Studio 1 - Week 6 - Related Works HH

I’ve really been getting into horror stuff this year. I was so scared of anything horror as a kid that I’ve had to basically avoid it all, but now I’m really becoming interested in how it affects people. Aside from being too scared, I’ve always known that there is so much tasteless, boring, predictable garbage within the horror genre, so I'm on a mission to find the good stuff.

The Ring, dir. Gore Verbinski, 2002

The Ring is of course one of those super well-known horror films that everyone complains about having given them nightmares. I actually didn’t find it THAT scary, but thought it was extremely well made. The film follows a journalist, Rachel, who is investigating a story about a cursed videotape that somehow results in the death of its viewers exactly seven days after watching it. We are slowly fed information about a ghostly young girl who may be connected to these tapes, but the film never makes that feel too corny. The lighting and cinematography feel very epic and sweeping; every shot makes Rachel feel trapped in either a cold and lonely city or in the mysterious and haunting countryside where she ends up finding many clues. I usually find suspenseful films lose their intrigue after the reveal, but when the ghost in The Ring is finally shown, it is really only for a moment, and it is just enough to keep us all terrified even after everything is seemingly resolved.

1408, dir. Mikael Håfström, 2007

Mike Enslin is a pessimistic and skeptical author whose books investigate supposedly haunted locations. Having never experienced a paranormal event he is completely unafraid of staying in room 1408 of the Dolphin Hotel, which an unknown source has recommend he write about, despite getting a stern warning from the Dolphin’s manager. Soon Enslin is inside the room, ready for his night, and the rest of the film takes place within it. Though this isn’t a great film, I did find it interesting that for a project with such a big budget, most of it depicts one actor inside a pretty small space. Without giving too much away, Enslin’s subconscious begins to appear before him in the room. Through this we learn about his ex-partner and their daughter who died, and how he has been running away from his demons. This all sounds great, but I never found myself truly terrified or engaged, perhaps because Enslin is thoroughly unlikeable, but also because the scary parts are so bombastic. Subtle scares, like the bedside radio switching itself on at random, and a baby crying in the room next door, are outdone by knife-wielding ghosts, and paintings that come to life. My favourite part though was where he tries to Skype someone for help on his computer, but in the little box where he sees himself, a different version of him takes over and starts talking. Probably struck me because of all the Zoom-ing I’ve done lately.

Jacob’s Ladder, dir. Adrian Lyne, 1990

Finally, a great horror film. This one has been on my list since I was very young and I’m really glad I've finally seen it. Set in 1975, it follows Jacob Singer, a postman in New York City who had been a soldier in Vietnam. His happy home life with his girlfriend is occasionally interrupted by flashbacks to fighting in the war and to his old family who were lost in an accident. Eventually he starts seeing strange things: faceless bodies screaming in cars, tentacle’d homeless people on trains leading him to subway stations that don’t exist. Growing concerned he decides to contact his doctor at the veteran’s hospital, but soon finds out that there is no record of him being in combat in the war, and that his doctor has been killed in a mysterious car explosion. The audience really cares about Jacob, who is a good guy, and we absolutely follow him down the rabbit hole of everything he is experiencing. His visions start to impact on his daily life and they really are extremely frightening; I read somewhere that this film was a major influence on the video game Silent Hill. This is a perfect combination of subtlety and paranoia, and has great characters throughout its complex structure.