A few years ago my mother and I were having a conversation where I mentioned I had just bought a stack of DVDs. I don't remember specifically what they were (I think one was Zombie Doom by Andreas Schnaas) but I said they were mostly zombie movies. My mother, being the 60-something Midwestern Christian lady she is, had no idea what a zombie was. Using the most delicate terminology I could, I explained that zombies were dead people returned from the grave usually for one of two reasons. The first and most common reason is to consume human flesh. The second reason, and the true definition of a zombie, is that they were resurrected under the supernatural control of some malignant spirit or voodoo master to do the bidding of said spirit/master. I then started to explain the difference between zombies and ghouls as most zombie movies today feature ghouls and not true zombies. It was at this point that her eyes glazed over and her face froze into a soul shattering look that can best be described as a combination of disappointment and horror.
The point of this little anecdote was to show that when it comes to horror movies, you either get it or you don't. This issue of BthroughZ is the perfect example of that. Take Cannibal Holocaust for example. I hate that fucking movie. Seriously, what the hell is wrong with Italian people? Anyway, back on track. Cannibal Holocaust. It's slow, it's boring and it relies more on gore and unpleasant situations than plot, story telling or character development. I have this theory that if you reduced an Italian horror movie to a mathematical equation it would look something like this:
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boredom + gore + boredom + boobs + boredom + gore + gore + incest + boredom
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= Italian horror movie
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the inability to tell a coherent and interesting story
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You can replace Cannibal Holocaust with just about any Italian horror movie and you'll find that the result is the same. Try it. Throw in Zombie or Burial Ground or Hell of the Living Dead. You can't argue it, it's a mathematical fact. It's science, folks. And yet, people whose opinion in movies I respect love these movies. Once you rule out that these people might be insane or possess a basic character flaw, it comes down to the fact that I just don't get it. And frankly, I hope I never do.
Horror is the most widely encompassing genre of film there is. It can include comedy, romance, drama and even musical numbers and still be considered horror. Even movies like J.D.'s Revenge and Fight For Your Life, while not horror in the traditional sense, have enough rape, murder and torture to easily allow them to be included in the genre. What this means is that there's something to appeal to almost everyone, and conversely, something to appall almost everyone. Just look at this issue for instance. Karyne preaches the virtues of the JHorror St. John's Wort, a movie generally shit on by critics, while Ben describes the impact of Animal Soup, a movie which, from his description, most people wouldn't be able to sit through. And let's not even get started on on BK's review of Uwe Boll's Seed.
While putting together the Run Bitch Run review over lunch at my job, a coworker stopped to see what I was working on. Once he got past the title he hesitantly asked what the movie was about. I explained that it was your basic rape/revenge movie. Having no idea of what I was talking about, I gave him the basic plot. A sweet innocent girl is graphically raped and left for dead and then comes back and violently kills her attackers. Needless to say, he was appalled and wondered what sort of people could enjoy something like that. The movie, not the rape and murder part. I explained to him that it was a whole sub-genre of horror movies and was quite popular amongst a certain crowd of people. I then gave him a brief rundown of the exploitation genre including the sub-sub-genres (if you catch my meaning) of sexploitation, blaxploitation, women in prison and nazi-ploitation. Needless to say, the look on his face was strikingly similar to the one on my mom's.
What I'm trying to say, and perhaps the biggest lesson I've learned from running this site, is that horror isn't for everyone and not all horror is for all horror fans. It's like one's taste in music, you usually know within the first few notes if you're going to like it or not. The other lesson I've learned is that most of my co-workers think I'm bat-shit crazy. So it goes.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go watch House of the Dead again. Man, Uwe Boll sure came through on that one. As I said before, "Even if I explain it, you still wouldn't understand."
See you next issue.
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jamie