CB; Gender in Slasher Films

Gender in Slasher Films

·         When, and in what way were women repositioned within the horror genre?

Women were repositioned within the horror genre in the late 1970’s by American cinema, which underwent a profound change as directors responded to the politics of the current time; these included the Vietnam War, race riots, civil unrest and the growing Feminist movement. Directors such as George A. Romero, Wes Craven, Tobe Hooper and John Carpenter all incorporated these issues within their latest horror films in order to introduce the ‘new woman’, who would no longer be represented as weak and unable to defend herself but be able to protect herself and actively seek out the threat and destroy it. Films that promoted this ideology were Night of the Living Dead (1968), The Last House on the Left (1972), The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) and Halloween (1974).

 

 

 

·    What are the conventions of the 'Stalk and Slash' subgenre of horror?

Stalk and Slash subgenre has been described as one that is inherently an American product and one that is intensely formulaic by Mark Whitehead in his book ‘Slasher’.  Virtually all stalk and slash films are a manifestation of American studio productions, all of which follow the same basic plot: a mixed-sex group of teenagers who travel to a remote location and almost immediately indulge in drink, drugs and sex. After these events have taken place, those involved are steadily murdered, one by one, by an unknown and often masked killer. This usually only leaves just one member of the group isolated who, in order to survive the ordeal, must confront the murderer alone and vanquish them. Once they have been killed, their identity and rationale for their murder spree is revealed.

·    Who originally watched these films and why?

Audience research into the Slasher film industry highlighted that the main core audience were teenage boys and young men. The reason for this, no doubt, was the visual elements of sustained scenes of female nudity and the graphic depiction of assault and murder.  So popular was the subgenre and so dominant was the desire to see explicit violence, that Slasher films had to find new and increasingly gory means by which to kill their cast of teenagers. Directors did this by piercing arrows into throats and squeezing heads until eyes popped out of their sockets; one even featuring a character trapped inside a sleeping bag and beaten to a bloody pulp against a tree.

·    Why does the author argue that the films were 'significant'?

It is said that Slasher films are nothing more than puerile entertainment, being without morals and lacking any merit in terms of film study. However, Mark Whitehead argues that the films were significant as on a superficial level, the Slasher subgenre created two of contemporary horror cinema’s most enduring icons: Jason Voorhees from the Friday 13^th series and Freddy Krueger from The Nightmare on Elm Street series. As a consequence, these icons gave birth to the notion of a sustained narrative (and income revenue) through popular horror film franchises. While both these qualities certainly have financial properties, the films themselves, despite their graphic content, were, at their most basic, deeply moral tales. As Whitehead states, “the killer is punishing the group either for trespassing upon its territory or is avenging an earlier wrong perpetrated by that group or a group that they symbolically represent.”

·    What is the concept of ' the final girl'?  

The concept of the final girl (constructed by Carol J. Clover) was presented in her seminal essay ‘Her Body, Himself’ (1987), in which she coined the term ‘The Final Girl’ and used it to describe the sole female survivor of numerous Slasher films. For Clover, the final girl repeatedly embodied a set of features that marked a female character out as ‘different’ from her peers. The final girl is:

·         Smarter and more conscientious than her friends, being intelligent, watchful and level-headed.

·         Morally pure and therefore does not participate in drinking, drug-taking or sexual liaison


·         The first to recognise both the lack of morals in her peer group and the inherent threat of danger.

With such qualities, the final girl is often visualised, at the start of the film, as a character that is slightly distanced from her peer group exactly because of these qualities. By rejecting the drinking, drug use and sexually active behaviour, the final girl is subtly pictured as a repressed teenager, a potentially weak, young girl who is frightened by the ‘adult’ nature of her friends’ activities. In effect, she is visualised as ‘powerless’ while her friends ‘empower’ themselves through the ‘adult’ acts of getting drunk and high and engaging in sexual intercourse. Although, when the killer begins to take action upon his murderous violence, it is this girl who emerges to be the most ‘powerful’ as she uses her intellect and cunning both to outwit the killer and then trap and/or challenge him. The final girl is the sole survivor and therefore she must, one way or another, kill the threat in order for the narrative’s desire for normality/equilibrium to be returned. Clover interprets these events in a different way, viewing the shift of the final girl as going from ‘powerless’ to ‘powerful’, from weak/passive female to strong/aggressive ‘male’. She has this view simply because the final girl becomes increasingly masculine as the film moves towards its climatic confrontation. To visualise this, the final girl will defend (and murder) with a phallic object whether it be an axe, machete, chain saw or shotgun. By taking up this weapon, the final girl becomes ‘masculine’ and is therefore empowered to become proactive in her survival and as equally aggressive as the killer. Clover notes that, from the very start of the film, the final girl is already represented as ‘masculine’, appearing to be boyish by her smartness, gravity, competence in mechanical and other practical matters and sexual reluctance which set her apart from the other girls and ally her, ironically, with the very boys she fears or rejects, not to speak of the killer himself.