Oppressive and repressive social institutions, value systems and codes of behaviour are central to the horror, science-fiction and fantasy genres. Focusing on 1-2 examples of your choice, consider how these genres mediate the ‘problem’ of the social. How significant is ideology, as well as genre theory, to your case-study?

This essay will explore the ways in which the horror genre perpetuates repressive and oppressive social institutions, value systems and codes of behaviour surrounding the homosexual subject. It will be suggested that the generic conventions of horror films sustain repressive understandings of the normative order which position the homosexual subject as a threatening ‘other’. This essay will offer the opinion that it is through these representations that the horror genre produces the ideological figure of the ‘monstrous homosexual’. The discourses and ideologies explored will primarily be those relating to coding of the homosexual subject as predator and paedophile. This essay will engage with genre theory in order to demonstrate how narrative repetition in the horror genre mediates the homosexual subject as a disruption to the social order which must be eliminated in order to restore the heteronormative order. The methodology of genre theory will first be outlined, and the generic conventions of the horror film will be explored. The methodology of discourse analysis will also be employed in order to expose the ideologies at play in the case study. This essay will take Wes Craven’s A Nightmare on Elm St II: Freddy’s Revenge as a case study in the examination of the oppressive and repressive social institutions, value systems and codes of behaviour which are perpetuated by the horror genre with regard to the figure of the ‘monstrous homosexual’.
In order to explore the ways in which the horror genre perpetuates repressive structures regarding the homosexual subject, an engagement with genre theory is necessary. Neal establishes the primary concerns of aesthetic theories of genre as “issues of repetition and variation, similarity and difference and the extent to which the elements repeated and varied are simple or complex” (200, 195). Schatz engages with these structural concerns when he asserts that a genre film “involves familiar, essentially one-dimensional characters, acting out a predictable story pattern within a familiar setting” (1981, 6). Schatz goes on to suggest that the social world performed in the genre film is “premeditated and essentially intact” and that the narrative structures of the genre film “have prior significance as elements of some generic formula” (1981, 10). While Neale refutes Schatz’s claims that genre films are always one-dimensional, predictable and familiar (Neale 2000, 196), an aesthetic approach to genre theory is nonetheless useful in establishing the conventions according to which a genre functions. However, an understanding of the “socio-cultural functions” that genre performs (Neale 2000, 208) is also necessary to an exploration of the ideological implications of a genre film. Schatz establishes genre as a “cooperation between artist and audience in celebrating their collective values and ideals” (1981, 15). This understanding of genre may point to the idea that generic repetition can only be established if its values and ideologies are popular. With Schatz’s rendering of genre as a “vehicle for the exploration of ideas, ideals, cultural values and ideological dilemmas central to...society” (1981, 13) in mind, we may now question the ideologies encoded in film texts. A genre film may be a cooperative celebration of the shared ideals and values between artists and audiences, but how can we analyse those marginalised by this ‘celebration’? This essay suggests that if we consider is notion alongside an understanding of the essentially “conservative nature of the horror genre” (Tyree 2009, 31), the ways in which its generic conventions perpetuate oppressive and repressive structures can be exposed. Neale notes that not only is it difficult to distinguish between the horror genre and the science fiction genre, but that horror often overlaps with a number of other genres (2000, 85). Given the multiplicity and ambiguity of the horror genre, this essay will isolate the generic conventions of two specific varieties of horror; the post-modern and body horror genres. Pinedo establishes that all horror films involve the “violent disruption of the normative order by a monster” (1997, 15), however the nature of the ‘monster’ varies greatly. In an exhaustive analysis of the conventions of the horror genre, Tudor notes that in classic horror films the ‘monster’ or “destabilising force” is external (1989, 28). Tudor goes on to note that an external destabilising force ensures that “within the genre world there is considerable security about the final safety of our minds and bodies” (1989, 28) and that in every classic horror film under