constructing a desolate and dangerously silent world. In the spirit of recent films on viral pandemics such as 28 Weeks Later (2007) and I Am Legend (2007), Carriers conveys images of the world as an empty house, in which Man is no longer at home.

Survival in a virus-infested world is only made possible by the erection of strict sets of rules, which in turn must be supported by an explicit categorization. Only in times of absolute desolation is one forced to learn how to harden oneself in order to live as long as possible. Two fairly uneven brothers, Danny (Lou Taylor Pucci, The Informers) and Brian (Chris Pine, Star Trek) are on a roadtrip ad horrendum, trecking through a post-apocalyptic America with their friends Kate and Bobby, while learning how to survive. Acts of humanity become inane in the face of a virus with 100% communicability; anyone who is infected is as good as dead and must be segregated from the healthy.

In memory of idyllic vacations on Turtle Beach, the group is planning on travelling to what they consider to be the last bit of halcyon world (if there ever was one) to find peace in a world reigned over by death. However, their journey is more Homer’s Odyssey than a Jack Kerouac novel.

Snapshots of empty streets, deserted towns, and a few corpses on the side of the road are the only a glimpses of this world’s condition that we receive. A lynched body, decorated with a racist slur, hangs from a telephone pole, admonishing a torn society while simulatenously serving as a cynical reversal of religious symbolism: as Jesus was mocked by the centurions with a crown of thorns and the words “King of the Jews” above his head as he died for mankind’s sins, this man is labelled at fault for humanity’s demise, guilty by provenience. Meanwhile, a coughing priest preaches on the radio about the end of times, speaking of God’s punishment for the sinful human race.

It is not solely the virus that brings mortal danger, but also the behavior presupposed by a pandemic. Survival at all costs is the new mantra – kindness and self-abandonment are a sure-fire way to get yourself killed. As soon as protective mechanisms are neglected and bouts of humaneness ensue, for example when it comes to selflessly helping an infected child, imprudence is punished by infection and death. There is no longer an age distinction between innocent and guilty, a child is just as much of a carrier as anyone else.

There is a thin line between the will to survive and utter selfishness. Homo homini lupus: Man turns into a beast when thrown back on his own resources. When all social ties are broken and authorities no longer regulate social coexistence, mankind regresses quickly. William Golding warned of this in “Lord of the Flies,”and Friedrich Nietzsche mentions mankind’s inner beast on several occasions.

In fact, Nietzsche refers to man as an animal, contending that the development of man’s deep and evil spirit has placed him above all other animals; in the course of time, man has be domesticated, made tame and predictable.

The Nietzschean dichotomy of good and evil –or, respectively, good and bad - is part of his account on the development of the master-slave morality, a system he believes to be rooted in Homerian Greece. Throughout this system “good” is associated with the life force, with strength, power, and health, whereas “bad” is connected to poverty, weakness, and sickness. This type of categorization is in accordance with the protagonists’ self-taught survival ethic.

We can no longer make out any type of binary logic; good and evil (or let’s call it “harmful” just to remove the solely religious base) are no longer strictly separated and can in fact hardly be discerned from one another. There’s no specific feature that makes something harmful stand out- a harmful person cannot be distinguished by his looks, the dichotomy of good vs. evil equals fair vs. ugly has been cast overboard long ago.

Two women driving a car decorated with ample Christian symbolism are revealed as selfish and brutal. There is something bad, something pernicious within all inhabitants of this viral world, it does not take much for them to cross the line between just and unjust. It is debatable whether the ends really justify the means, and whether desperate times call for desperate measures, since such bywords are empty phrases. And really this points at the world outside of the movie as well. The proverbial desperate times are called upon ever so often to justify baneful acts

So how far can one go to ensure survival? Carriers shows us mankind’s dark side when it portrays how healthy individuals refuse to help each other, and even fight to the death over a tank of gas. People are the real danger in this story, more dangerous to each other in their struggle to live than the virus itself. And instead of choosing a somber setting, instead of applying pathetic fallacy to let the viewer experience the peril, Carriers stages these scenes amidst fields of flowers, under endless, clear-blue skies, with birds singing in the background. The world’s physical appearance has not changed; it has only lost a few of its inhabitants. The world is still as it was, and it does not require mankind to continue. Nature has not only outlived Man, it has defeated him.

