I was shocked when I saw the movie "Scream" in 1997. Actually, previously, I had not watched many horror movies. I knew that "Scream" was classified in the horror film genre which contained violence, gore, offensive language, and sexuality. However, I wanted to see Neve Campbell and Drew Berrimore, my favourite teen stars. Certainly, there were many bloody, killing scenes mixed with coarse language and sexual references. The background music was frightening. The special effect sound was loud and worked well together with other factors to shock me. Honestly, at first, I was upset by the film. However, after half an hour, I started to enjoy the frightfulness and horribleness. Since then, I have viewed many other horror movies. All of the films effect my emotion. I often feel disturbed. How about other people? Do horror films disturb them? This prompts my research question.
Research Question: What are the effects of "popular culture", which are shaped by post-modern media, on people's behaviour with special reference to horror film?
- What kinds of pleasure or suffering does consumption of horror movie yield?
- How do people react to the violence contained in horror films?
- Does violence on horror films develop aggression in people's real lives?
Section 2: Rationale
In Australia, there are many imported Hollywood films screening on cinemas everywhere. The films are argued as the post-modern media that rely on the terms "mass product" and "popular culture", especially in this decade. The terms give the sense of communicating widespread to the mass, a large number of people. In another sense, the media makers try to create media product that serves all diverse interest of people as much as they can. Then, some scholars claim that post-modern media are produced only for commercial profit and ignore art. Therefore, popular culture is known as the division from high culture. Post-modern media is an interesting issue to analyse as the important current issue.
This research will particularly look at "Horror film" because the genre is, in fact, a classic film style which is adapted to the post-modern world. Nowadays, horror films are popular for teenagers and others. Horror film fans like to experience things that upset or frighten them. Thus, sometimes, filmmakers place more violence into the films for commercial profit. As well, the film producers try to push for a wider audience market of people who do not usually appreciate viewing death and blood in films. The strategies to extend the audiences include combining horror with other genres and reproducing films of the past. Then, this approach as has been witnessed in the last decade, has been most successful for horror films in the box office. Thus, many horror films are produced following this successful trend.
Specifically and recently, Australians also have watched some horror movies imported from the US which contain bloody, killing, nude, sexual, and horrible scenes. These horror films are blamed by many as a cause of people's violent actions - murder, rape, assaults, robbery, and so forth. These actions are sort of major social problems which should be carefully looked at and solved. Many believe that the media has a great effect on people.
There are many studies on the issue of mass media violence and the effect on people's behaviours. This research will also concentrate on horror films that, sometimes, contain violence, sex scenes, nudity, and coarse language which may or may not have a huge effect on Australians' behaviour development. Thus, to narrow the research, Australians will be participants for this study. The research may be valuable in finding the conjunction between commercial product and the responsibility for society in term of violence in films in the current world.
Section 3: Literature Reviews
Although the term "post-modern" was actually created in 1870s, it was first clearly understood when television emerged in 1960s. Thus, television is argued as the real medium of post-modernism. Post-modernists also consider cinema and other media as medium which communicate post-modern style, spectacle, special effects and images, at the expense of content, character, substance, narrative and social comment. Moreover, post-modernism is concerned with the distinct breakdown between high art and popular or mass culture. (Prawer: 1980)
Jameson (1991), Jancovich (1992) and Pinedo (1997) argue that popular culture is relevant to the contemporary capitalism aspect in which media content is seen as a commodity. In the post-modern world after the emergence of capitalism perspective, media is a tool of economic behaviour. Television programs, films, books and music are produced to attract people's attention for selling advertising or gaining much marketing profit. The point is that, these scholars, Jameson, Jancovich and Pinedo, define popular culture as "commercial culture". Instead of analysing media audiences as a homogeneous mass, the media are produced as fragmented, consisting of different segments of interest to different advertisers and audiences in different markets. Both Jameson and Jancovich believe that diversity of audiences is classified by age, class, gender, geography and race. The hybrid of genre, re-production, inter-textual references, rearticulation, and identity politics are used in producing media content to cover a
s many markets as possible. This capitalism of media content production is not developed only in market capitalism and monopoly capitalism stages, but also in late or multinational capitalism. Therefore, to understand the nature of popular culture today is essential to grasp post-modernism not as a style, but rather as a cultural dominant.
Therefore, the trend of post-modern films is to avoid realism and sell their unclear surface. Badley (1995) and Pinedo (1997) point out that popular culture in films appears to stress the use of unreal techniques and non-stop sequences, rather than the realism of clever story-plot and character development. In other words, post-modern cinemas ignore the narrative demands of classical realism. Moreover, the form of contemporary movies is claimed as the confusions over time and space, the use of division genres, and recycling of the cinema's past.
