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Ask the Expert ... The Five Basics Of Horror
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Question: "What elements need to be included when writing a horror film?"
Answer: Halloween is just around the corner, so I guess you're thinking of writing a horror screenplay. I recently turned in the first draft of one of those studio remakes of a hit horror film from the 1980s, so I’ve been hanging out at the Fangoria and Monsterpalooza Conventions and watching a stack of horror films to find out what makes them scary. I’ve narrowed it down to five elements...
1) THE LOSS OF FREE WILL: In The Wolfman (and other werewolf movies) you are a normal person until there's a full moon... then you kind of black out and wake up having done terrible things. Dracula can hypnotize people (which is why you shouldn't look him in the eyes) and after he bites you? You're his bitch. In The Exorcist Chris MacNeil's daughter is possessed - the kid is out of control. She even loses control of her bladder!
Look at most horror movies and you will see people losing control. In the Final Destination movies, no matter what you do, if death wants you he will get you. In a horror movie you no longer control your fate, your life... until Act 3.
2) THE UNKNOWN/UNSEEN: One of the basics of horror (and this is tied to dread) is that you don't know when or where the creature will strike. You don't see scenes where people walk into a creepy old house and the creature is just standing there - no, the creature is hidden somewhere in the shadows, but *which* shadow? Jaws is scary because we know the shark is down there, but we can't see exactly where. Any time you can find a way to hide your monster... somewhere... you build dread because we don't know where the monster will come from.
We fear the unknown. If the killer is some guy you know, not as scary as if you have no idea what that thing is. You want your killer/monster/ghost to make sense, but you don't want to explain away the mystery.
3) SUSPENSE: The anticipation of an action. In The Pit & The Pendulum, we have that swinging blade that gets lower with every swing. Starts out above the stomach of Bernard and each swing brings it closer to disemboweling him alive.
With suspense we know what's coming, and fear builds from the anticipation of what we know will happen. You have two speeding trains heading right at each other on the same tracks! You show a booby trap, then show someone walking toward it, unaware that they are about to step on the trap. You want to stretch out the suspense - make every step closer to that booby trap more frightening.
4) DREAD: Like suspense, but it is the anticipation of an “unknown” action. Dread is the most important element in a horror script. When the group decides to explore the abandoned mental institution, rumor says a crazy killer still lives there, and they wander from dark spooky room to dark spooky room. The audience doesn't know which room the crazy killer is in... or what they might find in the other rooms: dead bodies?
Dread is built on the audience knowing something bad may happen, but not knowing what that may be. Usually the writer front-loads some frightening thing (like young Michael Myers killing his sister and her boyfriend) in the first ten pages of the script, so that the audience will begin to fear what may happen later (when Michael escapes and returns to Haddonfield). There isn't a specific action/threat like in suspense, just the constant feeling that something bad will happen.
5) SHOCK/SURPRISE: Helps build dread. It's when something happens that we do not expect. The opposite of suspense. The people are wandering through that mental institution and *wham* the killer jumps out and slices off one of their heads!
Everybody runs, and for a while the killer chases them with the apple-peeling device that is his signature weapon... and as he gets closer, this builds suspense (he might catch them). When they lose him in the maze of the mental institution and then wander around looking for a way out, that builds dread (we don't know where he is - around the next corner?). And when they turn a corner and - wham! - a cat jumps out at them, that's surprise ... I call that "schlock shock." Then, after they've said "It's only a cat" and the audience has let their guard down, because it was just fake shock - wham! - the killer jumps out from behind them and uses his apple-peeler to kill another one of them... spinning them until he has removed their skin in a single thin strip!
Those five elements are the basics of a horror screenplay. Dread is more important than blood and gore and unusual ways to kill teenagers while they are at camp. Remember, if it’s not on the page, it’s not on the screen.
Comments
Hi William,
Nice article. When looking back at some of the most famous of horror movies over the last 25-50 years, there's two ingredients, or themes, that are prevalent in each and every one of them. Films like Psycho, Night of the Living Dead, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Exorcist, Halloween, Silence of the Lambs, and even Scream share these.
What are they? Well, first, let's look at what horror really is, or what makes it effective. Horror, at its most fundamental level, is about psychological destruction/devastation. Horror, as defined by Merriam Webster, is "painful and intense fear, dread, or dismay". Regardless of what the fear is (a phobia perhaps), it's based on the character's own psychology, which leads to their predicament. A movie such as Arachnophobia, for example, wouldn't exist if there wasn't a fear of spiders.
That being said, the two things all these movies have in common are a) Identity and b) The destruction of family.
A movie such as Psycho uses both very successfully and equally. Norman Bates, having killed his mother (the destruction of family), assumes her identity and becomes conflicted by it.
Night of the Living Dead prays more on the destruction of the family, twice, in what was once a very taboo subject at the time.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Exorcist both embody these themes. Leatherface makes a mask out of his victim's flesh (identity), while serving the family. Regan loses her identity to possession, her mother left only with turning to a literal "father" to help.
We all know the basic premise of Halloween - Michael Myers kills his sister, then returns 15 years later to wreak more havoc. He wears a pale, expressionless mask, which becomes his identity.
Silence of the Lambs' Buffalo Bill is something akin to Leatherface, but it's Clarice who has issues with her own familial upbringing.
Scream carries on the "faceless" killer identity theme while one of the killers' motive relies on the destruction Sydney's mother caused to his own family.
There are numerous other examples (Jacob's Ladder, Poltergeist, etc.) where these two elements come into play time and time again, and it's not surprising when we stop and think about it, how the two are really inter-related: we assume our identity based on our upbringing and family.
That is why I believe these elements have provided for such strong basis for horror films, because, as with life, the people who are capable of creating the most psychological damage are the ones we hold closest and trust the most.
Film critic/theorist Robin Wood discusses these themes in an essay (I can't recall the title) which might be worth hunting down if interested in reading more.
Thanks!
Jim