Motherhood Fears Beyond Psychoanalysis (Hereditary)

"Once we realized what was happening, we had to act, contain the damage.  Contain families.  Had to act against people who went home from a day of trying to kill the rest of us and cooked a nice dinner, oblivious to just how fucked they were in the head.  People who were otherwise good, who got warped on a fundamental level, left open to the preaching and the incitement of their angrier neighbors.  Two years of fighting before we got the word down from on high, that they couldn’t rehabilitate the ones they’d captured, the ones who’d listened too long.  The poor assholes would play nice until they saw an opportunity, then they’d take it, do as much damage as they could.  Two years fighting good people who’d been convinced they had to throw their lives away fighting an enemy that didn’t exist."

-Worm chapter 22.2

It's kind of an old adage for Amy to tell students that they're doomed to become like their parents, that no matter what they try they won't be able to shake the worldview and values that they were raised with. It's a genuinely scary thought, especially for those of us with abusive family members or those who made nasty mistakes in the past. We grow up living with the consequences of things that were never ours to control in the first place, and the idea that destiny or whatever other guiding forces of the universe will push us back on a track we reject is legitimately scary. This fear is common to almost all of us and is likely why parental figures play such a prominent role in psychoanalytic theory. At the same time, fear of becoming like your progenitor (which I'll call "Convergence" from this point on) is not dependent upon many of the social paradigms or antiquated conceptions of sexuality that pervade psychoanalysis, and so holds up much better than many other psychoanalytic concepts to modern readers.

Hereditary is a film that plays with that fear of old sins gone unpunished, of the lingering effects of abuse and manipulation which lead into a adulthood. Annie is a woman who was forced into parenthood against her will and in spite of her efforts, and her children struggle to trust her as a consequence of her mental illness and her attempts to control and correct them. In the therapy scene, Annie recalls how she and her brother were manipulated by her own mother Ellen, expressing the breakdown of trust while sidestepping the fact of her miserable experiences as a parent. Not only has Annie become a mother against her will, she has become the exact kind of mother she grew up fearing. 

Under this lens, the fears of motherhood discussed by Barbara Creed take on a new light. Rather than vague, subconscious constructions posited by Freud, the fears of motherhood become couched in powerful, conscious anxieties about one's own future and potential. Once somebody is mature enough to be somewhat independent (typically in the teenage years), they usually begin to question their parents and come to terms with certain toxic lessons they might have had pounded into them over the years. We think of concepts like birth or blood or even physical contact with revulsion because they remind us of the places where we lacked control and quite possibly still lack control. Motherhood is a position in which on can do a great deal of impressing and can't easily be resisted, which makes the danger of somebody screwing up a victim in this malleable state particularly stomach-churning.

This horror is common to many and is particularly powerful because it's not easy to shake or to escape. How do you know what conclusions you came to on your own and which ones were imposed on you by your upbringing? How many others before you have tried to rebel in the same manner you are, only to slip back into the same patterns of close-mindedness and hostility which you're so desperate to escape? Most people can never really tell if they've escaped the influences or the errors of their family, and this perpetual uncertainty is why fear of motherhood is so persistent and so influential in our media (doubly so in teen-focused media). You are trapped in a sort of cultural rut, unable to write your own destiny or even right your own wrongs, and you may not even be aware of this.

Horror Science (Creature from the Black Lagoon)

"Good science meant starting with the conditions, forming a hypothesis, making a prediction, and then testing it.  Repeat, repeat, repeat, until there was a solid base of knowledge.  That knowledge let one establish further conditions, refine hypotheses.

But tinkers started with the end result.  A moment of inspiration, glimpses of the major steps one would need to take to get there.  It involved working backwards, up until that moment the means came into view. "

-Worm Interlude 19

I'll be the first to say that scientists are not perfect people, nor are they above pettiness and ego. There are countless examples of scientific infidelity or recklessness throughout history, with a particularly famous case being the Bone Wars of 1877-1892 (rather pertinent to this film, given how it helped induct paleontology into pop culture). With that said, I'm always confused by how scientist protagonists are depicted in film, with the characters often displaying an impulsiveness and narrow-mindedness which doesn't exactly mesh with a research-based career choice.  The scientists see a specific creature or plant and don't ask any questions about where it came from or the role in plays in the environment. Their objectives are reduced to capture or kill, often employing a horde of assistants ("Red Shirts") whose only expertise seems to be dying.

