The Perception of Monsters in Film
Horror, as a genre of film, has grown and expanded from its beginnings in the 1930s when the term was brought about.
Horror films, according to Noël Carroll, are paradoxical in the fact that they provide the viewer with something in the film that they can find to be both disgusting and pleasurable. This paradox of horror is further described by Carroll as being necessary in order to achieve the cognitive pleasure provided by the narrative of the film. “Horror narratives… with great frequency, revolve around providing, disclosing, discovering, and confirming the existence of something that is impossible, something that defines standing conceptual schemes” (Carroll, “Paradox of Horror” 171). Carroll posits …show more content…
However, Carroll does not explain what the viewer may feel when the monster character is a human with some psychological illness or a psychopath. Berys Gaut, in his article, “The Paradox of Horror” is critical of Carroll’s theory in these respects. Gaut is critical of Carroll’s use of “monsters, such as werewolves or a man with a fly’s head, are violations of our categorical schemes” and that “such violations are seen as threatening and impure, and this is Carroll’s explanation of why works of horror generate fear and disgust” (Gaut 333). Berys supports his belief that Carroll’s defense of his theory of the paradox of horror in that Carroll’s theory “depends crucially” on monsters, which are beings that, according to contemporary science, do not exist “yet not all horror fictions involve monsters: an important and popular sub-genre of the modern horror film is the ‘slasher’ movie, which deals with psychopathic serial killers. Psychopaths are not monsters, they are instances of an all-too-real phenomenon” (Gaut 334). On Carroll’s idea that the viewer is interested in this genre of film to satisfy one’s curiosity, Gaut criticizes …show more content…
Murray Smith’s concept of recognition is defined as the construction of a character based on a set of textual elements, including the character’s traits, physical characteristics, and the emotions they present, which coalesce around the image of a body. This level of engagement does not limit nor deny the possibility of a character’s development and change throughout the film. The next step in Smith’s “structure of sympathy” is alignment. Alignment is the term used to describe “the process by which spectators are placed in relation to characters in terms of access to their actions, and what they know and feel” (Smith 162) and is similar to the notion of ‘focalization’. This alignment is usually a result of a spatio-temporal attachment, where the narration is restricted to the actions of a single character, and subjective access to the thoughts and feelings of such a character. Allegiance is the “moral evaluation of characters by the spectator” (Smith 162). This level of imaginative engagement with the characters is “perhaps closest to what is meant by ‘identification’
Horror, as a genre of film, has grown and expanded from its beginnings in the 1930s when the term was brought about.
Horror films, according to Noël Carroll, are paradoxical in the fact that they provide the viewer with something in the film that they can find to be both disgusting and pleasurable. This paradox of horror is further described by Carroll as being necessary in order to achieve the cognitive pleasure provided by the narrative of the film. “Horror narratives… with great frequency, revolve around providing, disclosing, discovering, and confirming the existence of something that is impossible, something that defines standing conceptual schemes” (Carroll, “Paradox of Horror” 171). Carroll posits …show more content…
However, Carroll does not explain what the viewer may feel when the monster character is a human with some psychological illness or a psychopath. Berys Gaut, in his article, “The Paradox of Horror” is critical of Carroll’s theory in these respects. Gaut is critical of Carroll’s use of “monsters, such as werewolves or a man with a fly’s head, are violations of our categorical schemes” and that “such violations are seen as threatening and impure, and this is Carroll’s explanation of why works of horror generate fear and disgust” (Gaut 333). Berys supports his belief that Carroll’s defense of his theory of the paradox of horror in that Carroll’s theory “depends crucially” on monsters, which are beings that, according to contemporary science, do not exist “yet not all horror fictions involve monsters: an important and popular sub-genre of the modern horror film is the ‘slasher’ movie, which deals with psychopathic serial killers. Psychopaths are not monsters, they are instances of an all-too-real phenomenon” (Gaut 334). On Carroll’s idea that the viewer is interested in this genre of film to satisfy one’s curiosity, Gaut criticizes …show more content…
Murray Smith’s concept of recognition is defined as the construction of a character based on a set of textual elements, including the character’s traits, physical characteristics, and the emotions they present, which coalesce around the image of a body. This level of engagement does not limit nor deny the possibility of a character’s development and change throughout the film. The next step in Smith’s “structure of sympathy” is alignment. Alignment is the term used to describe “the process by which spectators are placed in relation to characters in terms of access to their actions, and what they know and feel” (Smith 162) and is similar to the notion of ‘focalization’. This alignment is usually a result of a spatio-temporal attachment, where the narration is restricted to the actions of a single character, and subjective access to the thoughts and feelings of such a character. Allegiance is the “moral evaluation of characters by the spectator” (Smith 162). This level of imaginative engagement with the characters is “perhaps closest to what is meant by ‘identification’