[A Pleasurable Headache] No running in the pool; horror that sticks; genre cinema in 2020
This week's links:
- Strangers: Prey at Night
- Moorhead & Benson Interview
- Horror that Sticks
- Superman in the modern era
- The horror movie in a horrible year
- That Labour report
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“Once Upon a Time We Were Falling in Love”: Why Time Will Be Kind to ‘The Strangers: Prey at Night’
2008's The Strangers is considered to be a bonafide modern horror classic (and rightly so). More recently (and ten years after the original) came the sequel, The Strangers: Prey at Night. This editorial from Nat Brehmer at Bloody Disgusting argues this lesser known sequel should be receiving more recognition.
Nat argues the sequel is operating very much in slasher' mode, whereas the original skewed more towards the home invasion sub-genre. What I really liked about Nat's article was the emphasis on sound design and soundtrack choice in the latter film, arguing about how both accentuate and heighten the onscreen action.
Of course, the article also touches on the movie's most talked about scene - the pool sequence. I'll leave you with that (spoilers obviously).
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High Powered: Aaron Moorhead and Justin Benson on Synchronic
https://www.rogerebert.com/interviews/aaron-moorhead-justin-benson-synchronic-interview
Moorhead and Benson are stalwarts of modern horror at this point, with their lower budget efforts Resolution, The Endless, and Spring impressing with their quality. Synchronic marks a bit of a step up in profile and budget, sporting Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan as leads. This interview touches on the challenges of this step up, but the part that sparked my interest was the pair's comments about using guns in the story:
Does that personal aspect make you more interested in not using guns in storytellers? Do you avoid them in other scripts?
JB: In the writing, we really try to. Some of that is an ethical thing. And a lot of it is just … oftentimes it could be argued that it’s sort of a lazy choice.
AM: [Guns are] this great equalizer in which every character suddenly has the same amount of power. And that’s also true in real life, that’s why people love guns. You don’t have to be physically strong to hold power. So as a storyteller, you think, what’s the harder way to do this? How do you make it harder for your characters? Once you give them a gun, or any powerful weapon really, they start becoming more generic, weirdly enough. Because all they have to do is pull the trigger, there’s no other choice involved, there’s no other cleverness involved. I guess you could make them very bad or good with guns.
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How to Write Horror That Sticks
https://litreactor.com/columns/what-makes-horror-stick
Peter Derk at LitReactor on writing horror that sticks in the reader's brain pan.
"Make good choices about how much time you’ll spend explaining and where that exposition comes in the story. If you write a zombie story, I do not need a long, made-up scientific explanation about how zombies happen or operate.
The explanation is important for you, the writer, but when you finish a draft, ask which parts are important to the reader. Jason Voorhees is a killing machine, and his motivation is about as meaningful to me as a steamroller's motivation for flattening shit. "
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Superman doesn’t need fixing because he’s more relevant than ever
Samantha Nelson at Polygon argues that Superman, rather than being an outdated figure, is more relevant than ever.
"Yet again the realism isn’t really the point. What Clark Kent represents is a concerted effort by a powerful alien to fully integrate himself into his adopted home. Some might argue that Superman is wrong to spend any time as Clark Kent because he’d be of greater use to humanity if he was saving lives, but by that argument doctors also shouldn’t be allowed any recreational time. Being Clark lets Superman understand and appreciate the people he’s trying to help."
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Planet terror: the horror of 2020
https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/features/horror-2020-cinema-fears
Kim Newman at The BFI on the state of the horror movie in 2020, and how the genre has been blindsided by current events.
One thing that might play in favour of these films is that they are about something else – though, as with many films delayed by Covid, there’s a risk their genuine, deeply felt concerns will seem almost quaint when they’re eventually released.
The Labour Antisemitism Report Has Always Been a Politically Motivated Travesty
https://jacobinmag.com/2020/10/labour-antisemitism-report-ehrc-corbyn-commission/
It's been a week. Sigh.
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Right, I'm off to watch scary movies until the last dregs of Halloween soak into the compost heap of 2020.