ON HORROR: Noel Carroll - A Summary and Analysis
Since the first storyteller told of what lay beyond the safety of the campfire, human beings have been obsessed with the threat of the unknown. So much so that it is hardly surprising that when flickering shadows upon the wall gave way to the iridescence of celluloid, horror movies would be among the most popular. The reason for this appeal, however, has puzzled scholars, critics and filmmakers alike. What compels us to make and study films so rife with abhorrent themes, conventions and imagery? To many, confronting images of gruesome violence and the macabre may serve as a sort of “exposure therapy.” Whether it comes at the end of a killer’s knife, or warm in bed at the ripe old age of one-hundred, death serves as the ultimate boogeyman. Unlike most monsters in the closet, mortality is not only real, but unavoidable. Thematically, horror deals with death more than any other genre of fiction (save, perhaps, war films and true crime), and it is perhaps through viewing such depiction