How women are represented in Horror - The Shining, Halloween & Eden Lake

"Carol Clover, in 'Men, women and chainsaws', argues that many horror films are interesting in their representation of gender because they provide a female point of identification for a male core target audience - To what extent do you think horror represents gender progressively?"


Carol Clover presented many theories within the horror genre, but one in particular that allowed us to explore gender and sexuality to a whole other level. Horror has always been known as being one of those genres that aimed mostly at males - the sheer terror and gore is something that hasn't always appealed to women, so to meet the needs of its target audience, horror has produced some of the sickest, evilest and frightening films in the bid to attract its target demographic more so than the rest of the competition. Clover suggested that, although Horror is obviously a genre that is aimed at men, it also does something very sneaky - this being that in Horror, directors, movie writers, actor/actresses, (etc) all hold the power to take a mans masculinity and completely turn it upside down, by putting the men in the place of a women. Clover suggested that all Horror films ended with a 'final girl' - the girl that goes through the most and toughens up throughout the film to make it to end, and survive. But wait, final girl? Yes, without the audience even realising, they are always put into the point of view as the girl who survives (well, most of the time, there is the rare time in a film where we may see a point of view shot from the killer, but not for the whole film). How does this relate to the question being asked? Well, Would this be seen as progressive or not? Some may look at it as - well, of corse it is, the women is surviving, and clearly, this is completely out-ruling the stereotype that women are weak and dumb, and only belong in the home or looking after children (Anything that meets the criteria of a domestic female). But in doing so, I can't think of an extreme horror film I've ever watched where I haven't had a women in white lingerie or an oversized shirt put in front of my eyes. Well, that certainly isn't progressive - fair enough this women may, or may not survive, but either way she's still had to get her body out at some point to please the men in their 'male gaze'.

Let's take the film 'Halloween' (1978). Now, I feel that this film meets the criteria to be seen as progressive, but also conservative in many ways. Firstly, let's think of the female characters in the film. We follow the story through the life of Laurie, a kind, well behaved and intelligent girl. But within the film are a few other characters - Linda, Annie, Judith Myers, The Nurse as well as another Girl who babysits. All together - 6 girls. Now, how many of those girls do we see in their underwear at some point in the film? 3. So, half of the female characters in this film are simply sex objects - nothing more than a male gaze. On the contrary, the other half of the female characters are actually seen with a little more respect, and are all presented as domestic females. If that wasn't enough to leave me confused as to whether this film was conservative or progressive, the narrative structure itself was questioning sexism in a whole other way. Throughout the film we see 5 deaths occur, 3 of those being women (60%) and the other 2 being men (40%), Well, obviously this isn't progressive in the slightest. In fact all it does is stick to the same idea that is always presented of women being weak and stupid. However, something that is progressive is the way the main protagonist is female, but not only that, the final girl. Another thing quite odd is the way that Laurie never objectifies herself in the same way the other girls do, and yet she becomes the subject. At one point in the film one of the other girls dies, whilst waiting for a man in bed, can someone objectify themselves any more than that?! So, This film is confusing, is it progressive? is it conservative? I struggle to come to terms with it. But also, something that helped me comprehend with the idea of sexism in the film a little bit better was researching into the roles of women in 1978. I discovered that feminism was huge in the whole of the 70's, women fought for equal rights and feminism was at its peak, so, why would films produced in the late 1970's still have women strutting around in lingerie with brains the size of pea's? I don't see that being progressive in the slightest.

