Film Genre - Horror (Incomplete)

Nosferatu, Frankenstein, The Body Snatcher and Cat People.   These are just some of movies that started a movie genre unlike any other.   Horror films live off the primal fears of the audience and often use supernatural and deathly themes to create spine-tingling and heart-pounding scenes to startle the audience.   This genre also introduced Carol Clover’s ‘final girl’ which created a shift in perspective between the killer and the final girl and is also used to move the narrative forward. But some horror films play on the audience’s expectations making characters seem like the murderer when they aren’t which is displayed by Trevor in Scream 4.

She’s pure, intelligent and a virgin. Everything we, the audience, expect the final girl to be. Laurie Strode is the excellent example of such a character, her friends die around her but she pushes through these traumatic events and takes down Michael, but to her disappointment he escapes. But looks can also be deceiving.   Wes Craven’s ‘Scream’ played on our expectations and shocked the audience with the death of Drew Barrymore’s character, the girl we all expected live till the end.   And that was just the opening scene.   Sidney Prescott broke the rules of being a final girl and also the rules of horror layed out by Randy which proved that even if you break the rules, it doesn’t mean that you will die (but generally in most horrors you would).   Another film that plays on our expectations is Psycho which follows Marion who has stolen money from a client and has run away.   We expect her to be the final girl but to the audiences surprise, she is murdered by ‘Mother’ (Norman’s other identity).   The audience will most of the time expect women to die, but this is because the audience seems to get more of kick from this than men dying due to the different reactions and decisions each gender makes. Male characters tend to try to stand their ground and fight back while women will often panic and flee in any direction without thinking...