I am fearful. Since I like to sleep peacefully (and wash my face without worrying about a ghost appearing in my bathroom mirror), I avoid horror movies. I may not believe it, scary stories affect me without common sense. How to explain that they can haunt us so much?
Posted at 4:00 p.m.
When I posed the question to Bernard Perron, director of the department of art history and film studies at the University of Montreal, he offered to give me a crash course in horror cinema.
I answered “present! » without suspecting that I would have a crazy pleasure to hear it…
The researcher — with breathtaking passion — first explained to me that fear is a primary object-oriented emotion. Stephen King, king of the genre, has determined ten particularly important sources of fear: that of the dark; slimy things; deformity; snakes ; some rats ; insects (anything that relates to the fear of infection); closed places; of death ; others ; and, ultimately, fear for others.
Very well. But why do we feel this fear even when we are faced with a fictional story? Even when you know no one is actually caged and coerced by the orders of a saw-loving clown?
The professor quotes the philosopher Noël Carroll and his theory of thought. In short: we are afraid because we conceptualize the object of fear.
PHOTO ROBERT SKINNER, THE PRESS
Bernard Perron
“It’s when you’re afraid that you tell yourself the most beautiful stories of fear and horror,” Bernard Perron explains to me. When I see a zombie, I conceptualize my fear of the zombie — I imagine the bite, the infection, the danger. My thought leaves and makes me react! »
Moreover, the zombie is at the heart of the course currently offered by the teacher. For him, the figure represents the 4e age: “The 4e age is the moment when the body degenerates, summarizes Bernard Perron. It’s the loss of autonomy, Alzheimer’s disease and dry skin, a sign that the end is approaching. When we talk about conceptualizing fears from a simple image…
If the frightening stories affect us, it is therefore because we accept to play the game and let the fictitious monsters arouse very real fears in us.
“This genre makes us think of the horror of the world, believes Bernard Perron. It’s a way of projecting oneself. We let go of our limits more easily because we know that we are not really in danger. The fear becomes thrilling. »
Let’s say that I now want to initiate myself properly into the genre, how do I get there as a great coward?
The professor, who admits to being not very brave, offers me some suggestions:
“I always tell my students to start counting at the beginning of a silence. In general, it will fart between three and five seconds later! And I close my eyes, during this time. We startle because our body responds reflexively to the image that suddenly appears to scare us. If we don’t see her, we give each other a hand. Finally, I suggest watching movies in broad daylight. If Stephen King puts fear of the dark first on his list, it’s because it’s the perfect time to tell these kinds of stories. We all remember the legends heard around the fire, when we were children! »
It is moreover the nostalgia of the campfire which explains the passion that Sébastien Diaz devotes to horror cinema. I wanted to talk to the director of the Terror 404 series, after my crash course, to continue to tame this art form…
PHOTO ROBERT SKINNER, THE PRESS
Sebastien Diaz
“It’s the only genre that takes me back so much to childhood,” he told me. I always feel like the little ass around the fire with a flashlight! There is a form of transgression, like a ban on watching this. »
Moreover, horror cinema has for him an important social function.
We watch so much stuff these days! We are bombarded with images and I think we have become a little desensitized. I like when I’m pushed around and I’m no longer a passive spectator. Good horror movies push you to your limits; it’s not pleasant, but you question yourself as an individual or as a father, for example.
Sebastien Diaz
To this end, Sébastien Diaz cites his most recent crush, the Danish psychological thriller Speak No Evil by Christian Tafdrup. This film made him think about the place of kindness in our society and the difficulty he sometimes has in putting his foot down.
Then, he throws me a final sledgehammer argument: horror cinema is a great gateway to several other art forms. Directors are often inspired by painters, classical composers or important authors. Immersing yourself in the approach of the masters of horror is both learning about the history of art and the culture of different periods.
“Horror cinema tells us about the evolution of mores,” continues Sébastien Diaz. When I was little, I was fascinated by the films censored under Thatcher, which were called video nasties [vidéos malsaines]. My brother and I had made it our mission to rent them all! In the United States, there was also the Hays code [qui a assuré 30 ans d’autocensure hollywoodienne]. Some films have managed to circumvent it with horror. Zombies symbolized radioactive air, for example…”
Horror cinema would therefore allow us to live a primary emotion in complete safety, to conceptualize our fears and to approach subjects that we otherwise struggle to consider. “As you’re on a roller coaster ride, you don’t realize right away that we’re talking about the Cold War,” sums up Sébastien Diaz.
Okay that’s good. You win, gentlemen.
Bring me Halloween and its terrifying classics, please… I have some catching up to do.