HORROR(BLE) ESSAY

It has been said that the essence of genre is ‘repetition and difference.’ Discuss this claim relating it to one of the horror films screened, John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982), and another film from the same genre sharing similar themes or features, Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956).

In the early days of filmmaking studios believed “successful films were the product not of individual genius but of innovative adherence to general formulas.” [Altman,1997:280] This helps explain the conception, and evolution of genres within film, and their reliance upon ‘repetition and difference.’ Repetition of themes, iconography, characters, and ideologies within film helps establish a connection with a desired audience, while creating a system of classification which can be utilised in the duplication, and evolution of the established genre. On the most fundamental level genre relies so heavily on difference to ensure the same film is not continually created, but difference also allows for the evolution of the genre (eg. postmodern films), the creation of ‘sub genres’, and creates space for hybrid genres. This theory of ‘repetition and difference’ within genre will be explored further through an examination of Don Siegel’s original Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) and John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982) and their importance to American society.


On the surface Invasion of the Body Snatchers and The Thing appear to be superficially connected; both have been remade (in 1978 and 1993) or are a remake (of Christian Nyby’s 1951 film The Thing From Another World), both were developed from short stories published in 1954 and 1938 respectively, both are invasion movies, and are classified as ‘science fiction horror’. They fall into this hybrid category due to an equal emphasis placed “on the mind (science-fiction) and the body (horror).” [Kuhn,1999:20] On closer inspection it becomes apparent what is most similar about the films is the horror which arises out of fear.


A gap of almost three decades between the two films does not matter in terms of their similarities, even in terms of social concerns of the times, as Maddrey says, it is simple to transfer “the 1950s monster onto the similarly conservative 1980s.” [2004:147] Cold War fears lasted throughout the 50’s and didn’t truly subside until the Berlin Wall came down in 1989. Both eras were still recovering post war; WWII and the Vietnam Conflict, which is expressed in the way the films give the military and the government less power simply by placing greater importance on the individual, and humanity. The Thing presents the military as a fragile community from the opening sequence when the characters are introduced separately with no sense of unity. It does not take long for their fragile community to splinter completely, and, as Kurt Russell, in his portrayal of the anti-heroic helicopter pilot MacReady says, “Nobody trusts anybody now.”
Both films offer no Government assistance; characters are unable to make contact at all, which is a featured fear of both films: isolation. The lack of authoritarian guidance is reflective of America’s underlying pessimistic view of authority which also highlights the importance of the individual, and pursues “the question of what it means to be human.” [Landon,1992:40]


Telotte believes the science fiction genre “has focused its attention on the problematic nature of human being and the difficult task of being human,” [1995:2] which is an ideal description of the struggles of characters from both science fiction horror hybrid films. The true horror of the films lies in the fear of the ‘other’, and more importantly in the fear of the ‘other’ becoming the self. It is this repeated fear of a loss of personal, and societal identity which reproduces the genre, while the varying physical manifestations of the ‘other’, ensures there is difference.


Dr. Miles Bennell (Kevin McCarthy) encapsulates an idea of what the true horror is when he says to Becky Driscoll in Invasion of the Body Snatchers,
“Only when we have to fight to stay human do we realise how precious it is.”
The ‘other’ in both films is “neither human nor non-human, but occupies a disturbing, unclear intermediate place.” [Prince,1988:26]. This is uncomfortable and horrifying for the characters, and the audience, because in America’s ideologically driven society, binaries are key. Everything requires an opposite, a more desirable state; man, woman, good, evil, to ensure the stability of the dominant ideology. This explains why it is far more threatening to “[blur] the line between man and monster” [Maddrey,2004:135] then to have a clear-cut monster, as it weakens everything their society is built on, and in turn their understanding of the world around them.
Telotte explains these feelings in more detail saying,
“As simulacra spread and seem to edge out the real, they also undermine its significance. The possibility arises that we might come to assume there is nothing beyond the copy itself – no original, no history, ultimately no meaning beyond the simple image.” [1995:113]
Not only is there fear of the blurred binary, but there is a fear the ‘other’ could wipe out the delicately balanced original binaries and replace them with itself, allowing eventually for no memory of the way of life that existed before.