The Hollywood film industry is an example which can be seen as post-modern media. Recently, many "horror films" have been produced and the producers have completely avoided marketing them as just horror films. Thus, the filmmakers draw in audiences who do not usually go and see horror films. For example, Scream (1997), Scream2 (1998), I know what you did last summer (1997), and I still know what you did last summer (1998) rely on the hybrid of different genres. They are not only horror films, but also "teenage films", soap opera, and romance films which are like a series repeating and referring to themselves. Similarly, H2O - Halloween (1998) is a reproduced film which refers to its past story of the first classic Halloween twenty years ago. Psycho (1999) is also redefined from the famous 1960 Alfred Hitchcock "Psycho". Besides, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992) is also seen as a post-modern movie which is remade to be a television series, so called cross media production.
Jancovich (1992) suggests the reasons for the popularity of post-modern horror films since the 1960s. Although horror films are horrible and reprehensible, they are generally produced to be easily recognized and then attract the attention of large middle-class audiences. The filmmakers also present both their own marketing and advertise in the press to the middle-class people who are not the target group to view death in horror films. Thus, it is not that middle-class audiences are mindless mass, but they are different social groups to those who usually are the horror fans. Derry (1992) believes that usual horror fans are teenagers who are emotionally affected by the media. To rely on the different audiences, horror films have not to be both outdated and crude. Successful films have to be in vogue. Moreover, some horror films contain violence because of the marketing. One crucial factor that contributes to filmmakers producing violent films is the commercial factor. (Nelson: 1994)
However, some believe that examples of popular culture often are works of art. For instance, Prawer (1980) does not accept the common distinction between 'film' as a work of art and 'movie' as a popular entertainment. As well, Prawer looks at the shift and continuity from literary 'tales of terror' to popular entertainment: 'horror movie'. Pinedo (1997) suggests that tales of terror have been reproduced since the emergence of classical horror film paradigm which is relevant to pre-sixty period of time, 1930-1959, and tales of terror and high Gothic monster culture. In contrast to classical horror films, post-modern horror films are reliant on the post-sixties time or contemporary everyday world, 1960-now, and the recreation terror of psychotic monsters.
The popularly successful films of post-modern period, such as The Exorcist (1973) and Fatal Attraction (1987), represent the instability of consciousness and identity within contemporary culture. These two horror films are examples of horror films usually used to suggest that without appropriate authority, the children who view them are open to restricted influence, no matter how bad.
Derry (1987) also argues in this point that, in a sense, horror films are produced with low budgets, few stars, primitive production values, less then literate dialogue, and exploitative advertising. The films connect to people's subconsciousness, the issues that are often painful for people to deal with consciously and directly. However, the subconsciousness is needed by people for dreaming with the things that frighten them. Whilst films are much like dreams, horror films are like nightmares. For Derry, adults are mature enough to separate nightmare and reality. Some adults may think that horror films are unpleasant and silly. Other more-sensitive adults may see horror film as an instrument to protect their "psyche". On the other hand, children have less connection to the value judgements of culture. They seem to enjoy anticipation and enthusiasm toward horror films, although that type of films, sometimes, damages them. As well, children may not be able to know that monsters in horror films are not real. Both Macooby (1968), in the 1960s, and Edgar (1997), more recently, expand this point that the media awareness of each person is unequal by the influence of life experience which is less in children than mature adults, social context, and the audiences' characteristics.
In addition, for teenagers, the major audiences, the films also represent a glance into the restricted contents of the id, especially the sexual and violent impulses. This is not a dream which is at individual level but can be mainly seen in contemporary films which are social. The films are produced for public audiences and screened in public place where one can be aware of the effect on people. (Derry: 1992)
However, some people do not take the violence in films seriously. Paterson (1993) discusses the idea that people may enjoy violence. Therefore, they argue that the acceptance of violence, sex scenes, nudity, and coarse language are in wide range because of the variation of sensitivities. In some cases, people are offended by coarse language, sex scenes and nudity more than violence.
Horror films, sometimes, are classified as violent films which may harm people. There are three categories of violence in films - sexuality, violence and offensive language. Badley (1995) demonstrates that violence on horror movies is in the content of "raging hormones, the Oedipus complex, female sexual power, rape, child abuse, the 'crisis' of the family, sexual harassment, dirty old men, misogynistic gynecologists, male narcissism, Victorian sexual repression, and sexually transmitted disease" (p. 13). This is the case even in horror teen films which show that horror functions are displaced and seen as "safe" pornography which are accounted as a kind of mass media violence. The cause is that mass culture, especially in the entertainment market, is monopolized by young males who require aggression for passage into adulthood. Thus, violent themes dominate popular culture.