This definitely isn't a universal problem in horror, and written horror in particular sometimes traps itself by making the characters overly cautious and analytical to the point of alienation (At the Mountains of Madness is the most infamous example, throwing around so much terminology that the audience has no idea what exactly is supposed to be scary). That said, the limited time frame of film and the general audience expectation of action-oriented heroes can make the cautious approach unfeasible for a silver-screen production. However, I think that there is a larger disconnect between the horror genre itself and science as a discipline, with that disconnect centering around the preservation of the unknown and unknowable.

Horror, as we've discussed at length by this point, centers around what we can't understand and oftentimes relies upon ambiguity to generate its impact. As soon as we figure out what makes something tick, it becomes significantly less scary because we can follow its action. The Reavers from Serenity lose some of their fear factor once we know how they came to be this way, Darth Vader is knocked down a peg or two once we've seen him whine about sand, and the ghosts from Ghostbusters become much more comedic once the characters find ways to capture them. Science is very good at stripping away uncertainty and mysticism, at shining a light on the alien and making sense of what is truly going on. Once that's done, there's less reason to be scared, and thus less reason for a horror-inclined audience to pay attention. When we want to be scared, taking control of the situation feels like a cop-out. This creates a dissonance with the world outside the horror film, where fear is generally considered unpleasant and anything that can give you certainty about your life, your future, or your world is generally considered a good thing.

In this way, the Horror Movie Scientist (and, to an extent, the Disaster Movie Scientist and Sci-Fi Scientist) is a completely different profession from the IRL Scientist. Their goals seem to be near-opposite, with the Movie Scientist seemingly taking every opportunity to increase uncertainty and fear while the IRL Scientist works to find patterns and assuage anxieties about the unknown. This isn't just a divergence in competence (CftBL's protagonists aren't the smartest bunch, but there are genuinely learned horror scientists every once and a while), but a complete reversal of ideology which (I suspect) informs the popular view of scientists a bit too much.

Aggregate Fear (The Shining)

"Study, analysis.

An impulse, something that couldn’t be tracked with any conventional devices, then a steady feedback.  Pretercognition.  Spread out over several targets at once, it serves as her primary sense.  Each target is conceptualized in the context of twelve to eighty years of history.  More time, more feedback from the steady feed of information, and the images clarify.  Discard the useless elements, maintain the pivotal ones.

Deciphering, searching for the fulcrum points."
-Worm, Interlude 28

The Shining is a film that is widely discussed in great detail, and for very good reason. The film's construction is comparable to clockwork, a thousand moving pieces interlocking to create a cohesive whole. There are numerous elements that are well worth describing, from Jack's descent into mania to Wendy's complicated relationship to Danny's youthful perceptions to the screwed-up history of the Overlook hotel as a microcosm of America's legacy. However, one thing that I haven't seen discussed much is the element of the "Shining" itself, a concept which both King and Kubrick saw as relevant enough to make it the title of their respective works.

The first time we hear the term "Shining" in the film is when Danny talks to the chef, Dick Halloran, after learning that they can communicate telepathically. The Shining is Halloran's term for a psychic phenomena which allows certain people to communicate with some sort of greater power to glean information about the past, the future, or each other (this is far from the only Stephen King work to feature such elements). Danny's imaginary friend "Tony" is the most obvious manifestation of the Shining outside of direct telepathy and is responsible for many of the film's most iconic scenes. What is perhaps more thematically relevant to the film, however, is the idea that objects and locations can also be affected by the Shining. The Overlook Hotel, clearly stated as a place which "Shines", is overrun with strange psychic echoes of its messy past, ranging from the watchmen who killed his family back through numerous strange affairs which occurred in decades past (and which are implied to go back even further, given that the structure was built on an Indigenous burial ground without the consent of the Indigenous people). Jack's rampage eventually becomes part of this tapestry of misery and terror as well, as evidenced by his appearance in the photograph at the end of the film. The Overlook Hotel builds a piecemeal history out of the atrocities which are enabled by previous atrocities, with the most shocking a resonant events building on each other in the hotel's ephemeral "Shining". As much as some people may wish to forget or ignore the location's history, the grossest events linger on in the structure's walls, these echoes guiding psychics like Danny as well as laymen like Jack.