The formation of a post-apocalyptic society, as is so hopeful portrayed in many movies of this genre, is virtually impossible in this world. Instead of organizing into larger and more functional groups, the few survivors wander about in search of some peace and quiet, of a place where they can escape their situation. Deep down, everyone is aware that there is no escape from the omnipresent death and disease, and even if there are no corpses in an idyllic field, the memories of the events linger. No one wants to help his fellow man, especially not if the fellow man is a stranger. A group of men clad in protective suits thinks they have invented the perfect system by hermetically sealing off a hotel building with duct tape and plastic foil; yet this perfection can be ruined simply by a broken window. The adhesive power of a strip of duct tape suddenly decides between life and death.

As Brian so aptly puts it, “everyone dies.” For most of the characters, this comes true sooner rather than later. Because of this, everyone is forced to learn to depersonalize the infected. Once you’re infected, you are already dead, and this mantra applies to lovers, siblings, children - to everyone. According to psychologist Philip Zimbardo, it is this type of dehumanization which enables the transformation from good into evil. Once a group of people is characterized as inferior, maybe even less than human, they can easily be mistreated.

The group sabotages its own survival pact as it comes to realize that strict rules are easier to live by when they are only present in theory. Applying them to reality changes the perspective. Fear blinds people in the end, and the fear of being alone, of being ostracized due to infection, is too powerful to handle. When one of the film’s characters becomes infected and turns into one these inferiors him/herself, the cruelty he or she has to face is overwhelming.

In the end, it is not sibling rivalry that destroys their coherence, it is the lie: concealing infection endangers the whole group, and forces the implementation of their own deadly rules upon them. When the remaining members of the group arrive in Turtle Beach, they find it to be as it has always been; yet nothing is the same. Spiritually, they are already dead. A location is often defined by its inhabitants, and memories are painful proof of this. Memories of careless times show the brothers enjoying beach life and prove to us that no man is an island. The tragedy in all this is while people are dependant on human surroundings for their identity and stability; they are incapable of erecting a stable network of survivors to ensure continuity, and to stabilize their future. There is no use restoring for posterity, as there will be no progeny.

Carriers manages to install a feeling of discomfort in the viewer without exerting the Freytag triangle to its maximum. The plot develops more slowly than normal for this genre, and the sense of helplessness and abandonment dominates any kind of perturbation or even horror that might arise. Brian’s nihilistic and cynical way of dealing with the situation enforces this atmosphere just as much as his brother Danny’s quiet suffering. Fans of action-laden cinema are likely to criticize the film’s slow pace, and the fact that events unravel slowly, if at all. This slow and quiet progression, however, might also be seen as a signifier of a dying world’s abundant hopelessness. A horror film does not need to hurl frightening effects at the viewers, as these subtle means serve the purpose just fine. Instead of focusing on excessive violence and gore, Carriers prefers the silent atmosphere of nihilistic postmodernism. There is no hope for this world, and there is no help coming. The few remaining and healthy survivors are left to fend for themselves, and since selfishness is the master of this post-apocalyptic world, they probably won’t make it. The impression of a god-forsaken, heartless world whose massive progress in all fields could not save it from eradication at the hands of a thing as simple as a virus is confirmed by the coughing priest on the radio.

These protagonists are anything but heroes, as they do not arise from a catastrophe like a phoenix from the ashes but are forced to adapt to their new situation. Young people, torn from their everyday lives, are now armed with Clorox, rubber gloves, and protective masks, trying to sanitize their way to survival. While Carriers does make use of a fair amount of stereotyping (women are shown as dishonest and incapable of action, while men are drastically tart), it manages to build a convincingly nightmarish atmosphere. The film never supplies an answer as to whether Man is inherently good or evil. It merely shows choices and consequences, and a world that is empty as it can be.

Works Cited: Nietzsche, Friedrich. Zur Genealogie der Moral (1887). Eine Streitschrift. Stuttgart 1988. Zimbardo, Philip. The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil. Random House: New York 2007. Carriers. Dir. Àlex and David Pastor. 2009.

This article originally appeared in Jura Gentium Cinema.