Editorials
Horror, Men, Queer Love, and Cars: ‘The Hitcher’ & ‘Christine’
When thinking about the historical and traditional symbols of heteronormative male culture, two main things come to mind; women and cars. Cars are such an essential part of this identity that an entire franchise is dedicated to the power of cars. So utilizing cars, and the culture around them, to tell stories about queer identity and sexuality is fruitful territory. Christine (1983) and The Hitcher (1986) take on these ideas but utilize them differently. Christine is a movie about a killer car that entices a nerdy boy desperate to be a man, while The Hitcher is about a man who accidentally picks up a killer that he becomes inexplicably attached to. Ultimately the two movies give our main characters two options; repress their identity or accept their transformation. In one tale, we see how this struggle drives two best friends apart, and the other brings two strangers together. Yet both highlight how our focus on traditional societal values and binary identity can cause immense harm, destruction, and death.
Queer Moments in Car Culture
While car culture is traditionally seen as a part of heterosexual male culture, these two movies have many queer moments specifically in and around the car. Both movies start with sexually charged scenes between the characters as they enter the car. In Christine, Dennis picks Arnie up to go to school. Immediately the conversation turns sexual as they talk about blowjobs which prompts Dennis to talk about how they need to “get Arnie laid”. Eventually, Dennis comments that Arnie “can count your life savings between your legs”. Insinuating that Dennis knows that Arnie has a big dick. In The Hitcher, Jim picks up John, making the excuse that he needs someone to keep him awake during his long drive. The first thing he says to John is, “My mother told me never to do this”. The time spent on the ride is filled with awkward first glances and touching. Eventually, someone stops them on the road, gets the vibe that they are a couple, and says, “Get going sweethearts”. These two first encounters show us how a car is a place where these men can be alone with each other. And the atmosphere often feels like an awkward first sexual encounter or a nervous first date. They offer a secluded location where the outside world does not influence these characters.
Symbolism of Cars in Christine and The Hitcher
Cars are used in other ways as well. By all accounts, Christine is meant to be looked at like a woman. The car is frequently sexualized by the camera. When she’s destroyed by Arnie’s bullies, it’s filmed like a rape scene. And there is the iconic “show me” scene in which she repairs herself in front of Arnie. It’s shot like a seduction scene. In The Hitcher, cars are not given a personality, but they are a tool. John rear-ends Jim, which has clear sexual allusions. They’re used as weapons and home to deviant behavior like the multiple murders that John commits. It is the mode in which the two can stalk one another. John uses cars as a weapon to destroy the heteronormative world, killing families, cops, and young girls. And it feels like a big coincidence that both movies have a scene with a flaming car, which in and of itself is clearly a queer implication.
When Jim and John are not in cars, they are frequently framed coming in and out of doorways, gates, and car doors. Jim is also frequently in gas stations, diners, and bathrooms. Several times we see Jim sexualized in the bathroom spaces. We see him constantly changing into “clean” clothes, and even showering. He tries to be clean, but John continuously brings him back into the dirt, filth, and everything deviant. Jim even dreams about John, his conscious and subconscious, wholly focused on this one man. As the movie goes on, they begin framing Jim the same way they frame John, a subtle nod to the transformation he is going through. By the end of the movie, when he is given the opportunity to move on and leave behind the events he has faced, he actively chooses to turn around to find John and become the deviant killer John wanted him to be. They constantly compare their actions up until the end, when they are truly aligned. Where Arnie has an unspoken supernatural connection with Christine, Jim has a similar connection with John. These forces can sense each other.
