Category: Group D

In reading the section of Trembley’s books assigned for today’s class, one particular scene stood out to me. The incident in the basement, which seems to be the first normal interaction between Merry and Majorie since the beginning of the book, brought to mind the uncertainty of reality and question of reliability as discussed in class. In this scene, Majorie discloses her “biggest secret of all”: she is faking her possession. Her story seems likely, and almost noble, as she is sacrificing herself for the wellbeing of the family and home. However, as Merry points out, the story is not completely air-tight, but rather is Majorie “trying to convince herself that she was okay and in control of what was happening to her and to us.”

This quote struck me for a number of reasons. First of all, it adds to the theme of unreliability in the novel- what is real or not- a trope of postmodern horror. Second, Marjorie’s questioning of her own state of being and subsequent attempt to feign control makes me think about our society’s need for predictability and authority over a situation. This control that we long for often comes in the form of knowledge, disseminated through and digested by technology. Much of our modern day fears, as evidenced through popular horror, stems from the lack of knowledge or understanding of a situation. When we do not have information automatically at our finger tips, or an easy solution is not readily available, we tend to panic. Majorie is quick to defend herself and her self-governance, stating that her behavior is a game over which she has control and design. Her father, unsure of how to explain his daughter’s behavior, turns to the church to “fix” the problem. While dealt with in different ways by the members of the Barrett household, the main source of fear seems to rise from the uncertainty and lack of “diagnosis and solution” to their family situation.

With the aid of technology and global communication, there is often little in this world which we cannot explain or google to find an answer. However, the inconclusiveness and mystery surrounding Marjorie’s ailment, as reinforced by her own failure to understand what is going on, adds to the fear of both the family and the reader.

Just as Marjorie’s father easily adopts the idea of possession and Majorie herself claims that it is all an act, our society tends to jump on the easiest explanation for things to dissolve fear and restore normalcy. Scape goats, while first introduced to me as something from the time of the Scarlet Letter, are still very present in our culture. We have become accustomed to immediate gratification via technology, thus have lost the skill of patience in finding the worthwhile answer. If a solution cannot be reached within a certain period of time, panic ensues and we begin to grab at straws. Technology has been glorified for uniting the globe and providing a medium through which information can be shared. However, with the growing need for immediate gratification and the tendency to jump on the easiest, potentially detrimental, way out, technology may be hurting out society rather than helping.

After recognizing Marjorie’s bluff, Merry says, “in that moment, i was afraid for her instead of being afraid of her.” In this scene, the aspect of fear is not the possession itself, or even the prospect of possession, but rather is Majorie’s inability to grasp and make sense of what is happening to her. Funny how not knowing the facts may be scarier than possession by the devil himself.

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After reading Creed’s article on the sexualization of the feminine in the horror genre, and continuing to read A Head Full of Ghosts, a movie I had previously watched came to mind entitled It Follows (trailer). I believe this movie simultaneously reinforces and rejects Creed’s claims of the horror genre’s stereotypical “feminine evil – beautiful on the outside/corrupt within” in an interesting way.

The movie summed up (with no spoilers) is about a girl, Jay, who inherits a sexually transmitted “disease” that comes in the form of the possessed trying to kill her, only seen by those who have this same STD/curse. She is told from her sexual assailant that the only way she can get rid of the possessed killer is to pass the STD on to somebody else. The catch is that if the person who she passes it on to dies, the killer will come back to get her. The killer can come in any form, a family member, a friend, or a stranger and the only way to identify them is that they walk slowly towards you and try to kill you.

It Follows reinforces Creed’s claim that the horror genre relies on the sexualization of women and the exaggerated duality of their innocent outside and corrupted inside. In the movie, Jay is introduced as an innocent teenage girl just wanting to find a decent boyfriend. Jay meets a boy and the two go on a picturesque date, a movie spiced with sexual tension. The two then spend some alone time together which ultimately leads to a consensual sex scene. Her date then precedes to drug her and relocate her to an abandoned building where he informs her of the STD he has gave her. This quickly moving plot flips Jay into a sexual deviant, more or less suggesting that her consequence of this deviancy is an STD (baffling, I know). Many of Creed’s points are seen/validated in the exposition of this film as the woman’s innocence is contorted and how a strict male gaze is enforced upon her, not only for his benefit but for the audience’s as well.

However, most of film’s remaining plot rejects Creed’s claim by building Jay herself to be the one who tackles her “indirect possession” (that taking the form of the stalking killer) instead of a male force as seen in many horror films. Though Jay eventually enlists the help of her friends, both male and female, it is ultimately her that needs to take on the demon. She is more or less alone in the effort to kill the demon once and for all because she is the only one who can see it. This detail is where I see It Follows rejecting the established horror tropes of sexualized women. Instead of relying on the powerful male presence to defeat evil, Jay uses both male and female friends, and more importantly herself, to take on the evil presented by the film. Whereas The Exorcist and A Head Full of Ghosts have external male powers attempting to defeat evil (religious clergymen), It Follows has a combination of internal (Jay) and external male and female powers combating the possessed.

Spoiler ahead:

Unfortunately, the end of movie finds one of Jay’s friends, male, nabbing the final kill of the demon. It Follows tries to subvert the horror tropes it is critiquing but ultimately relies on them to tie the movie up and bring it to a close. It is interesting to see when horror films try to turn the horror genre on its head by characterizing the female as the one who rids evil instead of a male (see Nightmare on Elm Street or Hellraiser II), but these still rely on some male force to drive the plot to an end. I can see future horror films trying to portray women as the ones who “take care of business” but I have yet to see one that does it one hundred percent without sexualizing the protagonist (a la Kill Bill or Buffy the Vampire Slayer). Let me know if you know of any that do so effectively.

i hope you’re well. i am. today, i woke up, texted some people, checked my email, made coffee, went to class, to the gym, showered, had lunch with a friend, talked to a counselor, texted some people, checked my email, hung xmas lights, and had a snack (pretzel crisps & roasted red pepper hummus). i’m doing that now, and listening to music, in my room. the blinds are closed,  as is the door, and i’m alone. but i’m not alone; i have you, the internet. we can go everywhere together. i can share today with you. i can share everything with you. you can be my best friend. oh wait, no you can’t. you’re just a medium, but people forget. people forget what you are and share everything with you because they go everywhere with you and you’re convenient and personal enough to say hello but not so personal it’s hard to look you in the eye and more people will sympathize with whatever’s going on in their personal lives if they share it with you and let you share it with them. and, wordpress, internet, guess what? you’re a good friend, occasionally. mostly, you’re not enough. i wouldn’t want to offend you, but you don’t have feelings. mostly, you’re apathetic, fake, quantitative, unpredictable, but again and again, people come back to you. you’re becoming the place where we talk about our personal lives, lives that are seeping out of conversations with the people who love us, that are replaced in those conversations by public things that were already out there, so we forget how to share and grow less personal, still. that doesn’t have to happen, but it’s happening. how is that relevant? look at what’s happening to the barrett family in a head full of ghosts. for more on this, check out ‘the man who married a robot / love theme,’ by the 1975.