Men, Women, and Chain Saws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film [Hardcover]

Carol J. Clover (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1992

Do the pleasures of horror movies really begin and end in sadism? So the public discussion of film assumes, and so film theory claims. According to that view, the power of films like "Halloween" and "Texas Chain Saw Massacre" lies in their ability to yoke us to the killer's perspective and to make us party to his atrocities. Carol Clover argues, however, that sadism is actually the lesser part of the horror experience and that the movies work mainly to engage the viewer in the plight of the victim-hero - the figure who suffers pain and fright but eventually rises to vanquish the forces of oppression. Noting that since the late 1970s the victim-hero is usually female and the audience predominantly male, the author explores the fraught relation between the "tough girl" of horror and her male fan. Horror movies, she concludes, use female bodies not only for the male spectator to look at, but for him to feel through. The author concentrates on three genres in which women and gender issues loom especially large: slasher films, satanic possession films and rape-revenge films, especially those in which the victim is from the city and the rapists from the country. Her investigation covers over 200 films, ranging from admired mainstream examples, such as "The Accused", to such exploitation products as the widely banned "I Spit on Your Grave". Clover emphasizes the importance of the "low" tradition in film-making, arguing that it has provided some of the most significant artistic and political innovations of the past two decades.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Before Men, Women, and Chain Saws, most film critics assumed that horror (especially slasher) films entail a male viewer sadistically watching the plight of a female victim. Carol Clover argues convincingly that both male and female viewers not only identify with the victim, but experience, through the actions of the "final girl," a climactic moment of female power. As the Boston Globe writes, Men, Women, and Chain Saws "challenges simplistic assumptions about the relationship between gender and culture... [Clover] suggests that the 'low tradition' in horror movies possesses positive subversive potential, a space to explore gender ambiguity and transgress traditional boundaries of masculinity and femininity." Be forewarned, though: Clover addresses an academic audience, so her language can be heavy going.

Related title: The Dread of Difference: Gender and the Horror Film by Barry Keith Grant --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

From Publishers Weekly

Clover contends that contemporary horror films are not simply the misogynist fantasies that critics have made them out to be. Photos.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 276 pages
• Publisher: Princeton Univ Pr (April 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0691048029
• ISBN-13: 978-0691048024
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,932,909 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Thank You Harris Ross and Chris Straughen, April 19, 2000

By 

Andrew Bacon (Philadelphia, PA (USA)) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Men, Women, and Chain Saws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film (Paperback)

I was lucky to have a film teacher recommend this book to me. It articulated a view that I have long held- that audience members identify with victims, not killers, in horror films. Although alot of the writing depends on existing psych and film theory, I found the book very accessible as she explained relevant past theories succinctly and in a way that even a novice like me could understand. This book is not just for academics and should be required reading for horror fans. "Andrew says check it out."

15 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Film criticism that's not just for film students, May 29, 2000

By 

David Tepper - See all my reviews

This review is from: Men, Women, and Chain Saws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film (Paperback)

Horror films have always been one of my guilty pleasures, but it's not until I read this book that I truly started to understand the inner workings of fright flicks-- and of film in general.

When people find out this is a "feminist critique", they immediately think "politically correct man bashing". Nothing is further from the truth. The author seems genuinely more interested in understanding horror and its audience tham in making any kind of political point. She even raises the stakes in the discussion when she, for example, equates the Oscar-winning "The Accused" with "I Spit On Your Grave", noting that they are high and low forms of the exact same story.

The lit-crit jargon can be daunting to those unfamiliar with film analysis, but stick with it. The insights in this book will color your appreciation for all movies.

18 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Take that, Andrea Dworkin..., July 25, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Men, Women, and Chain Saws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film (Paperback)

...and all other "feminists" who think a work of art/entertainment featuring violence and women is automatically violently anti-woman. This is the book you want in your corner when someone (sometimes male, too) starts gassing off about how those bad, bad horror films demean women. Um, I would say a schlockfest like "Hanging Up" or "You've Got Mail" demeans women a hell of a lot more than your average slasher film that doesn't star Meg Ryan.

Carol Clover makes the convincing point that most of the better-known slasher films are narratives of women empowering themselves over a (usually male) antagonist. In this respect, the much-reviled "I Spit on Your Grave" could be seen as the forerunner of "Thelma & Louise." I have to admit for the record that I'm not a fan of "I Spit on Your Grave," which I feel is ineptly made and contains far more grossness than it absolutely needs to make its point (rape = bad; violence = bad); Clover, however, devotes an entire appreciative chapter to it, which indicates she's seen it numerous times and thought about it at length, which at least is better than the usual knee-jerk hatred of it you tend to see. It's refreshing and fascinating to find a woman defending -- at length -- a film many of us had thought to be indefensibly misogynistic.

Not the only academic defense of drive-in cinema, but one of the best-known, and probably the best -- after eight years, it's still in print in an affordable mass-market paperback, which should tell you something. Namely, it should tell you to buy it if you're at all interested in horror movies and what makes them tick. Horror movies don't have to be GUILTY pleasures!