Misc
INTERVIEW: Sitting Down with Abigail Waldron, Author of “Queer Screams”
August was a very exciting month for Horror Press’s Abigail Waldron because her book finally hit the shelves after years of research, writing, and peer review! I got a sneak peek of Abigail’s book, Queer Screams: A History of LGBTQ+ Survival Through the Lens of American Horror Cinema, and got to talk to her upon the book’s release.
Horror Press: Tell me a little bit about your book and the research that you did.
Abigail Waldron: I started working on the book back in 2018. It was part of my Master’s thesis, but I started expanding it to be a full manuscript after some encouragement from my advisors. It focuses on the relationship between social attitudes toward queer people throughout the 20th century, and queer representations in horror films in their corresponding eras and decades. I’ve always thought that horror films were mirrors – reflections of what we fear most in society at a certain time – and for a lot of America during the rise of cinema, it was the fear of the queer. For example, the connection between the dozens of vampire films in the 1980s and the AIDS crisis. You have blood, contagion, and sexuality. Vampires seduce regardless of gender, so they’re very queer-coded. We can understand queer horror better if we know the history of the American queer experience. While there have always been negative portrayals of queer people in horror, a lot of positives can be found in the genre, and better yet reclaimed. Once we think critically about these films, we as queer people can find moments of catharsis.
HP: How did you originally get into horror?
AW: Good parenting! Although my parents were cautious when I was a kid, I was always into the creepy and the weird, and they were very open to that. My sister and I watched scary movies, even the rated R ones, which my parents allowed. They explained some things or asked us to cover our ears, but overall they were very open about it. Blockbuster trips always consisted of a new release and a horror movie. I also was both excited and terrified by horror. I was extremely afraid of the dark, and I always imagined the little girl from The Ring in the corner of my room. I had to sleep with a nightlight, yet I was always interested in horror. These little things just added up, and in grad school, I knew I wanted to do something I was passionate about. And I knew I was passionate about film, horror, and queer history, so I combined all those into one, so very much of myself is in this book. It wouldn’t be possible if I weren’t a horror-obsessed queer kid.
HP: Why do you think queer people are so drawn to horror?
AW: Historically, horror cinema focuses on the outcasts of society: the weirdos, the misfits. As a queer person, I’ve always felt like a misfit or an other, and I know many other queer people have felt like that. We have been categorized as others and weirdos for centuries, so in that respect we can find ourselves in the horror among the misunderstood monsters, the oppressed final girls that get their revenge at the end, and the queer-coded anti-heroes like Carrie. Yes, she kills a lot of people, but she was bullied. As someone who was bullied as a kid, especially for my sexuality (I didn’t even know I was queer at the time and was called a dyke), I loved those stories. No, I wouldn’t murder people, but it feels nice to see this oppressed queer-coded person have their revenge. It’s pretty cathartic to see these oppressed people victorious on screen. I think queer people are drawn to horror because 1. They see themselves, and 2. They see themselves victorious a lot of the time. When you look at universal horror, you remember the monsters, and they’re very queer-coded.
HP: What’s your favorite horror movie?
AW: So I used to say Jaws. I used to watch it every year on the 4th of July. It’s sort of my patriotism, if you will. The one gripe I have with Jaws is that while it does pass the Bechdel Test, it’s hetero, white, and male-centric. While I return to Jaws every 4th of July, I find myself more in the mood to watch Rosemary’s Baby, The Blair Witch Project, and Freaks. Those are the ones that I’ve been gravitating towards lately. I wouldn’t say I have a favorite horror film, but those are definitely at the top.
HP: When I was reading your excerpt, I was struck by what you said about viewers perceiving fictional characters the way they do real people. Can you talk to me a little about that?
AW: Many people still have yet to meet an openly queer or trans person, whether they know it or not. Many of these people haven’t met a queer person because maybe they’re not the most friendly to come out to, or people are afraid to say anything around them. So for them, the only exposure they get to queer people is on screen. These people can take in the negative representations of queer people and grow to harbor discriminatory beliefs, or they’re even emboldened in their discriminatory beliefs. For example, in the documentary Disclosure, there’s a trans woman who came out to a coworker, and the coworker immediately responded, “Oh, like Buffalo Bill.” Buffalo Bill was an extremely problematic antagonist in Silence of the Lambs, and these portrayals are evocative, and so many people saw that movie, so they assume this is what a trans person is. This is what media tells them trans people are: violent and confused. These portrayals stick with people and paint trans people as mentally ill, unstable, and violent, and the fact is trans people have faced violence for decades. The issue is not trans people being violent, it’s violence towards trans people because of the equation of violence with being transgender. Look at the bathroom bills, and all these legislative battles, and abuse and stereotypes, and a lot of it stems from portrayals like Buffalo Bill. It’s sad because I love that movie, and so do so many other people. It’s unfortunate because for many people, it could be their only interaction with what they see as a trans person.
