The horror film genre has
been ever changing since it was created and one of the most recent and most
popular changes is a wave of ‘postmodern’ horror films. Postmodernism is "relating to art, architecture, or literature that reacts against earlier modernist principles, as by reintroducing traditional or classical elements of style or by carrying modernist styles or practices to extremes." (Item 10). "That gives the movie a sense of reality as the characters are
watching and talking about the horror films that we, the viewers, watch
ourselves." This is a quote from a Scream review (item 2). This shows that
throughout Scream (Item 1), there are references to other films that the
viewers will have seen. This is post-modern because it is intertextual.
Slasher movies
have been in production since the early 1930’s but they gained popularity in
the 60’s and continued to gain popularity throughout the 70’s and80’s. “In the 1990s, the horror
genre was almost dead.” (Item 3) it goes on to say that Scream attracted a new
audience and was a critical and commercial success. Scream was
the first film to really push the boundaries of horror at the time it was made.
Scream had a lot to contend with when it was made, there were many, many other
horror films that had already been made and these had already been smash hits,
and they are still referred to now, for example The Exorcist. This is what
makes Scream post modern; Scream often refers to other older horror movies, and
actors that had iconic roles in the horror movie genre. It is also a parody of
Halloween (Item 3). For example the scene in Scream where they are at the house
party and Randy and a couple of other none-starring actors are sat around a TV
watching Halloween, Randy starts talking about the rules of a horror film (Item
4). This is post modern because there is reference to another horror film
within a horror film (Item 5) and also talking about the rules of a horror film
isn’t done in any other film, the rules are none spoken, people just know them.
This makes Scream different because it is telling you what is going to happen.
The Cabin in
the Woods (Item 1a) is a film full of funny remarks, it is smart and witty but
it is also a serious film. These are all postmodern sub-catergories; irony, wit, smart remarks. Like Scream, The Cabin in the Woods isn’t a typical
horror film; there is a scene in the cabin after Jules has been killed and the remaining characters are in the cabin, where
Curt says they should all split up (item 2a). This is when the witty and
sarcastic character, Marty, questions this with ‘really?!’ (item 3a) This is an ironic and witty example of postmodernism within the film. This also shows that all
the characters are typical (Item 4a), Marty being the sarcastic, witty and
smart stoner, Curt being the ‘jock’, Jules being the ‘blonde’, Dana as the
equivalent to Sidney from Scream and Jamie Lee Curtis; she’s the virgin, and
Holden as the geek. These are all typical characters, just like in Scream, but
Dana and Marty break the stereotype.
Throughout
The Cabin in the Woods, there are intertextual references to other horror in the way of the monsters that are sent to kill the characters (Item 5a). For example: there is
a man with saws in his head, this is similar to the killer called Pinhead in
Hell Raiser. There is also a cobra which is similar to Anaconda, a ghost
similar to that is in Poltergeist, zombies that could be from any zombie film like
Dawn of the Dead, the angry tree from The Ruins, bugs could be from The Mist, the people
in white masks could be from The Strangers, and the list goes on. All these
killers are similar to them of all these different movies and more. This is
post modernism because these different horror films and killers influence The
Cabin in the Woods, and like Scream, it references different horror movies throughout
(Item 3a).
Scream uses
typical horror movie characters (Item 6) as well as The Cabin in the Woods;
Sidney as the virgin, Tatum as the blonde, Randy as the geek, Stu as the joker
and Billy as the jock. This is a clip of the scene in Scream where Tatum gets
killed in the garage (Item 7), this proves that she is the blonde girl but also
offers a different take on it because she actually fights back and becomes the
victim. Having said this, Stu and Billy also have another side to their
characters, they are also the killers. This is different to other horror
movies, because throughout the film, hints are made towards Stu and Billy but
there is also doubt about other characters even though it is blatantly obvious.
This is post-modern because it is making fun of other horror films, it is
breaking all the rules whilst, at the same time, making all the rules clear and
obvious, it is being ironic (Item 5).
Scream is
post-modern because it is a hybrid of horror and comedy (Item 6). A hybrid is
where two genres are mixed together. You can tell that Scream is a hybrid genre
because of the funny aspects in the film but also the horror aspects. For
example when Stu is on the phone to Sidney at the end of the film and Stu asks
if Sidney is going to tell his parents about what he has done, and then he says
‘they’re gonna kill me’. This adds an element of comedy to the film because it
is ironic that Stu is the fool of the film and also that he is dying when he
says it. An aspect of horror in the film is when the killer rings Drew
Barrymore’s character Casey and says ‘do you like scary movies? …cause I wanna
know who I’m looking at’ this adds suspense and disrupts the equilibrium.