Barriers to Connection in Christine
In Christine, Arnie and Dennis are always positioned with something or someone in between them; girls, parents, tables, and even a case of beer. It alludes to how the two are constantly separated by status, societal pressure, and Christine. Arnie’s transformation aligns with a girl in a teenage comedy where the nerd takes off her glasses and becomes hot. There are also moments in The Hitcher when John and Jim are separated in a similar way, but as they consistently show us, all you have to do is reach across the table or divide to get to each other. This is evident especially in the scene at the diner when Jim pulls a gun at John, and John moves his finger closer and closer to the barrel. In The Hitcher, they constantly find ways to touch and be physical with each other. Whether by fondling each other with weapons, or John holding Jim’s face tenderly. They even swap saliva, licking or spitting on each other at different times. These strangers have an immediate physical connection, one that Arnie and Dennis would probably envy. Yet they cannot find it in themselves to act on or entertain these ideas. Ultimately Arnie and Dennis are doomed because they cannot take that next step, they don’t try to reach for each other.
There are also women in the movies that stand between the men. Both women are androgynous or masculine in style and appearance. Even their names are masculine (Leigh and Nash). Leigh has strong, traditionally handsome features like her dramatic jawline. She usually wears pants and tops with little to no hint of cleavage. This is a stark difference from Roseanne, who has a crush on Dennis but cannot get his attention. She is nerdy and has a similar stoic presence as Dennis. In the final scene, she is styled like Arnie and has a similar stoic personality to Dennis. She is a combination of the two, which makes her a perfect cipher for them. If they cannot be with each other, they can be with a woman that reminds them of each other. She is also part of the status symbol Arnie needs to be seen as a “man”. He has the car, the makeover, and the hot new girl, so he does not feel emasculated for the first time in his life. In the movie’s final scenes, Leigh and Dennis are immediately very physical, in a way he never could be with Arnie. So when Arnie is gone, she can fill the void.
Nash as a Symbol of Heteronormativity in The Hitcher
Nash has a short bob haircut, is very casual, and dresses in jeans and t-shirts (also styled similarly to the men). In The Hitcher, John sees Nash as a potential lifeline for Jim. She is the only person that believes he is not a killer. She represents a return to a heteronormative life for Jim. In John’s eyes, she needs to be destroyed. John acts like a jealous lover when confronting Jim about her. Nash never gets the opportunity to understand what is going on. She asks Jim, “Why didn’t he kill us?” and “Why did you pick him up?”. But Jim is never able to answer. He wants to believe that he is another victim or that he picked John up out of kindness, but the truth is perhaps more complicated. They have an unexplainable connection to the outside.
It is fair to question if John is a real live person or a representation of the “deviant queer” lifestyle that Jim is seduced by. John has no record, and the police cannot find any information on him. Jim is framed for John’s crimes because he is always at the same place the crimes happen. He even has evidence on him. So it all begs the question, are these just two strangers who are inexplicably drawn to each other, or does the idea of deviance entice Jim, and John is simply a part of him that he cannot suppress? It’s all centered in a desolate area tied to hitching and truck stops, and queer culture is essential to these ideas. Even the name John brings to mind the idea of “a John” like a client of a sex worker. It’s steeped in ideas in and around historically “deviant” sexual culture. Christine and John are strong forces influencing others, one towards repression and one towards acceptance.
Repression and Masculinity in Christine
Christine is centered around repression and masculinity. Arnie is emasculated because he is a nerdy gawky kid. He is the target of bullies. Even Dennis unintentionally emasculates him by being at Arnie’s side, constantly fighting his battles. If Arnie has romantic feelings for Dennis, it is covered by his resentment of Dennis. On the other hand, Dennis does this out of love. He wants the two to be close and gets visibly emotional as Arnie drifts further away from him. He is even jealous of Christine as soon as Arnie sees her. Dennis can be vulnerable and emotional with Arnie, but as Arnie transforms into more of a heteronormative man, he pushes their emotional connection aside. Much of it is distilled in the last conversation the two have when Arnie brings up the idea of love:
Let me tell you a little something about love, Dennis. It has a voracious appetite. It eats everything. Friendship. Family. It kills me how much it eats. But I’ll tell you something else. You feed it right, and it can be beautiful, and that’s what we have. You know, when someone believes in you, man, you can do anything, any fucking thing in the entire universe. And when you believe right back in that someone, watch out world, because nobody can stop you then, nobody! Ever!