HP: Your book is incredibly relevant right now with all of the anti-trans legislature that is trying to be passed.
AW: I used the study from Haley E. Solomon and Beth Kurtz-Costes, where they looked at audiences who watched evocative portrayals of trans narratives or imageries of violence. The study showed that audiences take in these images, especially if it’s their only interaction with a trans person. It causes a lot of damage to both transgender and cisgender people because it’s effectively brainwashing these people. I know, for example, Angela Baker from Sleepaway Camp has a narrative in later movies that allows her to be reclaimed – she targets bigots and racists – but I don’t think anyone is going to reclaim Buffalo Bill.
HP: As much as I love that movie, I don’t think we want him.
HP: Do you have a favorite genre of horror films?
AW: I keep going back to bad movies. Is bad horror a genre? I was going through my Letterboxd, thinking, “You know what, I would love to watch some 80s trash”. So I went through the lowest-rated horror movies from the 80s because they’re just fun, and you can watch them with people who don’t even like horror. You can laugh at them, they facilitate conversation, and they’re usually a treat visually with practical effects or even really shitty CGI. So I think trash horror is my favorite subgenre.
HP: When we critique horror films, it can make other fans see us as killjoys, but we still love those movies. What can you say to that?
AW: I think I’m biased because I’m a historian. For me, critique is fun. I love diving into something. It gives you an opportunity for introspection. Because you think, “Why do I like this piece of media? What does this tell me about myself? What does that tell me about the world?” For me, that’s fun, asking those questions. While watching a film for pure enjoyment is an experience, when we critique – at least for me – I feel more connected to the world around me and the history of the world around me. Yeah, we can be killjoys, but if that’s the way you feel, don’t read critique – watch the movies and enjoy them because that’s great too. Once I was done with the book, I realized I could just watch movies and not have to keep an ear out for any gay slurs or keep my eye out for queer signifiers. Now I can just watch them. For me, at least as a historian, critique is fun. I don’t know if that makes me a killjoy or not, but it definitely makes me lame.
HP: In your book, you mention Transgender History by Susan Stryker. What did you think of that book, and do you have any other queer book recommendations?
AW: That was a great resource because within queer studies for the past 50 years, there’s been a focus on discussions of drag and queer sexuality but not gender. So I liked that book for its historical analysis of trans experiences in certain time periods. The other book I would recommend is Men, Women, and Chainsaws. Carol J. Clover, the author, basically states that final girls, in their essence, are very nonbinary. They go against the mold of cookie-cutter female protagonists during that time. For example, Nancy from A Nightmare on Elm Street is very much a girl next door and very sweet, but because she’s a final girl, she’s not focused on having sex. She spurns her boyfriend’s advances all the time. She’s concerned with her friends and this man who haunts her dreams. She has no time for sex. Carol J. Clover dives into the idea of the final girl transcending the binary in that she is very androgynous in her actions. They’re not passive, which goes against the traditional gender idea of women as passive and emotional. And that’s not the case for final girls: they’re going to fuck you up! I think eventually, the term final girl is going to become an umbrella term. Jesse from A Nightmare on Elm Street II is a final boy who became a scream queen. That’s what they called him back in the day, and Mark Patton, the actor, has taken on that label as a symbol of pride in being the final boy, and being an inspiration for many gay kids. I think many queer people can see themselves as the final girl because she is so androgynous and breaks these traditional roles.
The other texts I would look into are The Celluloid Closet by Vito Russo, which was a huge resource for me in writing this book, and Monsters in the Closet by Harry M. Benshoff. The Celluloid Closet isn’t as focused on horror, but Russo does discuss some horror movies. Monsters in the Closet dives into the history of horror movies.
The roots of horror are very queer because a lot of those vaudeville actors, who dressed in drag, and performed gender-bending on stage, went into horror. Case and point, James Whale, the director of Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein, and his friend Ernest Thesiger, who was in Bride of Frankenstein, both originally came from vaudeville. Vaudeville is incredibly queer, so you have these queer roots of horror. Unfortunately, when the Hays Code kicked in, the party was over for a while, but until it did, there was a lot of that vaudeville influence.
