What is Horror?

It's often difficult to define what genre a film is, based on it's content, because most of the themes associated with the various genres overlap. A scary film is rarely 'just a horror' as it may contain comedy, romance, action and drama. Films such as Trainspotting or Pulp Fiction have moment that are quite horrific but they're certainly not horror films. People know when they're watching a horror not necessarily because of the content but because of the feeling they get, a rush of dread, the feeling of waiting for something to jump out. Some horror films display a sense of horror but don't actually contain any blood, gore or death.

Hannibal Lector from The Silence of the Lambs 1991

I have always considered the film Silence of the Lambs to be a horror movie and yet other serial killer films like Zodiac clearly aren't because the focus of the film is less on the horrific aspects and instead concentrates on the investigation. Then you have films such as Seven, a serial killer film that is often placed in the horror category but is considered by many to be a thriller. The problem with the thriller genre is that it encompasses nearly every film, whenever someone is unsure what genre a movie is they say it's a thriller. Personally I have always felt that thriller is a branch of horror anyway and as any true horror movie fan knows, the horror genre is in many ways as diverse as cinema itself. There's gothic horror, slasher horror, scifi horror, comedy horror, romantic horror, psychological horror, body horror, action horror etc.

Sweeney Todd and Mrs. Lovett from Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street 2007

   

Tim Burton is a director who has made horror films in the form of musicals, this demon-straits how far horror has managed to spread as a genre. I have always been drawn to what I would describe as 'spookiness', skeletons, bats, candles and cobwebs the things people associate with horror films but which don't necessarily have to involve any gore or violence. Some times the scariest thing about a film is the overall concept or ideology behind whats happening in the story and this can conjure up a dark urge or morbid curiosity that keeps you glued to the screen, dramatic irony is often used to great effect in gothic horror of this nature 'we know she's still alive inside the coffin but he doesn't'.

Paranormal Activity 2007

I believe that, like most films, to enjoy a horror film you can't just watch it you have to feel it and live through it. Only then do you get a proper sense of what the characters go through and amerce yourself into their world.