Horror and Laughter

Comedy and horror are very commonly seen as two distinct genres. Horror is meant to incite fear and disgust according to Carroll and comedy is expected to cause laughter and happiness. Most people go to a horror movie to jump and scream while most people go to a comedy film to laugh and have their mood lifted. So is there any place in horror for comedy? Can a "monster" by Carroll's definition be involved in a funny situation?



My primary example of this hybrid genre is the film Shaun of the Dead. This is basically a play on the Dawn of the Dead films and most of the other zombie movies both past and present. The main actor is known mostly for his work in comedy and at it's roots I would say Shaun of the Dead IS a comedy. BUT I would also argue that the film is a horror film at the same time. The "monster" in the film is a mass horde or zombie's in a small town in England. The monster falls under the type of "massification" and in my opinion cause a great deal of fear and disgust to both the characters in the movie and the audience viewing the film.



The film is undeniably a comedy though. Whether you like the movie or not you have to be able to admit that it is at least tries to be funny. Though it has lots of funny jokes that are both between the living characters and those involving the zombies there is also a fare share of horror elements too. The film follows the Complex Discovery Plot very well and has some very tense moments. A scene when a group of the survivors are stuck in a car with zombies surrounding the vehicle gets very tense when one of the passengers who was previously bitten begins to turn into a zombie also. Another scene involving the group stuck in a local pub with zombies pouring in from the windows. The movie does, in my opinion, create plenty of "fearful" moments and even has an example or two of the "bus technique".

On another note, "true" horror movies also are great examples of this ideas of horror and comedy. Most of the films we have watched in our class have at least a few examples of comedy in them (though some of the older films may have been unintentionally funny).

For me I think there is a very strong connection between horror and comedy. I believe that essentially the emotions elicited by both genre's are very basic. Happiness, nervousness, anxiety, and the other things we feel during a film of either genre. I think that we go to both types of film to be put on the edge of our seat and to have the unexpected thrown at us, as the unexpected is the basis of both horror and comedy. I think that there are probably even better examples of this idea and that more examples will come our way in the future. The hybrid of horror and comedy is interesting to look at but I also have to wonder how many things can be mixed with a genre like horror that has so much potential.