If the premise of a stacking and evolving history seems familiar, it is likely because the concept is echoed in many film theory discussions. Carol Clover explains the slasher film as a medium particularly rife with historical baggage and layered trends, discussing how such stories of gruesome domestic murder are "compulsively repeated" in film after film for decade after decade. In fact, her quoting of James B. Twitchell indicates that she views the echoes and patterns as more important to the slasher legend than any unique approach or paradigm shift. Horror draws power from tradition, with events and concepts building up over time until they become legendary. Jack Torrence may not be particularly distinct from the killers in older movies, but his actions build off of atrocities we've seen committed by Norman Bates and countless other unhinged weapon-swingers from throughout cinema's history. When Kubrick brings a novel idea to Jack's actions, that idea may go on to influence other directors further down the line (and it certainly did, as multiple horror motifs can be traced back to The Shining). Just like the Overlook Hotel, the figure of the movie slasher is a palimpsest of countless gruesome events, propagating itself through the continued anxiety and fault of every progressive generation.

In this light, it seems particularly fitting that both King and Kubrick would use the story of a slasher to discuss this idea of historical recursion and the power of legacy. The figure of the slasher arguably extends beyond fiction as well, with audiences wetting themselves over characters like Jack Torrence, Norman Bates, and Michael Meyers due to the distinct possibility that similar killings can and do happen in real life. Fictional slashers complement and amplify anxieties over real-life crimes while also preserving the legacy of older horrors, just as the Overlook Hotel does by manipulating Jack. The aggregate of every lingering atrocity becomes more powerful in our imagination than any individual work or event could be, and it is in this aggregation that the true power of the slasher, and of the Shining, lies.

Faith, Control, and Destruction (Ganja & Hess)

“Check the surroundings,” Jouster said.  “Tools?  The group’s practices involve using tools, ritual, rites, chants, and all that crap to try to achieve better control over their abilities.”

“Kind of makes sense,” I said.  “Abilities get stronger when you’re in a mental state closer to how you were thinking before your trigger event, so-”
-Worm Chapter 23.1

[CW: Suicide]

The Christian themes of Ganja and Hess are in-your-face to the point where it's kind of hilarious, the film beginning with several shots of horrified cherubic figures and regularly punctuating dramatic or horrifying moments by flashing angelic imagery onscreen. Our original perspective character (Luther) is a Reverend, and we see him on the altar in the opening as well as the climax. The presence of Christianity in the film and its impact on the main character are undeniable, but the film deviates from convention by refusing to show faith as something inherently positive or even as morally neutral. Rather, we watch as the inflexibility and dominance of Christian morality seems to erode the confidence of the character Hess.

The tale of the mythological Myrthinians establishes the relationship between Hess and faith early on. For some unknown transgression, the Myrthinians are said to have been cursed with a need to consume blood, their only potential escape being death beneath the cross contingent upon Christ having already died (although, given the specific wording of the curse, my inner mythology geek and munchkin found at least two other methods that could theoretically have worked). The film seems to present Christianity as the sole form of redemption for the Myrthinian people, but at the same time this redemption seems to be rooted in their destruction. The implication is that the Myrthinians cannot live righteously, their only recourse from sin being death. This parallels the experience of being a black man in the US, as we see with George's final pleas before he tries to kill himself. He and Hess exist at odds with the (white-dominated) world and cannot find peace with it, and this leads to both of them pursuing self-destruction.

Hess' very existence as an immortal, blood-drinking black professional strikes him as inherently wrong, and much of the film revolves around him trying to grapple with this wrongness. He deflects any questions about his personal life as "impolite" and does his best to try and hide his condition and perspective in most situations. When he drinks blood to sate his addiction, he seems to be ashamed of the act, and the African chanting which reminds him of his state seems torturous. There are certainly moments where Hess seems to be at peace with himself and his condition (when he narrates to Ganja about how "I will persist and survive without God's or society's sanction. I will not be tortured. I will not be punished. I will not be guilty), but these sentiments begin to cave when he discovers a method by which he can end his life. In spite of his proclamations, Hess remains in a prison of expectation and of perceived normalcy, unable to sever himself from standards of acceptability which he could never meet.

The film climaxes in an extensive and overwhelming church chorus led by Luther, a spectacle that lulls us in and makes us feel welcome as everyone sings together and supports each other. It's only when Hess enters that the scene takes on a more sinister note, the atmosphere shifting somewhat as the immortal comes forward to be blessed by Luther. The faith that Hess seeks to power his destruction is being brute-forced into him by the spectacle, the shackles of society and expectation coiling tighter around him until eventually they force their way into his heart and enable him to (slowly, painfully) end his own life when he is alone. The overall impact of the scene leads us to perceive faith as a weapon against individuality and a prison which drives one to grief and self-destruction. Even when it is beautiful and energetic, the divine doctrine which has cursed Hess for his addiction and his racism can lead only to his demise.