HP: That’s an interesting connection, and certainly when I think of vaudeville, I think of camp.
AW: Right, it’s very campy. The Bride of Frankenstein is very campy, and it’s supposed to be! It’s an ode to that vaudeville mentality, and they were able to slip it in before the Hays Code. The Bride of Frankenstein was kind of the last hurrah.
HP: Can you tell me a little more about the Hays Code and how it affected the history of queer horror cinema?
AW: Before the Hays Code, the world of Vaudeville and theater was incredibly queer and seeped its way into motion pictures of this time. Because of the gender-bending that they were putting on screen, it scared the establishment and conservative audiences who detested “perversion” and saw it as a threat to traditional American values. The Hays Code, which was the production code, was established in March of 1930 by Will H. Hays and demanded that “all films should not imply that low forms of sex relationship are the accepted or common thing.” They thought that if you show these things on screen that kids would think it was normal, which it should have been. When the code talks about “low forms of sex relationships,” it implied adultery, premarital sex, and explicitly said “sexual perversion” was to be forbidden. The Catholic church was brought in to help set these guidelines for film. It insinuated that homosexuality was sin, and it was a big issue to be monitored closely. As people will see in my book, there’s an extensive list of 1930s queer-coded horror movies, but once you get into the 40s, 50s, and even 60s, there aren’t many. Because of the Hays Code, writers and artists in film had to get more creative. They had to figure out ways to display queers on screen without being explicit. Luckily for us, we were very crafty, and were able to sneak in a bunch of stuff. Vito Russo called it gay sensibility. If you had gay sensibility, you’d be able to spot these ques.
HP: Do you think that has continued into current times?
AW: To an extent. I think it’s definitely gotten way more open. I think of the movie They/Them; regardless of what you think of the film, it’s a huge step considering that in the mid-2000s, films were still pretty coded, or gay was used as a slur. But to have a movie like They/Them exist from a major studio is huge. I think some television shows and movies still skirt around queerness, and they don’t say it outright. We saw that in our faces in Stranger Things. It was extremely coded, and I just wanted them to say it. I get it: the show is set in the 80s, and Will’s character was probably scared, but if you’re telling these stories, and you want to make queer viewers, especially young queer fans, comfortable, just say it!
HP: Can you tell me a little about what queer representation looks like in movies today?
AW: Horror scholarship, while it’s fabulous, and I can’t thank Harry Benshoff enough for writing Monsters in the Closet, that was in 1997. So we have all this other scholarship from the past two decades. It’s moving towards, how I phrase it, revenge through representation. Movies are reacting to the Trump era. You have films like the Fear Street trilogy, and The Perfection. In these movies, you have openly queer protagonists battling homophobes, pedophiles, racists, and sexists. They’re fighting all these groups that were emboldened and fueled by the far right and the Trump administration. The horror genre these days is very angry. It has a very fuck you attitude that I’m very pleased about.
Queer Screams is available now on McFarland Books and Amazon.
Misc
HORROR 101: What is The New French Extremity Movement?
What is New French Extremity? The term New French Extremity originated in film journalist James Quandt’s article “Flesh & Blood: Sex and Violence in Recent French Cinema”. The bulk of the article addresses a rash of more violent films that were coming out of French cinema in the late 90s and early 2000s; the article sites Bruno Dumont’s 2003 art film Twentynine Palms as inciting the criticism, seeing it as the latest in a long line of, to him, unimpressive French films at the turning point of a century.
Welcome back to Horror 101, a series of articles where we explain horror movie legends and their lore. For beginners, the confused, or just those who need a refresher, these articles are for you.
It is certainly ironic to be close-minded as a horror fan. What do you mean you’ll watch fifteen terribly made movies in a week but then turn your nose up at something 20 minutes longer than your usual runtime? (That one was aimed at me, so if you caught a stray, apologia).
But, I’ve always been particularly averse to one grouping of films: New French Extremity, a genre whose name came from an article deriding the very notion of it. In more recent years, I’ve grown some appreciation for its offerings, though, as I’ve come to understand the commentary it has to share. It’s a genre pockmarked by bleak cinematic landscapes, painted with the pains of human suffering and grotesqueries to reflect the horrors of the real world. A genre that often delves into the surreal, wading knee-high through depravity to get there.
…Assuming you can call it a genre.