analysis, the threat was “successfully averted” (Tudor 1989, 28) The resolution of classic horror films inevitably involves the restoration of the normative order by masculine might or scientific knowledge (Pinedo 1997, 15). The clear coding of threats as external and the distinct boundary between normality and abnormality can be considered an important generic convention of the classical horror film. However, body horror and postmodern horror genres contain a different set of conventions in which the blurred boundary between the self and the monstrous other is the source of the horror present. In the post-modern horror genre, the boundaries between normality and abnormality are not clearly drawn; the ‘threat’ in postmodern horror film locates the source of horror in the familiar (Pinedo 1997, 18). Furthermore, Pinedo notes that postmodern horror often ends with uncertainty, with an ambiguous ending in which a threat is defeated “but only temporarily” (1997, 18). Pinedo also notes that body horror is central to contemporary horror films; the postmodern and body horror genres are “intent on imagining the fragility of the body by transgressing its boundaries and revealing it inside out” (1997, 19). This understanding of the genre is set in contrast to Tudor’s analysis of classic horror outlined above in which the self is clearly distinguished from the threat and is therefore relatively secure. The source of the horror in the postmodern and body horror genres is therefore the collapse of meaning (Kisteva 1982, 4) brought about by the ‘monstrous’; the monster “dissolves the basis of its signifying system, its network of differences; me/not me, animate/not animate, human/nonhuman, life/death...the monster’s body dissolves binary differences (Pinedo 1997, 21). What have been outlined above are some of the generic conventions of the classic and contemporary horror film. This essay will now demonstrate the ways in which the conventions of postmodern and body horror films produce subject positions and perpetuate oppressive and repressive social institutions, value systems and codes of behaviour. This section will focus on the construction of the monster, and in particular how repetitions in the postmodern and body horror genres encode homosexuality upon the monstrous. As outlined above, the source of horror in postmodern and body horror films is the collapse of clear boundaries between the normal and the abnormal, and between the self and the other. The space where these collapses occur is often the unconscious (Wood 1984, 173). Pinedo points to the importance of the “dream-coded-as-reality” as a generic convention in the postmodern horror film (1997, 23). The ways in which the desires of the subconscious, as played out in dream sequences, position the figure of the homosexual is the primary way in which the social ‘problem’ of the homosexual figure is mediated through the horror genre. Wood expands on this Freudian understanding of the source of horror through the idea that fears surrounding repressed desires, and the inability to police the boundaries defining the self, are what inform the ideologies encoded in the figure of the monstrous homosexual (1989, 125) in the horror genre.
In A Nightmare on Elm St II: Freddy’s Revenge, discourses and ideologies regarding unconscious desires and the invasion of self by the homosexual other are clearly played out. Furthermore, generic conventions relating to the ‘queer’ threat which must be overcome by the heteronormative order are also apparent. This section will first set out the premise of this film, and the ways in which it conforms to the repressive conventions of the horror genre and will then conduct a detailed textual discourse analysis in order to extract the ideologies present in the film relating to the figure of the monstrous homosexual.
The monster of the Nightmare on Elm St. series is Freddy Kruger, a “fire-scarred child-molester” (Benshoff 1997, 246). Freddy’s construction as a child-molester, or paedophile, is important when considering generic conventions in horror films regarding the vulnerability of children, the need to protect their innocence and fears of children being ‘recruited’ by evil (Redman 1997, 98). These discourses evoke ideologies surrounding the homosexual subject regarding fears about the homosexual who recruits innocent children, ideas which have “long been a mainstay of homophobic discourses” (Redman 1997, 98). Similarly, Best sets out the generic convention of the “child-victim” played out in horror films, this convention depends upon the “dramatic contrast between evil and innocent childhood” (1993, 115). In this way, Freddy is clearly coded as the ‘corrupter’ of innocent youth, a particularly evocative notion when one considers the ways in which the figure of the monstrous homosexual is being drawn. In this way we can see Freddy as “yet another depiction of the monstrous predatory homosexual” (Benshoff 1997, 13).