At the same time, however, it is because Hess internalizes this guilt that he is killed. Theoretically, moving beyond such regret in the same manner as Ganja could have been a possibility for him, a possibility which would have allowed him to continue living without his alleged sinfulness weighing him down. This ending makes a powerful statement about how the battle to survive is won or lost from within, how the conviction to push forward and define one's own existence proudly is crucial to moving forward in a world that resents you.

Something I realize that I didn't explore adequately in the above space is the nature of black Christianity explored in the film. The style of Christian faith explored in the film ultimately stems from slaveowners attempting to pacify their slaves, and it is quite possible that in the eyes of the filmmaker the modern churches still spread a doctrine of assimilation and passivity. Such is why black church leaders are depicted in conjunction with European religious art, and such is why they ultimately drive Hess to destruction while the more agnostic Ganja survives.

Construction of Good and Evil (The Untold Story)

“I’m a good guy,” I said.

Stepping closer to me, he tilted his head, “You don’t look like one.”
-Worm, Chapter 1.6

Over the last week, a vitriolic conversation has been brewing in the game design scene regarding the construction of beast-,men fantasy races (Orcs, Goblins, etc) as racist, with the primary idea being that these creatures use ethnic coding (Asian/Black physical features, bone adornments, tribal societies, description as "savages") to create an "evil" aesthetic that the game rewards you for destroying. One of the pillars of this stance is the idea that media, while not very good at eliciting specific actions from people, is a powerful tool for defining audience perceptions of good and evil, right and wrong. If a group or ideology is framed as the antagonist of a story, the mechanisms of the film work to portray their actions as wrong by displaying them as harmful to the protagonist. Inversely, an effective story utilizes its toolbox to make you root for the film's protagonist, doing whatever is necessary to make their actions seem justified. By creating these clear distinctions of good and evil, hero and enemy, a work plants itself in a powerful position as a moral arbitrator. The mentalities of good and evil extend well beyond the story itself, which is why stories are so effective at teaching morality and spreading propaganda. Hence, when a game or film labels something like ethnic features as "evil" or the mass murder of such ethnic entities as "good", people are likely to carry such sentiments with them after leaving the theater. For historical examples, think back to how Ronald Reagan frequently referenced movies in his addresses or how Birth of a Nation fueled the return of the KKK.

If there's one thing that I think "The Untold Story" succeeded at, it was creating a despicable villain and a powerful depiction of evil. Wong is a greedy, spiteful, ruthless, and utterly unhinged person, killing without remorse or hesitation and disposing of the corpses in ways that indicate a total lack of compunction or value for humanity. We as the audience are absolutely appalled by this guy and are hoping for the whole movie that he gets what is coming to him. This construction of evil is something that I have little concern with, as Wong's list of crimes are undoubtedly reprehensible (to the point where many of his actions strike me as gratuitous). That said, the greatest failure of the film is in the construction of good: the presentation of the Macau cops who take Wong down.

The team of Macao cops (Officer Lee, Bo, Robert, Bull, and King Kong, hereafter referred to as "the squad") are not likable people, being messy and incompetent in the best of times and grossly detestable at the worst of times. Their jokes fall flat, their personalities are obnoxious, and when we see them in action we as the audience follow them begrudgingly even when they are set up to be likable and relatable. It's in the second half of the film that I think the squad becomes a genuine problem, however,  as their methods take a dark turn. The extensive use of torture and prison violence are framed as good things, as they help get a confession out of Wong (the question of police brutality is given momentary lip service and is depicted as an obstruction justice stemming from "nosy media"). As the audience is so adamantly against Wong, we become obligated to stand with the squad as they commit inhuman acts of their own.

I view this as a problem because when such methods are rewarded in movies, audiences are more inclined to support them in real life. When the successful torture in The Untold Story becomes a reference point, a person would likely look upon real-life examples of police and military torture as a necessity or even as a righteous act. In reality, we have ample resources demonstrating how and why torture is a terrible method of eliciting information from people (https://www.newsweek.com/science-shows-torture-doesnt-work-456854) and results in little more than the brutalization of another human being. The concept of "deserved brutality" is similarly a construct of fiction which has little bearing on the real-world patterns of human behavior.

It is for this reason that I view the mainstream discussion of violence in films as being rather flawed. So intensely has the conversation been focused on the potential eliciting of violence that the construction of morality in our films has been thrown to the wayside. The acts depicted onscreen don't matter as much as their narrative rewards and framing, because context is ultimately what makes the audience wonder if an act is worth doing or if an authority is worth trusting. Films are powerful tools for guiding value judgments due to their long-honed mastery of emotional realism, and such is the reason why I weigh depictions of virtue and vice so heavily in media.