The Cabin in
the Woods is similar. Although it is not a hybrid, it takes reference and influence from
other horror films and filters them in. This is intertextuality because it is
one text referring to another text. For example, when they are in the glass
lift going through all the monsters, there are many monsters that are in other
horror films. "They offer a 'false realism', films about other films..." (Item 3a) this supports the intertextuality because intertextuality makes a film slightly more surreal, offer a slight de ja vu effect - as if its happened before. Like the monster people in white masks – taken from The
Strangers, the dinosaur could be from Jurassic
Park etc. (Item 6a). The fact that The Cabin in the Woods contains reference to
other horror films makes the film slightly unpredictable in the way that if you
haven’t seen the films it references, then you don’t know what the monsters
will do.
The music and sound effects
in both Scream and The Cabin in the Woods (Items 8a and 9) are post-modern too because the
same music and sound effects will be used in any generic horror movie; ‘A
series of films that uses a short melody as a symbol for its monster is the Halloween
series’ (Items 8a and 9). It is said that Scream is
a parody of Halloween. This is slight intertextuality because it is one thing
that is used in many things, past and present. Throughout both films, familiar
sound effects are used, such as creaking floor boards and a long silence
leading to a loud, startling sound. These are common horror movie conventions
which are post-modern because they are featured in so many horror films. The
sound effects and music are important in horror films to build tension and
create a certain mood. Without the music and effects, horror films would be
dull and the scary aspect of it will be lost.
Another sub-category of postmodernism is being reptetitive. The scream
films are very repetitive, the sequels are all similar in story line and all
the killings are along the same style. This is postmodern because it is copying
a copy of a copy (Item 8). As similar as the killings are and as the sequels
are, they have slight differences. This happens when things are recycled again
and again; there will be more tiny changes with every copy. Similarly, Cabin in
the Woods recycles regular conventions of horror; for example, when Curt says
they should split up. This has been recycled and copied over and over again,
throughout horror films and even Scooby Doo.
Paying homage is another sub-category of postmodernism. It means paying tribute or reverence (Item 9a). The Cabin in
the Woods pays homage to different horror films in the way that it takes
influence from different monsters (Item 7a and 5). Scream pays homage to a
variety of different films such as Halloween, Friday the 13th, A
Nightmare on Elm Street and Prom Night. All of these are in turn referred to at
different times throughout the film. At the house party scene where Tatum dies,
there are multiple occasions where you catch a glimpse of the TV, and there is a
horror film playing. The horror films have Jamie Lee Curtis in them, because at
the time Scream was made, Jamie Lee Curtis was a big horror film star. This is
post-modern because it is not only intertextual but it is also paying pastiche
to other films that have influenced it (Item 8). It is also ironic as Scream is
poking fun at these horror films for being so predictable and ordinary.
An example of
irony in Scream would be the clumsiness of Ghost Face, the killer. It is
playful and ironic that the killer is as stealthy as the typical killer in a
horror film. The killer is not a typical murderer. Typical killers are
perceived as having super human strength and are meant to be un-kill-able, but
Ghost Face is not super human. In typical horror films, the killer never dies
either, so when Ghost face gets shot, he doesn’t die straight away, he gets up
again and again. Gale shoots Billy Loomis (Ghost Face) when he is attacking
Sidney, he is on the floor with Randy, Gale and Sidney looking down at him and
he sits up as if to attack them again, Sidney shoots him in the head (Item 10).
This is ironic because Ghost Face gets shot multiple times but because he keeps
getting back up, this is making fun of the convention that the killers don’t
die.
The Cabin in
the Woods is an example of simulation because it is an example of the influence
television has on every day life (Item 3a). Television is a massive part of the
film because the film has a very ‘Big Brother’ feel to it. This is proved by
the amount of the unrealistic things that happen in the film and by the effect
of the two main characters in the offices that overlook what is happening in
the Cabin. Quoting Jean Baudrillard (Item 3a): “the dissolution of TV into
life, the dissolution of life into TV”, this supports what I said because
Baudrillard studied simulation and he too came to the realization that “It's a
perfect example of life imitating art imitating life” (Item 11). That is said
in Scream two, during a film class. This relates to Scream and The Cabin in the
Woods because both of these films strongly focus on the fact that life is
televised to the point that there is no longer any difference between what’s
real and what isn’t.
