"Oculus": A Psychological Horror Movie with Philosophical Implications

Copyright 2018 by Gary L. Pullman

I admit it: I'm a movie poster fan, especially if it's designed to promote a chiller or a thriller. Itself a work of art, such a poster often gets to the heart of the film's basic claim, or theme. By “theme,” I mean both the central idea the movie conveys and the primary, or core, emotion it elicits, for, in art, the mind and the heart are as one when thought and feeling agree. That's not to say there's such agreement throughout the film. Typically, there isn't. By the end of the movie, though, the mind and heart typically unite, supporting one another, and, through feeling, thought becomes belief.

Some contend that our personal and social values are the sources of our beliefs, and they may be right, but I believe—ironic this particular word should appear in my thoughts as I'm writing about thought, emotion, belief, and, now, value—that, without the marriage of thought and emotion at some point, belief will not take root, and belief, arising from a value we or our society holds as true, often without individual examination, will be based solely on one or the other, thought or emotion. Such a basis is weak and susceptible to surrender.

So, anyway, back to the topic at hand: movie themes as they're expressed in posters promoting chillers and thrillers.

In Beyond Good and Evil, Frederick Nietzsche wrote, “Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into the abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.” The mirror in the horror movie Oculus could represent Nietzsche's abyss. But what, exactly, is this abyss—and how is one to prevent one's becoming a monster if he or she fights monsters? There are monsters aplenty in the film, as there are monster fighters, but none of the slayers appear to survive against the abyss. Could the title of the movie suggest an answer to the questions its symbolic mirror poses?

Let's begin our investigation of these questions with a consideration of the posters designed to promote the feature film. There are three in English, and one in Italian.

In one of the posters, a boy (10-year-old Tim Russell, we learn in the movie) and a redheaded girl (his 12-year-old sister, Kaylie) stand, facing away from a large mirror in an ornate, but rather grotesque, metal frame. Tim wears a red-, black-, and green-striped shirt; Kaylie, blue denim overalls over a light-blue sweater. Her hair is slightly disheveled, and both children look frightened—indeed, they seem near panic. Neither of them is reflected in the mirror, although Tim is tall enough for the back of his head to appear in the looking-glass and Kaylie is tall enough for the back of her head and her shoulders to be reflected in the glass. Instead, the mirror displays the opposite wall, showing a photograph or a painting (the image is blurry) above wall molding. Centered above the children, across the wall and the mirror, is the word “OCULUS,” in white letters; beneath it, also in white letters, in letter case, is the sentence, “You see what it wants you to see.” Presumably, the “it” in the sentence refers to the mirror.

In another poster, a close-up of the Kaylie is shown. She is older than she is in the first poster (23 years old, we learn in the movie). Her hair is neatly combed, falling to the sides of her face. She wears a natural-pink shade of lipstick, but no other makeup. A pair of small hands, one arising from either cheek, cover the locations in which her eyes would normally appear. The hands are the same color as her complexion and appear to be natural parts of her body. Below her chin, the sentence, in white font and title case, reads, “You see what it wants you to see.” Beneath this caption is the word “OCULUS,” in white font and capital letters. If the eyes are the mirrors of the soul, the girl has no mirror into her soul, for her eyes are missing, stolen, perhaps, but not by an external agent, for the hands which cover the locations in which her eyes would normally appear are parts of her; they grow from her own face.

The third poster shows the mirror, its frame now green in color, rather than leaden gray, but otherwise unchanged. It stands on a bare wooden floor, in profile. Kaylie, age 23, steps from the surface of the glass, wearing a dress the same color as the mirror's frame and surface. Only the parts of her body—her face, upper torso, left arm, right leg, and part of her left leg—that have emerged from the looking-glass are visible, as if the rest of her does not exist. The mirror appears to be a portal between two worlds or dimensions. In the darkness of the room, behind the mirror, the centered same word and sentence appear as are shown in the previously described posters. Both are in the same color and font styles: “You see what it wants you to see,” followed by “OCULUS.” This poster seems to allude to Lewis Carroll's novel, Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There, thus casting Kaylie in a role similar to that of Alice, who enters Wonderland through an enchanted mirror.

In the fourth poster, Kaylie, age 23, stands in a room with a bare wooden floor. Her neatly combed hair is in a ponytail, and she wears a patterned dress. (She is shown from behind, down to her shoulder blades.) The mirror, in its ornate, but grotesque, gray metal frame, stands against the far wall. Although Kaylie gazes into it, the glass reflects someone else: a cadaverous, dark-haired girl with a ghostly pale complexion. She wears a white dress. Her left arm is at her side, its palm facing forward. Blood wreaths her neck, stains the bottom front of her dress, and is smeared across the palm of her hand. Across Kaylie's back, in white capital letters, “OCULUS” appears. Below it, also in capital letters, but in a smaller, yellow font, is the phrase, “IL RIFLESSO DEL MALE” (“THE REFLECTION OF EVIL”). If the mirror lets Kaylie see what it wants her to see and reflects evil, the implication appears to be that, in viewing herself, Kaylie sees the evil within herself. Is the image in the looking-glass a sort of portrait of Dorian Gray, then, an image of herself that decays as a result of the evil deeds she commits while Kaylie herself remains young, healthy, and beautiful?

The allusions to Alice and to Dorian Gray complexify and enrich the possible meanings of the posters, as does their apparent reference to Nietzsche's metaphor of the abyss. The movie's plot, of course, will suggest whether and to what extent any of these possibilities may apply to interpreting the theme of the film.