While Freddy’s character is coded as paedophile throughout the Nightmare on Elm St series, in A Nightmare on Elm St II: Freddy’s Revenge Wes Craven “consciously evokes Freudian metaphors about sexuality” (Benshoff 1997, 246) using Freddy’s body as the point of binary collapse. The horror in this film stems not from the fear of being victimised by the homosexual child-molester, but of becoming the homosexual child-molester and embodying his desires. Here, fears regarding repressed desires and the inability to police the boundaries of the self are played out. Benshoff summarises the narrative of the film as Freddy’s quest to “get inside of” a teenage boy (1997, 246). Here, an analysis of the generic conventions of the horror film with regard to the depiction of sexuality is relevant. Benshoff contends that the horror genre encodes “patterns of ‘normal’ sexuality that are in alignment with the dominant ideology; the monster is seen as the product of misdirected of inappropriate sexual energy” (1997, 10). A Nightmare on Elm St II: Freddy’s Revenge delineates the ‘appropriate’ heterosexual energy and the ‘inappropriate’ homosexual energy by coding the former using the imagery of waking, life and consciousness and the latter using the imagery of death, the subconscious and that which must be overcome. In this way, the eruptions of homosexual desire which occur in the protagonist’s dreams become a source of horror and it is not only Freddy himself, but also the homosexual energy he produces which becomes the ‘monster’ to be defeated.
A close analysis of a scene between Freddy’s victim Jesse and his friend Grady can help to illustrate the ideas discussed above. In this scene, Jesse sneaks into Grady’s room in the middle of the night. Jesse throws himself at a sleeping Grady, covering his mouth with his hand. Grady’s muffled scream and the darkness of the bedroom clearly position Jesse as the homosexual threat. Jesse then locks the bedroom door, and tells Grady that he “needs [Grady] to let [him] stay here tonight”. The setting here, with its locked door and darkened room, evokes discourses surrounding the secrecy and shame of the homosexual encounter. Jesse must ensure that the manifestation of any latent homosexual desires is kept private; the horror in this scene derives from the fear that the homosexual energy will escape from this private space and cause disruption the heteronormative world. Jesse therefore needs Grady to “watch [him] sleep” and ensure the homosexual threat is contained. The dialogue in this scene is also filled with self-consciously homoerotic intonations; Jesse explains to Grady that “someone is trying to get inside [his] body” to which Grady responds “So you want to sleep with me?” Grady eventually falls asleep (into a state of unconscious) while he is supposed to be watching Jesse, allowing Freddy to ‘erupt’ out of Jesse and murder Grady. In this moment, both boys are destroyed by the homosexual threat which they failed to contain. In this scene, distinct connections are drawn between (homo)sexuality “and frightening violence” Benshoff (1997, 246). The scene in which Jesse’s homosexual sadistic gym coach is murdered by Freddy is also framed by these discourses and ideologies; the potential for a homosexual encounter in the empty gymnasium locker rooms causes Freddy to “pop out” (Benshoff 1997, 248) of Jesse’s body. Through these scenes, the ways in which the horror genre mediates the ‘problem’ of the homosexual figure is evident; the homosexual figure is one which is simultaneously horrifying and desirable. The need to destroy the threat presented by the monstrous homosexual is thus all the more imperative; the horrifying destruction of the self which occurs when one allows the homosexual self to remain is evidence of this.