Paterson (1993) considers that violence is increasing everyday in the world and particularly also in Australia. This trend of violence growth is not only in film, but also on television and video. Paterson views violent depiction as damaging which may have more impact than other depictions on people because it is hard to forget. People cannot easily distance themselves from violence. Besides, sexuality and nudity, for some people, are private and personal matters which should not be communicated through media. Hence, this content should be presented in the context of romance and mystery. These depictions of sexuality and nudity are both enjoyable and informative. However, according to Paterson, both men and women, altogether agree that the scenes which are relevant to sexuality and nudity, such as sexual harassment and explicit abuse, should not be transmitted on media at any time because the scenes may harm people and arouse the sexual desire to commit harassment and abuse in the real world.
According to the statistics of deaths in school shooting in the United States between 1997-98, the rate was increasing. A lot of students and teachers were killed and wounded by young shooters. Child violence and films are blamed as the cause. Movie violence is a factor which teaches audiences' aggressive behaviours in using guns and weapons to commit crime. (Murphy: 1998) Especially in young people, Overington (1997) reveals that children may copy and learn the skills to use weapons and techniques of crime from the extremely violent films and television. This violence is, now, produced within many Hollywood films, television programs, and song lyrics and beat. Then, when children watch or listen to this kind of media, they may express their inside violent feeling and solve their problems by harm, or more, killing other people. Thus, Overington strongly believes that children are influenced by media in the way they think and act.
In other words, crime may be committed because children learn by copying the influential models, media. Films, television programs, and music are parts of social competence in the child's development and have an impact on child's behaviour. Children will learn how to do something new that they have never done or thought before. Stoddard (Cited in Overington: 1997) shows that children will remember 60% of what they view. Children also cannot separate reality and films as some adults can. Therefore, the violent scenes on movies are probably emulated by the children.
Bundura's experiment in 1961 (Reported in Maccoby: 1968) proves that films are as "hypodermic needle" which have a great effect on people's behaviours. The study shows that the trend of children's aggressiveness depends in the model that they watch. For instance, children who receive aggressive content on media are more aggressive than others who do not see an aggressive model. Thus, it has been claimed that media have some influence on their audiences, especially a violent effect on children, even before the actual emergence of the term post-modernism in 1968. Overington (1997) describes many categories of the effects of film violence. Firstly, films affect the emotional reactions which may be expressed in aggressive behaviours, such as, massacre, drugs, and guns. The second effect is verbal aggression. Next, aggressive love scenes are seen as the stimuli of sexual desire. The last effect is violence and sexual arousal by the rhythm and beat of heavy metal music which may be in films. Besides, suicide, violence and abuse of women in the "shock rock" soundtracks change the children's view to the world.
The Herald Sun (1997) provides an example of Australian teenager's violence following the film, Bad Boy Bubby (1994). The film shows that the character "Bubby" is a kind of mentally disordered person who is confined by his mother. Then, he learns how to keep a cat, his only friend, with him all the time by wrapping the cat in plastic food wrap. Also, he kills his mother and father in the same way. Following the film, an Australian boy wrapped his girlfriend with plastic food wrap around the girl's head. He told the police after being arrested that he was influenced by the movie. He learnt how to murder people while he watched the film.
The case of movie-copying murder happened before in 1993 when two ten-year-old boys committed the murder of two-year-old James Bulger. Schubart (1995) states by invoking "copy-cat theory" that the murderers copied scenes from Child's Play 3 (1991) which was rented by one boy's father. The judge's comment agreed that "violent video films may in part be an explanation". Then, the Sun launched a campaign to destroy all copies of the film in Britain.
It is not only film which contain violence, but also television. Furthermore, violence is not only in the horror genre. Thus, violence content is widespread everywhere through every media content and affect people's lives. There are some studies specifying children's emotional responses to television. Buckingham (1996) finds that children are the persons whom the media violence has the most effects on. He starts his study by seeing his own sons suffering from what the children watch on television. However, some programs, for example, the hospital drama Casualty, make him difficult to cope with watching injections, operations, and children dying whilst one of his sons and the same age friend of his son enjoy guessing who will die next. Thus, Buckingham suggests that parents should beware this response to television because it is negative emotion which may shape violent behaviour in the future.
