Customer Reviews

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

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

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."

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.

...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!

Carol Clover's book is an entertaining and readable look at gender constructions in horror films that goes far beyond the typical assumptions about the roles of men and women in this genre. I think Clover might have something different to say about some of the new sub-genres of horror, especially those focused more on torture (Hostel and the like) than on horror found in a situation or particular personality, but this volume covers many of the great horror classics of the 70s and 80s in a way that attempts to reimagine the audience members and their many (sometimes conflicting) investments in these films.

I found the chapter on slasher films ("Her Body, Himself") to be particularly useful, going beyond the typical "man kills woman because man hates woman" type of ideaology that you often see with this sort of criticism. Instead, Clover focuses on how the heroine (or "final girl") and the killer can be seen in relationship to one another, both serving as examples of incomplete or improper gender socialization. In other words, the killer is acting out because he is somehow impotent as a man; the final girl is able to survive because she is also not exactly "appropriately" gendered and is somewhat distanced from the "civilized" society which the killer invades and attempts to destroy. This relationship gives the slasher film an added depth, and helps explain the continued popularity of this type of film.

If you are interested in horror film and like getting new insights into the genre you enjoy, this is a good book for you. If you are a student of gender studies or film studies, then this is an excellent book to add to your knowledge of these subjects. While it is geared toward a more academic audience, it is not nearly as hard to engage with for general audiences as some academic offerings.

This book is so fun! Solid litcrit meets a genre that does not get much mainstream exposure. Clover makes her case well, and also makes it entertaining. Although it was published several years ago, this book is still relevant to the genre, and I recommend it highly!

Clover has a way of incorporating politics into her aesthetic analyses (something most scholars cannot balance properly, preferring to favour one over the other). The book never considers itself above B-list cultural artefacts like the underrated, unjustly condemned Meir Zarchi work I Spit on Your Grave, and John Carpenter's Halloween.

This book is one of my all-time favorites. Beyond a detailed and thorough investigation into gender and the horror film, Ms. Clover is able to get at a universal theme (in film, art, etc.) of urgency in battling the dominant culture; and, as such, is stunning in her analyses concerning even the most fringe of gore movies. Don't believe Denver, CO: allowing a little persistence, this book will ravish you...

I bought this book hoping to read a balanced and insightful analysis of gender in horror. What I got was the same trite "analysis" that seems so fashionable today. This book is profoundly feminist, in a very offensive sort of way. I am terribly sorry, but the author really needs more than a few months' worth of watching horror (see her own admission on p.19) and more than rudemintary understanding of pop psychology, to make a compelling case.

Briefly, her "analysis" of the female in modern horror slasher movies goes like this. Clover begins with the observation that most of these (American) films concentrate on the abuse, victimization, and triumph of a woman. The author then asks (i) why a woman and (ii) why do mostly male viewers watch these films. Her interpretation is that the "Final Girl" in these movies is really a male! It seems that in Clover's world, most males are homosexual, or at least bisexual, and they seem to have some bizarre beating fantasies. Because showing a male in this position would be uncomfortable for the male viewers (it would expose their forbidden fantasies too close for comfort), an unfemale female is substituted.

Clover simply misses several very simple things, which leads her to the mental acrobatics necessary to account for the phenomenon. Why does she dismiss the directors when they say that having a woman suffer is essential to horror? I don't know, but it is obvious that (i) out culture regards men as active, that is, when men are victimized, there's little sympathy for them---we expect them to react, strike back, and die in the attempt---which means that if you want emotions in the audience, you better go after a girl; (ii) our society focuses on female beauty much more than male beauty---from an aesthetical perspective, destroying something beautiful is much more painful; (iii) the reason why The Final Girl is not too feminine is because these horror films are American---one characteristic trait of this culture is the belief that the outcast, the underdog, can succeed through his/her own efforts---that's why the main character is seen as an outcast; (iv) the basic plot of these films is a variation on the ancient myths of the hero---someone who goes through incredible ordeals, and wins against all odds---this sort of story, however, is mostly attractive to males, which is why you don't tend to see many women at these films. This is a brief synopsis of a larger argument where every step is substantiated, but it illustrates why Clover's view is plain wrong.

It would have been helpful if she had viewed some European or Japanese horror films: she would have found out that many of the features characteristic of US films are simply missing. It would have been helpful if she did not regard horror as low art (she does, her posturing to the contrary notwithstanding). It would have been better if she avoided the turgid prose common to texts where the author either has little to say or tries to disguise wrong ideas.

Finally, Clover completely misses an important consequence of horror being made idependently of Hollywood. It's not just that it can cater shamelessly to the most exploitative taste (which some do), but low-budget cinema is a more accurate reflection of trends in contemporary society. While Hollywood produces slick and ultimately empty movies, B-flicks incorporate things the way the authors see them---the Final Girl in horror is nothing less than an acknowledgment of the achievements of gender equality. There are now female heroines (much more resourceful than the bungling males in these movies) and they triumph over adversity, and against the onslaught of maniacal males. This seems like a good statement of the fact that our society has come to accept women in roles that traditionally were not available to them.

The book is undeniably well written. Alot of the author's points are valid, and her(?)ideas about the role of gender in horror films are interesting. What really burns me is that I'm not too sure that she actually watched some of the films she mentions. Or if she did, she didn't really pay too much attention.

I think that if one were to write a book about character study, they should probably pay closer attention to the characters they study. Make sense to me.

Overall, reading this book was helpful in the way it describes a relativly small audience....not horror fans, but people who want to pick apart horror movies in order to make sense of horror fans. For the academics, who don't know how to shut their brains off in order to just kick back and enjoy a good old fashoined "Killin' Movie", this book could really come in handy. For those of us who need no help in enjoying the genre, this book might help you speak the language of people who don't. This new ability could be useful when you get dragged into either an argument or a sophist's conversation on the subject. (Sophist being different than sophisticate...sophists only pretend to know what they're talking about when they are around people whom they believe to not know any better.)

All things being equal though...its an allright book.

P.S.

I secretly wonder sometimes, when people talk about how its always women being beaten, tortured and killed in horror films.

99% of these slasher films are about slashers. Duh...ok with that out of the way, let's ask ourselves who these slashers are.
Maniacs, (Almost always male) with some sort of abhorrent social disfunction. Sounds alot like our real life serial killers.

As bad as Jason Voorhese is, he doesn't even compare to the Green River Killer, or Edmund Kemper. As witty and Terrifying Freddy Kruger might be, his evil genius pales in comparison to guys like Carl Panzram or H.H. Holmes. As ruthlessly deranged Michael Meyers seems to be, he can't hold a candle to guys like Richard Speck or Richard Ramierez. Now, what do all these fellas, (real or screen character) have in common? THEY ALL KILLED WOMEN. Point of fact, our onscreen killers are much more equal opportunity than our real life madmen. So, is it any wonder that women are victims in these movies? Also, the women in most of these films tend to get off with just a nasty death. In most instances, the real life killers would do some fairly terrible things to their victims before they killed them.

While Carol Clover has some interesting ideas, especially concerning the the identification of the audience with the screen villains and victims, this is a less than interesting book in spite of the subject matter. The academic approach may be great for impressing some, but I found that the life was sucked out of this topic. In other words, some kill with knives. Others kill with boredom. (And at least Jim Thompson knew how to make that second killer interesting.)