The most important narrative feature of A Nightmare on Elm St II: Freddy’s Revenge is the device of the nightmare. Wood’s understanding of nightmares in the horror genre as the space in which “truly loathsome” desires are represented (1984, 173) is relevant here. The dream-like quality of the film creates a space in which “time is unhinged” (Pinedo 1997, 23) and binary distinctions become uncertain. Carroll demonstrates that the generic conventions of the nightmare in horror films creates a world in which “paralysis, helplessness and vulnerability” code ‘reality’ (1981, I). Carroll contends that it is through these themes that the ‘nightmare monster’ is constructed (1981, I). It is through the coding of the heteronormative world as ‘vulnerable’ and the monstrous homosexual as threatening that the horror genre mediates the ‘problem’ of the homosexual figure. The embodied homosexual figure, as well as latent homosexual desires, must eventually be destroyed according to the narrative conventions of the horror film. The end of A Nightmare on Elm St II: Freddy’s Revenge mirrors Pinedo’s description of the uncertain conclusion of the postmodern horror film. Despite this uncertainty, the film draws a clear heteronormative conclusion. The repulsive body of Freddy, which has entrapped Jesse, is burnt away and his heteronormative love interest ‘peels away’ Freddy’s monstrous body to reveal a Jesse who has purged himself of his monstrous desires. In this conclusion, the Jesse has overcome his monster, but the threat of Freddy as the predatory homosexual to the rest of the genre world remains.
This essay has demonstrated the ways in which the horror genre creates and perpetuates repressive discourses surrounding the homosexual subject through the figure of the monstrous homosexual. Genre theory was useful to this analysis, in that repetitions and conventions were able to be isolated and exposed. Discourse analysis was also useful in this sense, in that the underlying ideologies and semiotic meanings encoded into the film were able to be uncovered and explored. By use of these frameworks of analysis, this essay has demonstrated that the figure of the homosexual in the horror genre is constructed as a predatory threat to the heteronormative order which collapses binary differences and threatens the boundaries of the self. The homosexual threat is therefore one which must be overcome and destroyed, and thus the horror genre can be seen to contain and perpetuate oppressive and repressive social institutions, value systems and codes of behaviour regarding the homosexual subject.

Reference List
Benshoff, H ‘Monsters in the Closet: Homosexuality and the Horror Film’, Inside Popular Film, Illustrated Edition, Manchester University Press, 1997
Best, J ‘Threatened Children: Rhetoric and Concern about Child-Victims’, Illustrated Edition (reprint) University of Chicago Press, Chicago, pp 239, 1993
Carroll, N ‘Nightmare and the Horror Film: The Symbolic Biology of Fantastic Beings’, Film Quarterly, Vol. 34, No. 3, pp 16-25, University of California Press, Spring 1981
Kristeva, J ‘Approaching Abjection’ in Jones, A (ed) The feminism and visual culture reader, Illustrated edition (reprint) pp 560, 2003
Neale, S ‘Genre and Hollywood’ in Sightlines Series, Illustrated edition (reprint), pp 336, Routledge, 2000
Pinedo, I ‘Recreational Terror: Women and the pleasures of horror film viewing’ in SUNY series: Interruptions- Border testimony(ies) and Critical Discourse/s, pp. 117, SUNY Press, 1997
Redman, P ‘Invasion of the Monstrous Others: Heterosexual Masculinities, the ‘AIDS carrier’ and the Horror Genre’ in Steinberg, D, Epstein, D and Johnson, R (eds) Border Patrols: Policing the Boundaries of Heterosexuality, 98-116, London, 1997
Schatz, T ‘Hollywood genres: formulas, filmmaking and the studio system’ , Illustrated edition, University of California Press (McGaw-Hill), pp 300, 1981
Tudor, A ‘Monsters and mad scientists: a cultural history of the horror movie’, Illustrated Edition (reprint), Wiley-Blackwell, pp 239, 1989
Tyree, J ‘Warm Blooded: True Blood and Let the Right One In’, Film Quarterly, Vol. 63, No. 2, 2009
Wood, R ‘An Introduction to the American Horror Film’, in Grant, B (ed) Planks of Reason, Essays on the Horror Film, New Jersey and London, 1984
A Nightmare on Elm St II: Freddy’s Revenge, motion picture, New Line Cinema, written by Craven, W, Chaskin, D, directed by Sholder, J, 1985