Foundations of Fear - The World of Horror Filmmaking



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'Possession' - Film Analysis

  Possession: noun -  1) the state of having, owning, or controlling something.                                       2) the state of being controlled by a demon or spirit.      There are few things within the human experience as potentially painful, traumatic, or devastating as divorce. The severing of a union made in happier times, no matter how mutually beneficial, is an affair that leaves its mark upon both partners. Tempers flare and accusations fly  as resentment and suspicion reign supreme. It is perhaps then no mistake that one of horror’s most overlooked films, the psychological /supernatural thriller Possession (1981) , deals almost exclusively with this theme. While other horror films such as Night of the Living Dead or The Purge may speak to allegories of political and societal dysfunction, Possession ’s boundaries lay firmly with...
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A Matter of Cultural Identity

       In Powell and Pressburger’s A Matter of Life and Death (1946), a British airman, torn between life and the afterlife, falls in love with an American servicewoman. In order to gain more time with his newly found love, an “appeals trial,” of sorts, is held in order to grant a stay-of-execution on the young airman’s death. Central to the argument of the prosecution, the Continental Soldier Abraham Farlin, is that this Englishman is little more than a corrupting influence on the life of a young, Bostonian woman. The defense, personified by the airman’s friend, the late Dr. Frank Reeves, argues, in turn, that America and England are more alike than even the superficial and historical similarities. “Does [a glass] break because it faulty or because it is glass?” The prosecution asks. “We are all as God made us,” he argues -- asserting that the difference between an American and an Englishman is as clear-cut as the difference between an American and a banana. Reev...
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Reber, Schwarz, Winkielman: Processing Fluency and Aesthetic Pleasure

       The expression “beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” while perhaps accurate, remains vague -- more appropriately, beauty is attributed to the fluency in which a viewer can intake and process aesthetics and stimuli. Objects which can be rapidly and reliably interpreted by its perceiver seem to almost universally prompt more positive responses, owing to many varying qualities including object symmetry, contrast and information saturation while also being attributed to the viewer’s history and familiarity with the subject.       The alacrity in which one can intake and interpret data, stimuli and information refers to one’s “processing fluency” (Reber 366). Generally speaking, subjects that require less processing in turn have been found to have a more positive effect on those viewing than other, more complex subjects. Often this is attributed to a feeling of “error-free processing,” and being able to accurately recognize the stimulus at han...
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