Page 202 - Student: dazed And Confused

The horror genre has long been thought of as unworthy of serious critical consideration.

This may be due in part to the commercial nature of the genre. Screenwriting could also be

said to be somehow less valid a creative writing discipline that some of its more literary
cousins due to its commercial value. To put away such prejudices and presumptions we will

examine the ways in which film is possibly even more demanding than any other writing

process and product - 'that extra energy translates itself to the page, and from there to the

reader.' (Goldman, 1983, p123). We will also see how horror film, relative to other genres,

holds so much power over its audience. Constant developments in the technologies
available to film-makers have changed the horror film over the years and a strong story, a

well-written film can appear to have been sacrificed for this cause. This is evident in the

majority of slasher films over the last 15 years.

The horror movie aims, chiefly, to horrify. The horror film aspires to scare an audience, to

chill and spook them, to leave a memory or a seedling of terror long after the 90 minutes is

over.

'Every film-development executive is looking for the same thing when
it comes to horror movies: an original idea with good characters and
cool kills.'
(Deneen, 2007, p213)

To produce a successful horror film characters and kills must not be the only two concerns.

Of course they are important and offer an almost instant resonance with the audience, but

story, dialogue and plot matter too. However, four things stood out to me whilst writing my

own film. I wanted to concentrate on the visual, the aural, the people and the possibility.
The economical way screen writers develop of creating a world and characters and events a

viewer can completely believe in breaks down into these four categories. Four films -

Psycho, The Exorcist, The Blair Witch Project and The Shining - will be used alongside my

own effort Stormed to further illustrate these points. Horror is about showing people just
enough to shock them, letting them hear enough to convince them, giving them characters

they start caring about and events that any audience member believes could actually

happen.