Like German Expressionism, or Dadaism, it’s a style with some major tenets, but no concrete trappings; debated and shaped by its watchers, and now brought to you here. It’s sometimes hard to grasp, but today’s article will try its hardest to answer the question…
WHAT IS NEW FRENCH EXTREMITY?
The term New French Extremity originated in film journalist James Quandt’s article “Flesh & Blood: Sex and Violence in Recent French Cinema”. The bulk of the article addresses a rash of more violent films that were coming out of French cinema in the late 90s and early 2000s; the article sites Bruno Dumont’s 2003 art film Twentynine Palms as inciting the criticism, seeing it as the latest in a long line of, to him, unimpressive French films at the turning point of a century.
Quandt generally writes them off, indicating that they utilize their debauchery as a blunt tool in a clumsy attempt to evoke some sort of philosophical or political message about the human condition, as opposed to the artistic movements of centuries prior like the French Decadent Movement and Dadaism that inspired it. Ironically, the term New French Extremity erupted from this article as the main takeaway for film scholars and critics, because Quandt caps off the article by saying that the grouping of films are too varied in their vision to be considered a proper genre:
The New French Extremity sometimes looks like a latter-day version of the hussards, those Céline-loving, right-wing anarchists of the ’50s determined to rock the pieties of bourgeois culture; but for all their connections (shared actors, screenwriters, etc.), the recent provocateurs are too disparate in purpose and vision to be classified as a movement. […] it appears to be the last gasp of Gallic libertinism.
And so, New French Extremity was minted as a piece of the cinematic lexicon. Jargon meant to describe not only grotesque thriller and horror films coming out of France from the 90s onward, but films whose whole cinematography (both by visuals and by narrative) is rooted in being transgressive. No matter how horrible you think a concept is, New French Extreme will depict it, and no matter how sacred you think something is, expect it to be trampled on with some extremely profane filmmaking. It’s about being so grotesque that they evoke raw and pure disgust, often to reflect the film’s themes or philosophical ideas.
Then, you might ask…
WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN NEW FRENCH EXTREMITY AND SPLATTER FILMS?
Surely, films like Saw, Hostel, and Human Centipede have political messages underpinned by their violence. And yes, the Saw franchise in particular can at turns be very meanspirited and violent while being bluntly political; it is what I’d call the most politically American horror film series of all time, and its traps and the major bodily dysfunction they cause are a big part of that.
But in the end, it’s not being an American film that separates it from the genre, as even if it were a French film it wouldn’t fit either. Part of the horror of New French Extreme films is how the violence is presented; it is served as real, raw, and uncut as possible. It is unflinchingly (and unhappily) violent, and grounded in a level of uncomfortable reality. So, there goes another tenet of the movement: it has to crank up the meanspirited energy in its violence, and it can’t really be “fun” in how it displays its extremity.
WHO ARE THE DIRECTORS OF THE NEW FRENCH EXTREMITY MOVEMENT?
As critical as Quandt was of the idea, he did provide a very handy list of names to focus on as the most prominent voices of the movement:
“François Ozon, Gaspar Noé, Catherine Breillat, Philippe Grandrieux—and now, alas, [Bruno] Dumont”.
Names missing from that list, but which crop up later in the article and in the scene in general include Alexandre Aja (director of High Tension), Virginie Despentes (the mind behind the very controversial Baise-moi), Alexandre Bustillo & Julien Maury (the duo behind Inside and this years The Soul Eater), and Pascal Laugier (of Martyrs and Incident in a Ghostland fame). And though Xavier Gens was a bit late to the party with his 2007 film Frontier(s), he is an important director in terms of where the movement went and where it’s going with its politics. This isn’t a comprehensive list, but a good starting point for you if you’re interested in the genre.
WHO IS THE MOST INFLUENTIAL NEW FRENCH EXTREMITY DIRECTOR?
The short answer? Michael Haneke. The long answer? Technically, Haneke popularized the use of transgressive elements to shock and disquiet the audience among his contemporaries. Still, Gaspar Noé is the genre codifier and the most dominant voice in the space creatively.
Despite the extreme nature of films like Funny Games and The Seventh Continent (both brutal and genuinely terrifying), I personally find myself in the camp that his movies are not New French Extreme. We can debate the limits of how messed up something has to be before it’s considered extreme until the cows come home. But the fact is, if you put Haneke’s work alongside all of the films I’ve listed above in the previous segment, he would be the odd man out. He is, simply put, considerably more restrained in terms of showing gore and sexual violence, and the majority of his films’ horror and anxiety come from psychological aspects rather than physical consequences.