In terror play, Prawer (1980) classifies the reaction of audiences into three kinds. They are "the audience's 'breathless eagerness'; the detached amusement of intellectuals (many of whom had a hand in providing thrills for the multitude and could occasionally be seen winking over the heads of the 'hicks' they thus served); and the indignant rejection of the aristocratic connoisseur, whose appreciation of the skill involved in such entertainments only increased his scorn of their intellectual and moral content" (pp. 4-5). However, he suggests observing these attitudes again because the study of popular horror film has to be also looked at the specific influences of mise en scene.
Finally, Prawer believes that terror in films often involves scenes of violence and stages five conflicting theories about effects of these violent scenes on perpetrators' violent actions outside the world of cinema. The first theory is that cinema has no effect because people modify the content with social experiences and encounters and interactions with real people in non-fictional situations. The second is that people avoid violence in real life because they suffered from what the films show. According to the third theory, violence in films is sought as a safety-valve which drains off impulses to commit violence in real society. The fourth theory is that people place violence in films instead of acting violence outside the media. On the contrary, the fifth aspect looks at the power of films as models for developments of aggression that are acted in real life.
Section 4: Discussion of the Concepts
From the research question that "What are the effects of 'popular culture', which is shaped by post-modernism media, on people's behaviour developments with special reference to horror film?", it is important to look at the concepts in terms of "post-modern media", "popular culture", "horror film" and their "effects on people's behaviour development". That helps to deal with the question.
Firstly, there can be no doubt that film is clearly defined as post-modern media which many scholars argue about. Film shows how itself becomes "popular culture" which is relevant to "commercial product" and separate from "high art" (Jancovich: 1992), especially in horror film which is always the hybrid of genre, re-production, inter-textual references, rearticulation, and identity politics. These forms are used in producing media content to cover as many markets as possible. However, the research will not look at the division of popular culture and high art because I strongly agree with Prawer (1980) that popular product is a kind of art.
Next, Derry (1987) is quite correct in saying that "horror film" represents people's nightmares. People are subconscious and dream things that frighten them. Thus, some people like to watch their nightmares on screen. Derry argues that teenagers are another target group of horror films. I also find this is true from my observation. In my opinion, the vogue in using popular teenage stars and hybrids of teenage genre, some soap opera content, and romantic film with horror movies bring success to the film. This is useful to understand as part of the research question why horror film is popular and interesting for many people.
In addition, I follow the viewpoint on effects of film violence of Badley (1995) that horror films often contain violence which means not only real violence like child abuse, rape and murder, but also aggressive sexuality. These lead to aggression in people. There are two cases of murder and other scholars' concepts in the literature reviews supporting Badley's idea, for instance, Overington (1997) and Murphy (1998) who examine the effect as "hypodermic needle". Therefore, my hypothesis is that violence in horror films affects people in negative ways even though Prawer (1980) suggests that there are also four other theories showing the positive effects of violent scenes.
Section 5: References
Badley, L. 1995. Film, Horror, and the Body Fantastic. Greenwood Press. Westport.
Buckingham, D. 1996. Moving Images: Understanding Children's Emotional Responses to Television. Manchester University Press. Manchester.
Derry, C. 1987. "More Dark Dreams: Some Notes on the Recent Horror Film". In Waller, G. A. (ed.). American Horrors: Essays on the Modern American Horror Film. University of Illinois Press. Urbana.
Edgar, P. 1997. Children and Screen Violence. University of Queensland Press. St.Lucia.
Jamesons, F. 1991. Postmodernism. Verso. London.
Jancovich, M.1992. Horror. B.T. Batsford Ltd. London.
Maccoby, E. E. 1968, "Effects of the Mass media". In Otto, N. L. (ed.). Violence and Mass Media. Harper & Row Publishers. New York.
Murphy, K. 1998. "Shooting: 1 Killed, 22 Injured in Gun Rampage". In The Age, 22 May, p.A26.
Nelson, A. 1994. "Colour of Violence". In Index on Censorship, 23(1-2), pp.86-91.
Overington, C. 1997. "Media Gets Beating for Its Violence". In The Age, 5 December, p.174.
Paterson, K. 1993. Classification Issue: Film, Video & Television. Australian Broadcasting Authority, Sydney.
Pinedo, I. C. 1997. Recreational Terror: Women and the Pleasures of Horror Film Viewing. State University of New York Press. New York.
Prawer, S. S. 1980. Caligari's Children: The Film as Tale of Terror. Oxford University Press. Oxford.
Schubart, R. 1995. "From Desire to Deconstruction: Horror Films and Audience Reactions". In Kidd-Hewitt, D. and Osborne, R. (eds.), Crime and the Media: The Post-modern Spectacle. Pluto Press. London.