Dennis wants this monologue to be about him, fears it is about Leigh, and finds out it is actually about Christine. Arnie always thought Dennis stuck around out of pity because of his internalized self-hatred. Yet these complex emotions are too much for these high school boys to unpack. So Arnie gets consumed by repressive gender norms and traditional values.
Repression vs. Acceptance
They both have a similar “kill your queers” ending. Unsurprising, although still too present in mainstream media. But the stories have subtle differences in portraying the last men standing. In Christine, Arnie is killed, and Dennis is welcomed back into the heteronormative fold. While in The Hitcher, Jim is no longer the sweet innocent boy he was at the beginning. He becomes the violent hard man John wanted. Dennis becomes normal, and Jim is a deviant, now living in the queer-coded world. Whether looked at as cautionary tales or happy endings, it is clear that ideas around identity and sexuality permeate these movies. Making them interesting thought pieces on socialization and how heteronormative and toxic masculinity culture have made “being yourself” difficult and often painful. Whether choosing to repress or accept, you might end up taking a ride in a flaming car.
The United States spent most of this year celebrating its 250th anniversary. There have been parades, fireworks, and endless reminders of what the nation wants us to think are its founding ideals. Yet anniversaries are as much about what we choose to remember as they are about what we choose to forget. There is another anniversary this year. Five years ago this month, Candyman was released. The fact that both that film and America are sharing an anniversary this year may have been an accident, but that makes it no less significant.
Released amid another national reckoning over race, Nia DaCosta’s film asks a question that every celebration of America ought to confront: Is it possible to commemorate this nation without fully reckoning with the violence woven into its history? More than a sequel to a horror classic, Candyman is a meditation on the ghosts that haunt America because it has never fully reckoned with the past that created them.
How the Original Candyman Confronted America’s Racial History
The original Candyman understood this. Released in 1992 and set in the almost post-apocalyptic urban decay that was Chicago’s Cabrini-Green housing projects, Bernard Rose’s film arrived only months after the L.A. Race Riots, a moment when this country was coming to terms with the way the country’s relationship with Black folks was shaped by decades of segregation and racism.
Most audiences saw a supernatural slasher about a hook-handed killer summoned by saying his name five times into a mirror. But beneath the horror was a far more unsettling story. Candyman was about the lingering consequences of America’s racial history and the way white America has sometimes turned Black suffering into myth instead of confronting the systems that produced it.
The film’s true horror was never simply Candyman. It was the realization that monsters can be born from histories a nation refuses to face. That is exactly where the 2021 film expands the original’s vision.
Nia DaCosta’s Candyman Turns One Ghost Into Many
Bernard Rose’s Candyman explored the legacy of a single act of racist terror. Nia DaCosta’s film argues that the tragedy wasn’t confined to Daniel Robitaille, the man who became the monster. The 2021 film posits that Candyman is not one man but many.
Daniel Robitaille was lynched for loving a white woman. Sherman Fields takes on the mantle of the supernatural slasher because he was beaten to death by police after being falsely accused of harming a child. Anthony McCoy ultimately becomes part of the same legend. Their stories span generations, but they are connected by a nation that repeatedly produces the same injustice under different names at different points in history. The genius of the sequel is that it transforms Candyman from an individual ghost into a symbol of America’s recurring racial violence.
Candyman Shows How History Repeats Itself
History, the film suggests, is not something that happened once. It is something that keeps happening. That is why Candyman is one of my favorite films to teach in my Film and Philosophy course.
Students walk into class expecting a horror movie. They leave wrestling with questions about history, memory, and justice. We spend little time talking about jump scares or gore. (Because, let’s be honest, there is not much of that in the film.) Instead, we ask why some histories become legends while others are forgotten, what societies owe their victims, and whether a nation can ever move forward without honestly confronting the violence that shaped it.