The material world is the battleground of the New French Extreme, and the nauseating nature of the films is the tool that Quandt named as the hallmark of the movement. With that in mind, I believe that Gaspar Noé, instead, should be considered the godfather of the genre. Given his films are the most well-known and commercially successful of the New French Extreme “movement”, he is more than worthy of the title; not to mention, he’s the most extreme in all regards. I would consider Irreversible’s directing and presentation to be the peak of the New French Extreme, since its nausea-inducing and sickening content comes with plenty of disorienting directing and editing; and for people with better sound setups than mine, you’ll find the little sound design trick that Noé placed in the film to make it as disturbing as possible.
WHAT IS THE MEANING OF NEW FRENCH EXTREMITY?
A question that is much less definitional, and much more philosophical. Why the bleak landscapes? Why the hopeless endings? Why so much violence against women, especially THAT kind of violence? And there is no clear answer, as every filmmaker has a different motivation. However, there is an undeniably political slant running through most of these movies that can all generally be applied to the rise of the right-wing and alt-right in French politics from the 1990s onward.
Film scholars like Alice Haylett Bryan and Marc Olivier have pointed to films like Inside, Sheitan, and Frontiers as coinciding with and commentating on the rise of politicians like Nicolas Sarkozy, politicians running on strong anti-immigration platforms and blaming the immigrant populations of France for its ills like the 2005 riots. Though it is less easy to see on the surface level, the Mademoiselle of Martyrs and her secret society are a group of wealthy, white French aristocrats who find purpose through the suffering of others, depicted as the impoverished and WOC; they even describe the process of torturing their martyrs as something they do “systematically”, akin to the policies of a government.
Like the trend of the nuclear monster reflecting our Cold War anxieties in the 50s and 60s, and the spike of home invasion films that took place in the 70s, New French Extreme directors have political engines built into their movies. The shocking parts of New French Extremity punctuate what many of these films are supposed to be: countercultural art meant to attack and depict the dangerous political ideologies that spends the lifeblood and livelihood of underserviced people as currency; ideologies that could very well pose a threat to the existence of a democratic France itself.
New French Extremity’s horrifying sights are not only made effective through the verisimilitude of their directing and production; they are made to remind you of the world’s much more realistic terrors, here right now and possibly yet to come.
DO YOU HAVE NEW FRENCH EXTREMITY RECOMMENDATIONS?
So, now for your required reading from this lecture.
Needless to say, all of the films mentioned in this article bear a massive and profoundly long list of trigger warnings (seriously), primarily for their intense violence, depictions of sexual violence, and depictions of pretty much every terrible thing you can imagine. Please make sure to do your research before watching any of these, and don’t skimp on the self care.
Martyrs (2008) has some of my favorite reveals in any horror movie, and an unforgettable ending you won’t want spoiled, so watch this one first. High Tension is a favorite of many Horror Press readers and writers for a reason. It’s an unrelenting, pulse-pounding film that earns its controversial reputation, and you don’t really feel safe until it’s over (if that). Trouble Every Day gets a lot of flak from Quandt in his original article (what doesn’t?), but I went in blind and was completely caught off guard by what the movie turns into, so avoid any spoilers if you want to see something interesting. Sheitan is a head trip of a film, with recurring face-of-the-genre Vincent Cassel cranking up the madness dial on his performance to an 11. Calvaire, likewise, has a very demented villain on par with the main antagonist of Inside, so they would make for a very interesting double feature if you can stomach two at a time. And while I said Haneke is not New French Extreme, if you want something a little quieter but with an ending that will shake you to your core, I suggest watching The Seventh Continent.
That brings me to the one very big question I had writing this:
Should I even recommend Irreversible? It may be the one film that embodies New French Extremity the most, given how far it pushes the envelope. But do I like it?
No.
It personally is just too much for me. It’s bleak, horrific, it will disturb you entirely and might very well ruin your week, and I can’t stand to watch it. Which is the whole point, but there’s a limit to what I can tolerate. I find Noe is unflinching in his determination to make you run from the theatre and abandon the film altogether, especially in its most infamous and cruel sequence.
From a film history perspective, it is undeniably a piece that has carved itself into French cinema indelibly (for better and for worse), and if you want to plumb the depths of human horror, you’ll be hard-pressed to find as difficult of a watch. So, when you ask me, “Should I watch Irreversible?”, I can only meet you with one honest response: you can certainly try to.
Good luck with that, horror fan.
