The Erotic Potential of the Horror Movie

 The Erotic Potential of the Horror Movie by Sophie Hanson

Much has been written about the horror movie, from sociological and psychological studies claiming a negative effect (or not) on the moral fabric of society (most notably, Martin Barker’s analysis of the ‘video nasties’ moral panic, The Video Nasties: Freedom and Censorship in the Media), to their function as a form of social commentary (for instance, George A. Romero’s Dawn of the Dead as a critique of modern capitalism). Indeed, the question of just why it is that we are attracted to the horror movie, to watch fellow humans being hunted and tortured, has been addressed in the past to some effect. However, I aim here to explore an idea that has remained largely uninvestigated – the capacity for the horror movie to be an erotic experience, and a positive one at that.

Of course, it has long been accepted that sex and death are inextricably linked (see le petite mort, the “little death”), and this argument has in fact been explored to some extent in books such as Men, Women and Chainsaws (Clover, C. 1993); however many of these studies have either focused upon the experience from a male perspective, relegating the female audience of the horror movie to an almost non-existent background, or have followed Laura Mulvey’s argument that the woman can only view herself through the ‘male gaze’ (1975) and thus takes only a masochistic pleasure in seeing herself (projected upon the female character) subjugated, tortured and objectified. 

I believe this to be too simplistic a reading in today’s society, and more importantly, one that disregards the possibility for a female to watch – and enjoy – horror movies whilst still maintaining an aware, feminist perspective, rather than being unconsciously influenced by the patriarchal status quo. 

First, we must identify the ways in which characters in horror movies can be posited against each other. In most movies, a simple dynamic exists: that of the threat versus the victim. The threat can take many forms (ghost, vampire, curse, horde of zombies, et cetera), however here the focus will be upon the more tangible threat of a human or humans. The victim, of course, is generally young, good-looking and often female (although this is not always the case, as I will discuss further.) Therefore, as an audience we are given two strong possibilities for interpellation into the movie as a ‘real’ experience (Althusser, 1969) and for identification with a character: we may either identify with the killer, or with the victim.

“It's just murder. All God's creatures do it. You look in the forests and you see species killing other species, our species killing all species including the forests, and we just call it industry, not murder.”
- Mickey Knox, Natural Born Killers

Although many of us would hesitate to admit it, it is in fact common to identify with and even ‘cheer on’ the killer. This is encouraged by giving the killer more screen time; by developing them as a character with a complex and nuanced personality. Killers are often given a witty sense of humour or higher than normal intelligence (for instance, in notorious ‘video nasty’ Natural Born Killers, quoted above, the mass-murdering couple Mickey and Mallory Knox are portrayed as the only sane, rational and honest characters in the entire movie). We are in effect forced into identifying with the killers and even coming to like them.

What does this mean for us as a viewing audience? It means that we can vicariously experience the power and unhinged freedom that a killer does. In her analysis of women and horror movies, Recreational Terror, Isabel Cristina Pinedo argues that this  “…enable[s] women to experience taboo emotions (be they killing or fucking) without the onus of guilt. […] [T]he viewer is forced to vicariously indulge feelings and actions forbidden to her, and although she is “forced” she is in a position to stop it or leave if it does not suit her.” (p. 86) In other words, a female viewer can transcend the established social norms and boundaries set out for her in the ‘real world’ and can indulge in the fantasy of living without rules, morals or expectations. Instead of asking, she can take what she pleases – she has the power to inflict pleasure or pain upon whomever she likes. 

It could be argued that by placing the female viewer in this position, they are experiencing the power felt by a male in society, an argument with some merit. Rightly or wrongly, it is men who are largely seen to hold power both biologically and socially – they are the stronger sex, able to penetrate their victims, male or female, in a display of dominance. 

Indeed, on the occasion that the killer is female (and this is not as uncommon as one might think – from the rape revenge movies of the 70s and 80s to contemporary movies such as House of 1000 Corpses (2003) and Jennifer’s Body (2009)), the weaponry they employ to dispatch their victims is largely phallic – a gun, a stake, a knife. Clover argues that the female viewer is negatively “masculinised” by this gaining of a phallic object and the power associated with it, however I would argue that this may not actually be the case. By providing the female viewer access to something that is biologically denied to them – an instrument of penetration (and let us not forget that a great many possible violent deaths are caused by just that – stabbing, shooting, goring) – then surely it could be argued that the woman is able to transcend their traditional place of powerlessness to experience the sadistically arousing pleasure of holding dominion over the victim, of being the one to call the shots? 

“Nevertheless, does not fear hide an aggression, a violence that returns to its source, its sign having been inverted? What was there in the beginning: want, deprivation, original fear, or the violence of rejection, aggressitivity, the deadly death drive?”
- Kristeva, Powers of Horror, p. 38

