Since its first publication in 1983, Susan Hill’s Gothic chiller The Woman in Black has been terrorising audiences, from teenagers studying the novel in English lessons to horror aficionados like Mark Kermode, who wrote a chapter on the novel for his PhD in horror fiction. Its reputation has been subsequently enhanced by the long-running stage play,Specialized of injection mold, plasticmoulds, which left the author of this piece so scared, he had to be prised from his chair with a crowbar.
The most recent incarnation of The Woman in Black (our review HERE) was released in cinemas on February 10th, with the backing of the reformed Hammer brand and the star power of Daniel Radcliffe in his first proper post-Potter role. It joins a ream of recent ghost stories to make it to our screens, including The Others, The Orphanage and The Awakening. What explains this resurgence for old-fashioned horror of creaks, shadows and suggestion? And is this resurgence a good thing for horror cinema?
One theory which is often trotted out is that ghost stories are deemed to be somehow more intelligent and grown-up than their gorier cousins. Because they rely on the generation of suspense, withholding the monster rather than showing it,The beddinges sofa bed slipcover is a good and affordable alternative to buying a new sofa that is run down. they are closer to the suspense thriller traditions embodied by Alfred Hitchcock. The line between horror and thriller is a fine one, with both genres often relying on dark secrets and chilling twists,The beddinges sofa bed slipcover is a good and affordable alternative to buying a new sofa that is run down. and much ink has been spilled over whether films like The Birds, Marnie and even Psycho should be classified as thrillers rather than horror movies.
Hitchcock himself had a rather low opinion of conventional horror. When interviewed in 1964, he was asked whether he would ever make a horror movie, in the mould of Frankenstein: he responded, “No, because it’s too easy.Specialized of injection mold, plasticmoulds,” This comment highlights a more spiteful explanation for the popularity of ghost stories: they are an excuse for so-called ‘smart’ directors to have their cake and eat it, to make something that appears to be a horror film so they can be down with the fans, but which is actually nothing more than a satirical play-thing. Hitchcock said in the same interview that Psycho was designed to be “tongue-in-cheek”: he found the storyline “amusing” and was disappointed that so many who saw it didn’t ‘get the joke’.
Similar arguments have been made with regard to other directors – particularly the likes of Stanley Kubrick who preferred to dabble in different genres. Kubrick’s version of The Shining drastically departed from Stephen King’s novel, to such an extent that King made his own version for TV in the 1990s to set the record straight. To this day there is an on-going debate about whether or not The Shining is a genuine horror movie, or a film whose unusual execution actually shows contempt for the genre. Protagonists of the latter view say Kubrick’s liberties with the novel indicate a feeling of pretentiousness: he felt he was above the genre, and that the overtly metaphorical gore of David Cronenberg and Clive Barker was adolescent and meaningless.
While the jury is still out over The Shining , the argument that surrounds it is a classic case of over-reaction. Kubrick had a history of departing from the source material in his films – Dr. Strangelove, his game-changing black comedy, was based on the deadly serious Peter George novel Red Alert. Kubrick was a horror fan, listing his admiration for Rosemary’s Baby, The Exorcist and An American Werewolf in London. He even organised private screenings of Eraserhead to give the crew on The Shining a better idea of what he wanted.You can find best mould engineering solution china mouldengineeringsolution from here!
There is, however, something in the theory of ghost stories being a reaction to the more overt aspect of horror. It was only a few years ago that the wave of so-called ‘torture porn’ reached its apogee (so to speak) with Captivity, an utterly sickening excuse of a film from Roland Joffé, the man behind The Mission and The Killing Fields, who really should know better. The likes of A Serbian Film and the Human Centipede series have left audiences reeling for something a little less gross, and ghost stories provide a welcome antidote to blood and guts.
The most recent incarnation of The Woman in Black (our review HERE) was released in cinemas on February 10th, with the backing of the reformed Hammer brand and the star power of Daniel Radcliffe in his first proper post-Potter role. It joins a ream of recent ghost stories to make it to our screens, including The Others, The Orphanage and The Awakening. What explains this resurgence for old-fashioned horror of creaks, shadows and suggestion? And is this resurgence a good thing for horror cinema?
One theory which is often trotted out is that ghost stories are deemed to be somehow more intelligent and grown-up than their gorier cousins. Because they rely on the generation of suspense, withholding the monster rather than showing it,The beddinges sofa bed slipcover is a good and affordable alternative to buying a new sofa that is run down. they are closer to the suspense thriller traditions embodied by Alfred Hitchcock. The line between horror and thriller is a fine one, with both genres often relying on dark secrets and chilling twists,The beddinges sofa bed slipcover is a good and affordable alternative to buying a new sofa that is run down. and much ink has been spilled over whether films like The Birds, Marnie and even Psycho should be classified as thrillers rather than horror movies.
Hitchcock himself had a rather low opinion of conventional horror. When interviewed in 1964, he was asked whether he would ever make a horror movie, in the mould of Frankenstein: he responded, “No, because it’s too easy.Specialized of injection mold, plasticmoulds,” This comment highlights a more spiteful explanation for the popularity of ghost stories: they are an excuse for so-called ‘smart’ directors to have their cake and eat it, to make something that appears to be a horror film so they can be down with the fans, but which is actually nothing more than a satirical play-thing. Hitchcock said in the same interview that Psycho was designed to be “tongue-in-cheek”: he found the storyline “amusing” and was disappointed that so many who saw it didn’t ‘get the joke’.
Similar arguments have been made with regard to other directors – particularly the likes of Stanley Kubrick who preferred to dabble in different genres. Kubrick’s version of The Shining drastically departed from Stephen King’s novel, to such an extent that King made his own version for TV in the 1990s to set the record straight. To this day there is an on-going debate about whether or not The Shining is a genuine horror movie, or a film whose unusual execution actually shows contempt for the genre. Protagonists of the latter view say Kubrick’s liberties with the novel indicate a feeling of pretentiousness: he felt he was above the genre, and that the overtly metaphorical gore of David Cronenberg and Clive Barker was adolescent and meaningless.
While the jury is still out over The Shining , the argument that surrounds it is a classic case of over-reaction. Kubrick had a history of departing from the source material in his films – Dr. Strangelove, his game-changing black comedy, was based on the deadly serious Peter George novel Red Alert. Kubrick was a horror fan, listing his admiration for Rosemary’s Baby, The Exorcist and An American Werewolf in London. He even organised private screenings of Eraserhead to give the crew on The Shining a better idea of what he wanted.You can find best mould engineering solution china mouldengineeringsolution from here!
There is, however, something in the theory of ghost stories being a reaction to the more overt aspect of horror. It was only a few years ago that the wave of so-called ‘torture porn’ reached its apogee (so to speak) with Captivity, an utterly sickening excuse of a film from Roland Joffé, the man behind The Mission and The Killing Fields, who really should know better. The likes of A Serbian Film and the Human Centipede series have left audiences reeling for something a little less gross, and ghost stories provide a welcome antidote to blood and guts.
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