Due to both films also being classified as ‘invasion’, the source of the ‘other’ is an external source and remains unidentified, playing up the audience’s fear of the unknown, a common horror genre theme. An acknowledgement of the necessity for difference within genre is especially important here. Themes and iconography of a genre will always be repeated but it is the implied meaning within the themes which audiences read differently. Both films share similar Cold War fears, but Invasion of the Body Snatchers is also full of anti-communist subtext, while The Thing draws on concerns about the emergence of AIDS. Invasion of the Body Snatchers pushes ideas and paranoias such as; it only requires one to fall to start the domino effect, it makes everyone the same and equal but strips them of their individuality at the same time, and my personal favourite, the fact it takes over while the victim is asleep, playing up to the ‘red under the bed’ paranoia. The Thing meanwhile, infects you when you are alone with it, and in order to assess who has been infected blood testing is required. Understanding how “repressed paranoia [returns] reshaped in the basic mythology of science fiction [horror]” [1973:159] is simple when the subtext of the film is considered, it includes a comprehensive collection of issues which are worrying society, which people don’t discuss openly due to them being considered socially unacceptable, so they look for possible solutions in film.


The ‘other’ of The Thing has been described as a “parasitic virus” [Prince,1988:26] and Invasion of the Body Snatchers offers an ‘other’ described by Bennell as "a malignant disease spreading throughout the whole country." Attempts to diagnose the ‘other’ through medicine and science fail, having it cast aside in Invasion of the Body Snatchers as ‘an epidemic of mass hysteria’, and in The Thing “science capitulates first” [Prince,1988:27] as Dr. Blair becomes hysterical and begins destroying property with an axe while shouting “A Cell gets out, and it will imitate everything on the face of the earth!” This means the characters in both films can rely on nothing but their basic instincts to survive, which to an extent levels them with the ‘other’ as both groups desire survival, although it is the duty bestowed upon the humans to protect the vulnerable boundary of the human body, the only thing they ever really have, which will preserve their humanity and stop them from becoming the new source of horror. When the alien threat is used “to expose both the strengths and weaknesses of men under pressure” [Landon,1992:40] it is interesting to see how quickly they revert to primal instincts, in both films men use fire and burn the ’other’, perhaps an unconscious residue from early civilisation where man exerted his dominance over animals through his knowledge of fire.


The physical manifestation of the ‘other’ in both films is an excellent example of repetition and difference within a genre. Both monsters are “xenomorphs” [Maddrey,2004:33] meaning you are unable to tell just by looking if someone has been taken over or not. As Wilma explains to Dr Bennell in Invasion of the Body Snatchers,
“There is no difference you can actually see, he looks, sounds, acts, and remembers like Uncle Ira.”
This premise is repeated in The Thing by MacReady,
“If it had more time to finish it would have looked and sounded and acted just like Bennings.”
The only way to tell if someone has been replaced by their seed pod ‘body snatching’ doppelganger is through their lack of emotion, and the only way to tell who has been infected by ‘the Thing’ is through a blood test.
Throughout Invasion of the Body Snatchers Bennell’s face is frequently cast in shadows or lights giving the appearance of him behind bars projecting the feeling he is already been trapped and his attempts to escape are futile.
Within the genre it is the difference within the way the ‘other’ takes over which distinguishes how “plastic fantastic small town America [can fall] under the spell of an evil that cannot be seen nor heard” [Maddrey,2004:135] while Carpenter’s The Thing is apocalyptic, pessimistic, loud, and a very graphic tale. [Phillips,2005:147]
In their invisible xenomorphic form they are frightening because of the fear of boundary transgression concerning the body, but in their raw forms they are horrifying (The Thing more so) in the way they are depicted. It has been said the iconography of the special effects of the monstrous ‘Thing’ in all its various forms can only be described as manically reproductive. [Landon,1992:42] The seed pods of Invasion of the Body Snatchers are also quite obviously reproductive in their slow oozing bubbling way, but they are far more subdued to suit the 1950s audience .The squealing, raging, oozing, slimy, tentacled, writhing, vicious ‘Thing’ which stretches its neck up to the roof in one scene, and in one of The Thing’s most memorable moments, grows legs from a severed head and runs away, is absolutely grotesque and shows without doubt the evolution of a genre through repetition and difference.