The Horror of Remembering What America Wants to Forget
A good horror film reveals what we fear. What makes Candyman great is how it reveals what we would rather not remember. That is what haunted me the first time I saw it, long after the credits had rolled.
Five years after its release, Candyman remains one of the most unsettling movies in recent years because the history it confronts is not safely behind us. The original film understood that America’s racial violence could not simply be buried, while the 2021 film showed how easily that violence can be reproduced across generations.
Its Unquestionable Legacy in Horror
As America celebrates 250 years, Candyman reminds us that commemorating the nation’s founding requires remembering all this country’s history, including the parts that make the celebration uncomfortable.
We cannot exorcise a ghost by refusing to acknowledge why it exists. Perhaps that is the film’s most important lesson. The past does not haunt us because we remember it. It haunts us because we don’t.
Sometimes it feels borderline ridiculous to gush about John Carpenter’s The Thing as much as I do. It’s gotten to the point where when I’m asked about my favorite horror film by both friends and strangers, a little bit of embarrassment tinges my expression as I answer; it feels so obvious and rarely surprises anyone. Saying I love The Thing when people expect me to bust out an obscure foreign horror film or a cerebral thriller makes me feel like a rosy cheeked child with a propeller hat and a giant lollipop. “Wow, you love one of the most popular horror films of all time, congrats!”
But it’s just the truth. The first film of John Carpenter’s “Apocalypse Trilogy”, all three of its films are among my favorites. But The Thing has a special place in my heart. It shaped my taste in horror, my taste in most media in general, to be honest. It’s become the gold standard, 10/10 baseline test for the vast majority of my reviews; it is a perfect film, so I judge other films against it. And it’s one of the few movies I have to run back to and watch yearly like clockwork (usually when I’m spending a part of winter tied to the couch). It is, in all regards, the perfect film. If it isn’t the perfect film, then it is at the very least the perfect sci-fi horror film.
So, what exactly qualifies The Thing for literal perfection? It’s a high bar to clear. This article, as informal as it is compared to most of my editorials, is an attempt to explain it.
Even if Carpenter Isn’t the Goat, His Team for The Thing Was
As far as crews go, John Carpenter’s The Thing had the cinematic equivalent of the ’96 Chicago Bulls behind it. We’re talking about an amalgam of some of the most talented people to ever grace the silver screens with their work, boasting alongside John Carpenter two of the heaviest hitters in all of cinematic history: Dean Cundey, and Rob Bottin. Now, we can debate all day about whether John Carpenter is the greatest of all time when it comes to horror directors. Personally, I’m just as liable to say Cronenberg, Del Toro, or Hooper as I am to say Carpenter.
But the key factor to remember here is that Carpenter is the coach, not the star player; the Phil Jackson, if you will. Yes, he is the visionary who directed a near perfect cast of players and composed a tale of pure, apocalyptic paranoia. More importantly, he put together and coordinated the team that would make his vision manifest as reality. And if Carpenter is Phil Jackson, Rob Bottin is the team’s Michael Jordan here, the greatest of all time.
(And to all my Lebron fans, I love you, but you have to sit down for this analogy.)
The Legend of Rob Bottin
Bottin’s story is borderline unbelievable, but it’s the best way to explain how abnormally skilled he is and what he brought to the table for Carpenter. At age 14, Bottin became an apprentice to the at-the-time GOAT Rick Baker after sending him a letter seeking an autograph while sharing his creature designs. He was a quick study under Baker, joining him on the ’76 King Kong and Star Wars, before bouncing to Carpenter’s The Fog and then iconic werewolf picture The Howling.
When he reunited with Carpenter in 1982, he now had 6 classic films under his belt and was moving like an FX bullet train. From ages 22 to 23, he worked on The Thing for 57 weeks in both pre-production and on set. Nearly 24/7 for 400 days, Bottin’s all-gas no-brakes work ethic made The Thing at the cost of his own health, and it resulted in him being hospitalized with pneumonia. He survived and went on to make Robocop. And at least one of your favorite films.
