October 31, 2022
THE VARSITY The University of Toronto’s Student Newspaper Since 1880
Vol. CXLIII, No. 8
The Female Scream
Why do women in horror often meet overly theatrical and sexualized ends? Vicky Huang Varsity Contributor
Content warning: This article discusses misogyny and contains detailed descriptions of violence and sexualized violence against women. For decades, slasher flicks have delighted audiences with their neverending spectacular extremities. Although every slasher is the same, in that there’s always a sophisticated killer and someone eventually dies, the subgenre has managed to fill out theatres with every new release. Wes Craven’s 1994 classic Scream was the first meta movie to identify and satirize this predictability. In a hilariously self-aware scene, Randy Meek explains the infamous laws of surviving a horror film. His three simple rules
— no sex, drugs, or wandering off — are ruthlessly accurate, exposing the slasher subgenre’s formulaic tendencies. But I question whether Randy’s golden tenets hold true for both men and women. Indeed, both genders are punished for committing the same groan-inducing mistakes. But whereas the man tends to be killed in an unassuming way, the woman is always disproportionately punished for her crimes. I am not surprised that the woman slasher victim endures this misogyny-tinged fate. Look no further than at Hollywood’s top boogeymen, a lineup of iconic figures such as Micheal Myers, John Neville, and Norman Bates. Many, if not all, are men embroiled in sinister relationships with the opposite gender. Among the ranks are lecherous sadists who can only ‘finish’ to the bloodied female death. Others are intrepid, sickly frail outcasts moti-
vated by their torturous oedipal complexes. In all cases, one thing is certain: cinema’s murderous superstars have always wielded rusted knives and twisted feelings toward women. Even in films like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), in which our killer’s motive is unclear and does not appear to have a basis in gender, the camera has an obscene fixation on women. Consider the back-to-back murders of Kirk and Pam. Kirk is bashed once with a sledgehammer; but before we can process, the camera pulls so far back that his silhouette is submerged by shadows. It is a swift, private, and absolutely forgettable snuffing. On the other hand, Pam’s death is etched into our cultural consciousness. The iconic scene begins when Leatherface abruptly yanks her into hell’s house. The camera sticks close to Pam’s resistant, flailing body, tracking her every feral attempt to wrestle out of his tenacious grip. But it’s no use; she is impaled by a meathook. We cut yet again, situating us so uncomfortably close to Pam’s face. Her every muscle contorts in agony, a horrific sight
paired with her equally harrowing, discordant screams. This is macabre manifest. The difference between Kirk and Pam’s deaths is just one example of the gender discrepancy in framing. Every slasher formally unfolds the same way. The man victim’s death is always lackluster: attacked with a knife or, in Kirk’s case, a hammer to the head. It is almost as if he’s being skimmed over, an hors d’oeuvre served to placate our blood-lusting appetites until the main course. If he is the starter, then she is the Michelin meal. The camera takes its time with the woman; narrowing on her expressions, twitching limbs and bouncing buttocks. In a cruel yet spectacular frenzy, she is attacked until every drop of terror is wrung from her ravaged body. Broken yet still beautiful, her taxidermied image lingers across the scene before we cut to our next unfortunate prey. Continued on page 12.