Horror Essays

In comparing Stephen King’s “The Shining” novel to Stanley Kubrick’s film adaptation, I observed that certain colors in the movie differ from those described in the book. Through careful reading and viewing, this became apparent to me. In the novel and film adaptation, there are various instances where the colors of objects are reversed. In […]

“The Blair Witch Project” was a revolutionary breakthrough in the horror film genre. It holds the distinction of being the only film in history where actors were unaware of the script. Director Daniel Myrick intentionally withheld food and water from the cast to heighten their on-screen performance, aiming to capture raw and authentic emotions. Additionally, […]

Presenter Halloween was benchmark for all other Horror films to base themselves on. Made in 1978 it followed on from what Psycho had created. Not only did it develop several concepts from other movies, such as the killer hiding in the darkness. This is shown in Dracula (item 2) and Halloween relies heavily on this. […]

Film Presentation – How significant is the use of supernatural in modern horror?RUN AUDIO: background music from ‘The Ring’ playing for 1 minute 30 seconds. Fading outVISUAL: DVD cover of The Ring, The Others and The Sixth Sense show on screen for first section of presentation.SPEAKER: My aim throughout this presentation is to discover whether […]

‘The Exorcist’, directed by William Friedkin, is a Horror film which follows the demonic possession of a young girl named Regan. The film was adapted from the 1971 novel ‘The Exorcist’, written by William Peter Blatty, and became one of the most recognisable and successful horror films of all time. It remains one of the […]

William Faulkner’s A Rose for Emily – A Gothic Horror Tale William Faulkner is widely considered to be one of the great American authors of the twentieth century. Although his greatest works are identified with a particular region and time (Mississippi in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries), the themes he explores are universal. […]

Rhetoric is the art of persuasion using language. It is the study of principles and rules of composition formulated by critics of ancient times. Rhetoric has three main components. The first component, Logos, deals with rational appeal, facts evidence, history and science. The second component, which is Ethos, deals with ethical appeal, reliability, credibility and […]

The Silent Horror Every single day more babies are killed than people on September 1 lath. Abortion Is the name of the national disgrace. I am not here to debate whether you should believe in what I believe in or not; I believe that abortion is murder and should never be looked at as right […]

Mary Shelley incorporates elements of Gothic literature and Romanticism in her novel to create an engaging and captivating genre that connects to other horror tales while revealing the true nature of darkness and love. Through her character Victor, she portrays the consequences of delving into supernatural forces of nature and the value of love. Shelley […]

It is a type of horror film in which the usual dark themes are treated tit a humorous approach. These films either uses goofy horror cliches like in some well known horror comedies of the Hollywood such as scary movie sequels, little shop of horrors, haunted mansion where campy styles are favored. First of all […]

In “Weimar Cinema and After”, Thomas Elsaesser explains expressionism as not only the style of films created in the early 1920s, but as a “generic term for most of the art cinema of the Weimar Republic in Germany, and beyond Germany, echoing down film history across the periods and genres, turning up in the description […]

The two versions of The Hound of the Baskervilles show a discrepancy in different ways. Firstly, the audience get an overall view that in the 1983 version, it is more of an investigation rather than anything else. This appears to make the audience have their own theory what is to come at the end. David […]

This is a line taken from a draft war poem by Wilfred Owen written before he realised the true horror and reality of war; entitled ‘The ballad of Peace and War’. This poem contrasted strangely with his later work, when he wrote of how the fake glamour of war leads to unbelievable suffering. As a […]

Britain had a small professional army when World War One started in 1914 and urgently needed a larger one. To address this issue, the government enforced conscription in 1916. Prior to its implementation, the government applied immense social pressure on young British men to enlist voluntarily. To encourage enlistment, the government launched a large-scale recruitment […]

Poetry written in the English language has a long and fascinating history. Like other creative arts, poetry began in service to communities. Its function was to aid the memory and enshrine in its rhythmic diction the history of the tribe such as the First World War. Over the centuries it became a way in which […]

The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde was written by Robert Louis Stevenson in 1886, a time where the “Gothic Horror” story was at its fullest expression, and Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde continues to remain one of the most well written, exciting and terrifying Gothic Horror stories to date. The Gothic Horror […]

The texts chosen for this study are: ‘The Pit and The Pendulum’ by Edgar Allan Poe and ‘An Encounter’ by James Joyce which, I feel, are appropriate as they provide comprehensive coverage of the themes analysed whilst managing to cover a historical period of some seventy years1. Poe’s piece is a dark, Gothic work which […]

Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde was published in 1886 and is one of the best known of Stevenson’s novels. It is thought to be an example of a ‘supernatural fiction’; this is when one of the characters goes against the laws of nature. The main themes are usually good and evil, hate and love. One […]

The first thing I noticed about Stealing was the question on the first line, this immediately tells us that he/she is talking to someone (or is perhaps being interviewed), however, because the poem is a monologue, we never know who. Neither are we told the gender or age of the thief, which I think all […]

My goal with the trailer was to clearly communicate to viewers that my film falls within the horror genre. My aim was to promote it specifically to viewers over the age of 18, who were my target audience. My intention was to promote my horror film by showing it at the beginning of another horror […]

By starting the play off with a question, Shakespeare makes the audience feel nervous and uncertain about what is going to happen. By using the question who’s there? Makes the audience think, why can’t he see him? Maybe it is because it’s dark or foggy. Darkness and fog is a convention of horror films, writers […]

The short stories ‘The Signalman,’ and ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’ can be both categorised as gothic horror, as various elements of horror can be found within. The authors, Dickens and Gilman successfully convey this to us through their concepts, their use of language, as well as their characters, which are all significant components of the story. […]