It is also worth mentioning at this juncture the rape revenge movies popularised in the 1970ss and enjoying a revival today (the 1972 classic Last House on the Left enjoyed box office success as a remake in 2009). As their genre suggests, these movies generally follow a simple premise: a woman is raped and/or tortured, usually by a group of men, and later takes revenge upon them by hunting down, torturing and murdering them. Much has been written about these movies and their feminist intentions, however two films in particular are of interest: Last House on the Left (1972) and I Spit on Your Grave (1978). Both of these movies hold in common a castration scene – in Last House on the Left, the mother of a raped and murdered young girl seduces one of her killers and pretends to perform oral sex on him before biting off his penis; in I Spit on Your Grave the victim of a gang rape seduces one of her rapists in a bath and uses a knife to castrate him, leaving him to bleed to death. In both cases, the woman subverts the power balance by removing the males’ instrument of penetration (in the latter example, by using her own in the form of a butcher knife). She is shown to be using her sexuality in a powerful way, manipulating the evil male with her own body and using it to her own advantage: “Narratively, women use violence against men effectively; men are symbolically castrated. Stylistically, women exercise the controlling gaze; men function as objects of aggression.” (Pinedo, p. 84) There are of course also strong Freudian overtones in this act of castration by the female – a literal playing-out of castration anxiety (1924), reducing the male to a crippled eunuch as punishment for his own perverse transgressions. If the male is ‘reduced’ to the woman’s level by being castrated – having his phallus removed and thus his ability to penetrate – does it not also follow that a woman is therefore ‘elevated’ to the power status of the male by gaining a “phallus” capable of penetration?

The other way in which the viewer can identify with the horror film is of course through the victim. This method of interpellation is quite possibly more fraught with danger, as victims in horror movies are traditionally helpless females. By willingly identifying with the victim as they are tortured and maimed, the female viewer could be said to enter into a masochistic form of interpellation, borne out of self-hatred; or if we return to Mulvey’s theory, “the determining male gaze projects its phantasy on to the female form which is styled accordingly” – that is, even the female viewer will watch the victim through a male perspective, seeing the female victim purely as an erotic object devoid of any real emotion or importance to the narrative of the story being told. 

Clover addresses a variety of ways in which the male viewer identifies with or takes pleasure from the image of the female victim; chiefly, the obvious sadistic-voyeuristic model in which the male takes sexual pleasure from watching the female be degraded and mutilated. She also argues that the very presence of a dark interior space – that is, the vagina – means that women are biologically predisposed to become the victim: “Finally, there is the female body itself, the metaphoric architecture of which, with its enterable but unseeable inner space, has for so long been a fixture in the production of the uncanny.” However, of course, Clover does not address the issue of a female viewer watching a female victim, only that of the male viewer. 

If it is true that the pleasure gained from watching a victim being tortured stems only from a sadistic or masochistic viewpoint, (usually coded as males sadistically viewing female victims, or as females masochistically identifying with female victims) is this necessarily a bad thing? Like the rape fantasy, the horror movie provides an ultimate safety in the fact that it is not real. Thus, the female viewer is able to experience the emotions and fantasies that are taboo to her in real life, and that would be impossible (or certainly very difficult) to safely explore. If, by placing herself in the role of the woman being abused, the female viewer can experience a new, guilt-free and danger-free method of eroticisation, thus preventing the need for her, out of curiosity or otherwise, to seek out these experiences in the real world, then surely the spectacle is not morally detrimental? 

“The horror film, like pornography, dares not only to violate taboos but to expose the secrets of the flesh, to spill the contents of the body. If pornography is the genre of the wet dream, then horror is the genre of the wet death.”
Pinedo, Recreational Terror, p. 61

In conclusion, I would argue that the above quote sums up neatly the erotic purpose that the horror movie can hold. Just as pornography is a vehicle for someone to experience a sex act vicariously and gain sexual pleasure from this experience, the horror movie can act as the means to view an act of violence vicariously, whether from the position of the killer or the victim. Like pornography, there are many arguments against the horror movie as a feminist idea, and plenty who would say that their influence drives on a patriarchal, misogynistic system of violence towards and objectification of women. However, I believe that this reading, whilst having its merits, assumes too little of the viewer. Modern audiences are generally more aware, and can identify the difference between an on-screen portrayal of a taboo action, coded as an illicit fantasy, and the possibility of carrying out this action in real life. 

Furthermore, if feminism is to be about freedom of choice for women as well as men, then surely it is in fact hypocritical of feminists such as Clover and Mulvey to attest that women are powerless to view something through their own, informed and independent eyes, but are simply helpless in the grip of a patriarchy they cannot escape from? I would argue that this view – that a woman is somehow incapable of forming her own views, opinions and morals because she cannot overcome the patriarchal status quo, is in fact outdated and somewhat offensive. If pleasure is to be gained from viewing a horror movie, then who is to argue whether or not it is the “right” kind of pleasure?

References

Books

Clover, Carol J. Men Women and Chainsaws, 1993, Princeton
Pinedo, Isabel Cristina Recreational Terror: Women and the Pleasures of Horror Film Viewing, 1997, State University of New York Press

Movies 

Dawn of the Dead – George A. Romero, 1978
House of 1000 Corpses – Rob Zombie, 2003
I Spit on Your Grave (aka Day of the Woman) – Meir Zarchi, 1978
Jennifer’s Body – Karin Kusama, 2009
Last House on the Left – Wes Craven, 1973
Natural Born Killers – Oliver Stone, 1994

Websites 

Internet Movie Database [accessed online 28/02/10 @ http://www.imdb.com]
Memorable quotes for Natural Born Killers [accessed online 24/02/10 @ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110632/quotes]
Mulvey, Laura Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, originally published 1975 in Screen 16.3 Autumn 1975 pp. 6-18 (accessed online 24/02/10 @ https://wiki.brown.edu/confluence/display/MarkTribe/Visual+Pleasure+and+Narrative+Cinema)