Because no conventional disease or weaponry can kill Rob Bottin.
The Thing Still Features Horror’s Best Practical Effects
Okay, that last bit might be hyperbolic, but the man sincerely put his life on the line to make special effects that haven’t been topped since. Not the best effects in just horror history, or science fiction history, but effects that haven’t been topped in any genre for over 44 years. Not by his mentor Rick Baker, not by Screaming Mad George, not by Alec Gillis (though shoutout to him for his criminally scrapped work on The Thing (2011), and even more criminally ignored work on Harbinger Down). I love Dawn of the Dead, believe me, I do, but he certainly isn’t being beaten out by Tom Savini’s body of work. And that isn’t to disrespect and say that all of the artists that I just mentioned are bad, they’re the best in the game! But Rob Bottin was just that much better.
This inevitably invites the counterpoint: “But it wasn’t just Bottin! Stan Winston and his people were the ones who worked on the Dog Thing to give Bottin’s crew a break, and that’s the best monster in the movie!”. To which I say: look me in the eye and tell me the Dog Thing sequence is better than the Palmer Thing sequence. That’s not even counting the Norwegian Thing, both Norris Things, and the absolutely masterful final creature work that was the Blair Thing. The only reason Bottin and his people didn’t win Academy Awards for their work was because they got jumped by E.T., The Dark Crystal, Conan the Barbarian, and Blade Runner all at the same time at the Oscars. It’s just a consequence of being released during the best year for movies ever.
Okay, Now We Can Talk About Dean Cundey
But of course, these effects are then supported by another true legend: Dean Cundey. Selling people on Rob Bottin being the greatest effects artist of all time, isn’t nearly as difficult as advocating for Cundey, who despite an impressive catalog of filmography, slowed down in the back half of his career. He’s often overshadowed in conversations when it comes to The Thing; it’s always talk of Carpenter’s directing, Bottin’s effects, and Ennio Morricone’s incredible soundtrack up front, and rarely any of Cundey’s work. He isn’t spoken about in the same breath as John Alcott or Michael Ballhaus, cinematographers whose work is associated with prestigious cinema because of their proximity to great directors.
Cundey might not be the director of photography your Martin Scorsese’s or Paul Thomas Anderson’s went running to, but I would be lying if I said I didn’t think he was the most important cinematographer in horror history, just for his work with Carpenter and Spielberg. He helmed three of the most influential films in all of horror with his lighting and camera operating: The Thing, Halloween, and Jurassic Park. The man’s fingerprints are automatically on the cultural DNA of all slashers, most practical effects-driven horror films, and the biggest gateway horror franchise in film history.
The Dream Team That Made The Thing Perfection
Cundey has gone on record saying that despite Carpenter’s input, he was effectively given free rein to light and frame The Thing. The man didn’t just know how to shoot effects to make them evoke true disgust from the audience, he was able to manipulate every aspect of the shot to terrify. His sixth sense cinematography wasn’t just for lighting and playing with shadows, but for the speed of camera movement, the power of his blocking, and for having a complete grasp of communicating texture and temperature.
And temperature is the soul of The Thing. John J. Lloyd’s production design of the research station and the great white expanse around it feels just as bone chilling as the film’s antagonist, thanks to Cundey. There isn’t a single flat shot in the thing, not a moment that doesn’t feel dynamic, and it’s because of Dean Cundey.
Now, all this being said about Bottin and Cundey, they are far from the only ones who synthesized this structurally perfect organism of a movie. Every bit of Todd C. Ramsay’s editing splices the film’s scenes together to move perfectly in-time. David Lewis Yewdall’s sound design and how it gave a voice to the horrors on screen will be etched into people’s brains forever. The point is that everyone, every single person who had a hand in making the film, helped make the movie flawless.
Like the cells of the thing from another world, each crew member on John Carpenter’s The Thing moved in concert with the next, in unison, to create the greatest sci-fi horror of all time. So, is it any wonder why 40 some years later, the film still has us all captured?