In terms of the essence of genre being ‘repetition and difference’ the way in which a film is ended is important as it either reaffirms or deviates from what is expected of the genre. “Is it…repressive or progressive?” Reactionary, or repressive films, often offer the audience nothing more then a tidy narrative, they follow an established structure of “order, disorder, restoration of order.” [Strinati,1998:81] The Thing and Invasion of the Body Snatchers however seem to have endings which are more progressive because of the open ended narrative, which wasn’t done just to allow for sequels as many other films in the horror genre do.
John Carpenter said in 1982 that “people today are experiencing…paranoia in their everyday feelings…[The Thing] takes that underlying feeling and lets it grow.” [Maddrey,2004:136] This is an example of how Carpenter’s film is ‘postmodern’ progressive horror, he establishes what the horror is and his characters attempt to destroy it, but Carpenter refuses to placate the audience by giving them a tidy conclusion instead he “ends his film in uncertainty.” [Landon,1992:41] Only two men remain and as the base station burns in the background MacReady says to Childs “Why don't we just wait here for a little while... see what happens?” The audience is left not knowing if one of them is infected, if they have any chance of being rescued, or if they will die from exposure, as the camera zooms out to a long shot above the camp revealing nothing but fire and snow, the isolation of the base station to the rest of the world is amplified, which in turn emphasises each man’s fears about isolation from himself at the hands of the Thing.
Invasion of the Body Snatchers originally had a similar ending,
“There’s no happy ending…McCarthy’s girlfriend Dana Wynter is possessed by the alien intelligence and pods are dispatched all over America. As the film ends, he stumbles along the freeway yelling “You’re next!” to the faceless drivers who flash past him.” [Karney,2004:452]
Director Don Siegel’s open ended narrative was obviously too premature for his time to be acceptable, and a studio imposed prologue and epilogue were added involving Dr Bennell being interviewed at a hospital which eventually ends with the doctors believing him, and the lines “Operator, get me the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Yes, it's an emergency!”
Even with the more ‘Hollywood’ ending of Invasion of the Body Snatchers there is a sense in both films the ‘other’ will be successful, it is the ‘return of the repressed’; psychologically you can kill the apparent source of the horror, but it is still the fear which will remain rooted in the minds of the audience.
The idea the essence of genre is repetition and difference is obviously a very successful one as it is both for the repetition; themes, character types and situations, and the difference; the sub-genres, hybrid films, and growth and change throughout genres which the audience embraces and are captivated by which keeps them coming back for more. This is especially true of the horror genre in which fans remain loyal to their monsters, and their fears either just for their entertainment value, or as an acceptable expression of their repression.


REFERENCES:

Books:
• Altman R, 1997, ‘Genre Cinema’ in The Oxford Encylopedia of World Cinema, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
• Dowdy A, 1973, The Films of the Fifties: The American State of Mind, Morrow, New York.
• Karney R (ed), 2004, Cinema Year by Year 1894-2004, Dorling Kindersley, London.
• Kuhn A (ed), 1999, Alien Zone II The Spaces of Science-Fiction Cinema, Verso, London.
• Landon B, 1992, ‘Chapter 2: The Thing in all its Guises: Reconsidering a Science Fiction Classic’ in The Aesthetics of Ambivalence: Rethinking the Science Fiction Film in the age of Electronic (Re)production, Greenwood Press, London.
• Maddrey J, 2004, Nightmares in Red, White, & Blue The Evolution of the American Horror Film, McFarland & Company, USA.
• Phillips K, 2005, Projected Fears: Horror Films & American Culture, Praeger, USA.
• Prince S, 1988, ‘Dread, Taboo and The Thing: Toward a Social Theory of the Horror Film’ in Wide Angle, No.10
• Strinati D, 1998, ‘Chapter 4: The Horror Film’ in An Introduction to Studying Popular Culture, Routledge, London.
• Telotte J.P., 1995, Replications A Robotic History of the Science Fiction Film, University of Illinois Press, USA.


FILMOGRAPHY:

Films Studied:
• Invasion of the Body Snatchers,1956, Don SIEGEL, USA, Allied Artists.
• John Carpenter’s The Thing, 1982, John CARPENTER, USA, Universal Pictures.

Additional Films Mentioned:
• Body Snatchers, 1993, Abel FERRARA, USA, Warner Bros.
• Invasion of the Body Snatchers, 1978, Philip KAUFMAN, USA, Solofilm.
• The Thing From Another World, 1951, Christian NYBY, USA, Winchester Pictures.