Carroll - Plotting Horror

There's a LOT of material in chapter 3 of Carroll's text. At times, I thought that his taxonomy of horror narratives was fairly respectable and well-thought. At others, I felt that he was stretching some of his criteria to make most horror films fit the bill. Either way, his work is impressive because he breaks down most narratives into forms of Complex Discovery or Overreaching, each of which tie into our relationships with the unknown (whether it be knowledge that is forbidden or our lack of knowledge in certain events). Carroll thinks that themes of discovery, knowledge, the burden of proof and the hypotheses to the best explanation play into our cognitive pleasure in these films. As I see it, he's arguing that audiences take pleasure in how the characters reconcile the nature of the unknown or the fantastic through the processes of reason and logic. Interesting.

All told, I only had a few complaints here and there. I don't think we can form an exhaustive taxonomy of horror films, to which Carroll admits to. He also argues that the audience internalizes the events of a narrative, taking into account the reasonable alternatives that can be expected in erotetic format. This is fine, but I would argue that an audience only does this in so far as it cares about what is happening on screen. If a film is boring, no one is going to internalize the events in the narrative as easily as Carroll thinks. Again, it's a small grievance though.

I liked his treatment of the fantastic and the subsequent analysis of Cat People. There is a bit of a bone I have to pick though. Carroll argues that the supernatural explanation in the film becomes solidified once we see Irena attack the psychiatrist. "The audience does get a brief glimpse of the panther after Irena has killed the psychiatrist; and by the end of the film, the case for the supernatural interpretation is secure" (p. 153). Now, I'm not certain whether Carroll is arguing that the supernatural explanation is obviously and unquestionably the right inference, or just that the supernatural case is at least objectively plausible. I believe he's simply arguing that the case for the supernatural can be made as strongly as that of the natural, but at first glance, I seemed to interpret him as saying that the supernatural was unquestionably the best explanation. If this is what he intends, then clearly he's wrong. One of the hallmarks of the film is how Irena keeps returning the zoo and the panther in the cage. The psychiatrist notes at one point that many imbalanced people wish to do evil or cause a type of harm. Irena could've been letting the panther out of the cage for the entirety of the film without us or the characters knowing. Again though, I think Carroll recognizes this, perhaps I'm just tripped up on his wording.

His analysis of narrative and suspense is interesting because the formulas apply to many films. Aliens is definitely a case of onset, confirmation and confrontation in large part because the creatures were already discovered in Ridley Scott's original. I was thinking that the classic Tremors is a clear cut case of onset, discovery, confirmation and confrontation. We see the initial results of the graboid (the giant worms) attacks in the beginning; subsequently they're discovered by the two protagonists, Val and Earl. Later, they have to prove to the townsfolk that these are real creatures, which of course culminates in the confrontation in the desert where they kill the last of them with grenades and a well positioned cliff side.

I just watched The Fly recently and again, this could be an example of the overreacher plot. Jeff Goldblum's character isolates forbidden knowledge in the form of teleportation, conducts an experiment (which goes really awry), and then has the confrontation with Gina Davis at the end.

In thinking about these films and Carroll's formula, I think I'd like to analyze a few films using his methods to see how they play out. In effect, I'll treat Carroll's distinctions like Sinnerbrink's in regard to how films accomplish philosophy: investigate a horror film, apply the criteria, and see what happens. So, I'll be considering the monsters, the narrative, audience interaction and other key elements. I'm also interested in resolving the paradox of horror myself: why are we so attracted to horror films? As a lifelong fan of horror, I've often asked myself that question multiple times. I've had family ask me why I watch these strange things, and every time I try to explain it, I come up empty handed.

I'm going off on a huge tangent here, but I've always thought that some horror films and their monsters take on a superhero type status. My favorite is Jason from Friday the 13th. With a billion sequels under its belt, the franchise clearly stepped out of the element of pure horror to pure cheese: by Friday part 6 and 7, most fans (including myself) were rooting for Jason. The epitome of this attitude is the 2003 release of Freddy Vs. Jason in which each titular monster battled it out for domination. These guys become less like horror icons and more like superman - we wait to see what situation Jason is going to get himself into next. And he ALWAYS comes back, just like superman always triumphs. There's a weird play of reliability and fascination going on here, like these slasher villains will always deliver (and seeing how campy Freddy became in the late 80's and 90's, it's no surprise that fans begin to treat these characters less like monsters and more like heroes...perhaps anti heroes). So, perhaps part of the paradox is that fans get caught in this wave of "superhero fetishism." Yep, that's what I'd call it.