So, if the era does have anything to do with the way gender, if we looked at a film more recent then surely it would be more progressive than Halloween. "The Shining"(1982) may only be 4 years after, but it shows a lot of differences. In Halloween we are made to follow the story of Laurie about 80/90% of the time - making it clear that she is the final girl, and the story is in fact about her (progressive). However in this film we relate with all 3 of the main characters for various amounts of time - Not just Wendy who would be seen as the final girl, instead we relate with Jack, Wendy and Danny. The ratio of main male characters to main female characters obviously being 2:1, therefore obviously being a bit sexist when it comes to screen time. In fact, let's look at characters over all in the Shining - Over all there are 9 men, and 5 females. If you don't think that isn't conservative yet, then take into consideration how often you see the female characters. For example - fair enough Wendy has a lot of screen time (probably would seeing as she's meant to be the main character), but then the other female characters have hardly any screen time in comparison to her - take the lady in the bathtub for example, she must have about 20 seconds throughout the whole film. And Grady's twin daughters... well, we see them for a good 15 seconds, half of that time it's flashing to their body parts splattered across the hall way. But, when it comes to the roles of women in this film, I guess it's a bit better than Halloween. Wendy's role is obviously a familiar and yet domestic female - someone who takes care of the family. However the lady in the bath tub, well, she's clearly a sex object. However I personally think that this film takes the idea of 'sex objects' and 'the male gaze' and completely turns it round on itself. As the women gets out of the bath and walks towards Jack, she has a huge sex appeal, however her body begins to deteriorate and rot whilst she's touching him, until eventually she looks like a very old, if not, dead lady. So in a sense I see that as being progressive - as the film has only shown one woman as a sex object throughout the whole film, and even then it almost mocks the idea of needing a sex object in a film by having the sexual desire completely disappear so instantly, almost as if to say we don't need sex appeal in Horror. Obviously the narrative seems to be quite progressive too, as it shows Wendy as the final girl, having to fight for, not only her own life, but also her sons life in their bid for survival, and escaping from the 'monster' in this film (the 'monster' obviously being her own husband, it's so peculiar how one person can play so many different roles in one film, especially if we applied this film to Propps character functions).

A more recent film Eden Lake (2008), I feel that gender is represented very differently to those films from the 70's and 80's. Although there are 11 males in this film, and only 6 females (meaning there are nearly double the amount of men, which could be seen as conservative), we have to take into account the roles the women actually play in this film. For example, fair enough we have the waitress and a few other women playing smaller roles, but we also have Jenny - the main girl, who we watch transform from a sweet, innocent woman into what I can only describe as a monster as the film progresses. Not only this, the film begins with a group of young boys and one girl terrorising Jenny and her boyfriend on a weekend away, and eventually destroying them to the point that Jennys boyfriend is burnt. But Jenny powers through in the hope to save herself, and eventually makes it out from the forest and away from the gang that is after her... Now, surely that would be seen as progressive, a young woman protecting herself and escaping from a group of 5/6 dangerous teenage boys. Paige is another main character in this film. She plays a passive role as a female and is part of the 'gang' of young boys who are set out to kill Jenny and her boyfriend. However Paige herself even tries to escape, before she is run over by Jenny whilst making an escape. Paige could also be seen as a character who challenges sex appeal in the film, when she questions "You lookin' at my tits?", so, instead of having a male gaze in this film, we're actually being challenged for trying to find one, which of corse must be seen as progressive. In fact at one point in the film, we look through the eyes of the young boys as they look through a telescope at Jenny laying on the beach, however the camera quickly flips back on to Jenny, where we, the audience, are put in her position and aware of this, she wraps herself up. Progressive? Most certainly. Another reason why I feel this film is progressive is because of the death count, More men die in this film than women. The argument could be that there are more males in this film so therefore that may be why, but still, I think it is progressive as we see a lot more men die then women - in fact we only see 1 girl die (Paige), the film lets us interpret the ending ourselves by not telling us what does or doesn't happen to Jenny.
So, in my personal opinion I think that the way horror represents gender progressively all comes down to the era of the film. I think it is clear that, although it is seen progressive in certain parts of the films I studied in the 70's and 80's, the films also cover quite a lot of things that could make me believe the film is conservative and sexist. I think that since the 80's the roles of women have become a lot more equal to the roles of men, with women being able to do any job that a man can do and having equal rights. So, for this reason I think that horror has followed this trend and films have been produced that are progressive, and were women are seen as more than just a sex object, but as an actual person. I can only predict that in the future, as women and men slowly become more and more equal, horror will also provide men and women with equal roles in the bid to entertain the audiences in exciting ways. Who knows, Carol Clovers theory may even be scrapped and we may soon be experiencing horror through the eyes of a male, maybe even having a female as the villain?