***
And that will be it for today’s Horror 101 lesson. See you in the next class and stay tuned to Horror Press’s social media feeds for more content on horror movies, television, and everything in between.
I’ve talked about Frogman from writer/director Anthony Cousins ad nauseam. It even made my Favorite 3 Horror Movies of 2023 list. Hearing that Frogman was getting a physical release from Terror Vision was music to my ears. And, honestly, how crazy was it that it was also getting shelf space at Walmart?! Very rarely can you find a film that killed on the festival circuit and then was readily available on physical media at both a boutique distribution online store as well as a big box retailer.
August 10th, 2024, would be a day that changed my life; Terror Vision was releasing a deluxe edition Blu-ray bundle with a limit of 100 copies. Typically, boutique labels will do limited edition slipcases for films, limiting them between 1,000 and 2,500 copies. The Frogman Deluxe Edition bundle was different. For $68 bucks, you could get one of the most unique and visually stunning releases of my lifetime. So I purchased it. After preordering this majestic bundle, I waited patiently for two and a half months…and then it arrived.
The purpose of this piece isn’t to rub my one (hundred) of a kind purchase in anyone’s face, instead, it’s to highlight the care and beauty behind this release. Simply put, if you love a movie and find it being released by Terror Vision, you should pick it up. Here is the physical side of what came with this bundle:
- A black MILF (Man I Love Frogman) shirt
- A double-sided foldout poster
- A Frogman-themed brochure of Loveland, Ohio/Frogman Point (With a 15% off coupon for Sticky Tongue Gifts & Collectibles)
- A Loveland, Ohio postcard
- A sticker set
- The Fortune Teller Miracle Fish (not listed on the bundle’s itinerary, but a happy inclusion)
- A Frogman mug
- A bound film-supplement book
- A limited rigid box that perfectly fits over the embossed slipcase
- AND A CD full of frog sounds!
In all honesty, I initially thought $68 was a steep price. As the minutes passed, I knew my chance of picking one up was dwindling. Once I opened the box, put on the shirt, read the book, and drank some lukewarm coffee out of my mug…
I realized it was beyond worth the price.
Terror Vision has set the bar for labels like Shout! Factory, Vinegar Syndrome, Arrow Video, and many more. I do not know who runs the program behind the scenes, but it’s clear they are some of the deepest fans of physical media out there. If I had to nitpick, there was one issue I have with the Blu-ray. The title screen. It’s a flat image with a play, subtitles, and special features option. These options are overlaid over a thick blue bar and it doesn’t feel very in theme. Even though the title screen felt a bit bland, the special features surely made up for it.
All of this is to say, if you’re a physical media nut like myself and you haven’t picked anything up from Terror Vision, then what are you doing?! They have excellent releases like WNUF Halloween Special, Malum, Door, and so much more. And thanks to Terror Vision for all they’ve done, we can’t wait to see what you release next.
The Creep Tapes: “Mike” & “Elliot” (S1E1&2)
[REVIEW] ‘Calvaire’ (2004) Is An ORDEAL
HORROR 101: What is The New French Extremity Movement?
Physical Media Matters: Terror Vision and ‘Frogman’
The Joy Paradox of ‘Martyrs’ (2008)
[INTERVIEW] Can AI Consent? An Interview With the Crew Behind ‘Black Eyed Susan’
[REVIEW] The ‘Slayed’ LGBTQ+ Shorts Block at BHFF 2024 Tapped Into Queer Nightmares and Daydreams
[REVIEW] The Unconventional Extremity of ‘Demonlover’ (2002)
The Best Horror You Can Stream on Shudder in November 2024
Brooklyn Horror Film Festival 2024: I’m Addicted To ‘Habit’ (1995)
‘The People Under the Stairs’ Review: A Brilliantly Bizarre Undercover Horror Classic
Glen and Glenda: Don Mancini’s Reverence for Queerness in ‘Seed of Chucky’ (2004)
Slappy Was the Blueprint: How the Dummy from Goosebumps Became A Horror Icon
Is ‘Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker’ Too Problematic for 2022?
This Is What Makes Sue Ann from ‘Ma’ a Terrifying Yet Loveable Horror Villain
Was This Film the Blueprint for Malignant? No, It’s Even Better Than That: A SPOILER-FREE Review of ‘Cherry Falls’
‘Truth or Dare’: Who Did it Best?
Mia from ‘Evil Dead’ – A New Kind of Final Girl
‘Midsommar’ (2019): Dani’s Divisive Development