After Alan Russell, his wife Marie, and their children Tim and Kaylie move into a new house, Alan buys an antique mirror for his office. Shortly thereafter, he sees his body decaying, and he begins to have an affair with Marisol, a female ghost or incubus who has mirrors in lieu of eyes.

Gradually, he and Marie go mad. Marie withdraws, as she becomes paranoid. The family's dog vanishes. Kaylie, seeing her father with Marisol, tells her mother, and Marie and Alan argue. When Marie tries to kill their children, Alan locks her up. The food supply dwindles, and Kaylie, seeking help from her mother, finds Marie chained to a wall inside the house.

Tim seeks help from the neighbors, who refuse to assist him, believing he's making up a story about his parents. Kaylie's telephone calls are answered by the same masculine voice.

Alan frees Marie, and they attack the children. Alan kills Marie when she has a lucid moment. Aware that the mirror is the source of their parents' madness, Tim and Kaylie attempt to smash it, but hit the wall, thinking they are hitting the mirror. Like their parents' behavior, theirs, too, is controlled by the mirror.

During a rational moment, Alan tells his children to flee the house, before forcing Tim to shoot him, However, their escape is cut off by ghosts. Police arrest Tim, who sees his parents' ghosts watching him as he is escorted from the house.

After eleven years, Tim is released from the mental hospital in which he has been confined after “murdering” his father, no longer believing supernatural powers were associated with his parents' deaths. Kaylie, who works for an auction house, researches the antique mirror her father bought. Allowed to take the mirror home, she keeps it in a room in which it is monitored by surveillance cameras, an anchor suspended from the ceiling ready to smash the looking-glass at the flip of a switch. Before destroying the mirror, she plans to obtain evidence that it was responsible for Alan's death.

The siblings argue about Kaylie's plans. When plants begin to wither, they check the surveillance cameras' footage and discover they have performed deeds of which they have no awareness. Tim is now a believer in the mirror's supernatural powers, but the children's escape attempt is frustrated by the mirror's influence. Kaylie stabs an apparition of her mother in the neck, only to realize she has wounded her fiance. Attempting to telephone the police, she reaches the same mysterious masculine voice that answered her telephone when she was twelve years old. When Tim switches on the anchor, it strikes Kaylie, killing her. Tim is arrested and, once again, blames the mirror for his actions. As he is led away, he sees his sister's ghost standing with the spirits of his parents. The mirror has claimed another victim.

The authorities blame Tim for the deaths of Alan and Kaylie, but Tim blames the mirror. How should the series of fantastic incidents that occur in their new house be interpreted? According to Tzvetan Todorov's The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Litearry Genre, the fantastic either remains fantastic—essentially, inexplicable—or is resolved as uncanny (natural, if unusual, and explicable in terms of scientific knowledge) or as marvelous (paranormal or supernatural in origin). Is Oculus fantastic, uncanny, or marvelous? The authorities view the events as uncanny; they are bizarre, but they are explicable; psychiatrists can explain them as effects of Tim's psychosis, which produced hallucinations. Tim, like Kaylie, believe the incidents that happened inside their new house were marvelous, having been caused by the mirror's supernatural powers. Depending upon one's belief system, either interpretation is possible within the framework of the movie's plot.

Let's examine the film's incidents from the stance that they are the results of madness, which means that not only Tim, but also Kaylie, Marie, and Alan were psychotic (and probably paranoid); they all hallucinated, seeing and hearing things that were present only in their own minds. Everything they believed actually happened occurred only in their own minds. As the text in one of the movie posters suggests, the mirror was not evil; it was merely a mirror. It did nothing more than exhibit a “REFLECTION OF EVIL.” The images it displayed were images of madness, of psychosis and paranoia. The mirror was, in Nietzsche's terms, an abyss. In gazing too long into this abyss, it also gazed into them.

What is the nature of the abyss? The answer to this question depends on who one asks, but it might represent, among other possibilities, despair (“the sickness unto death,” as Soren Kierkegaard calls it), death, existential meaninglessness, or absurdity; the inability to sustain a definite self; or a feeling of psychological impotence. But the abyss, in Nietzsche's formulation of the abysmal, is related to monsters: “Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into the abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.” This association between the monstrous and the abysmal raises the question, what is the monstrous or, more specifically, what is a monster?

Historically, a monster was an omen created by God to warn of his impending wrath against sinful conduct. However, in more recent times, the monstrous has come to have psychological, rather than theological, significance. Today, many say people contend against personal or inner “demons,” metaphors for the inner conflicts that result from unresolved emotions.

It is by fixating, or becoming obsessed with, such feelings that one allows the “abyss” to gaze into oneself. People obsessed with vengeance may commit acts of vengeance; those fixated upon self-pity may become clinically depressed; people who dwell on fear may become paranoid; a person who ponders irrational behavior may become insane. An obsession with a particular type of abnormal behavior can not only cause such a behavior in oneself but intensify it, causing it to become extreme.

What monsters do the characters in Oculus see and hear? Their adversaries suggest whom they view as threats, as “monsters.”

Alan sees himself as being in a state of decadence; he sees his body as decaying. The body's physicality suggests he sees his flesh as the source of his decadence, a possibility borne out by his affair with the ghost or incubus Marisol. His personal demon is his emotional unfaithfulness toward his wife. His lack if fidelity causes him to view Marie as an enemy, rather than his spouse; he sees her as a monster whose relationship to him is emotionally unsatisfying.

Perhaps he feels trapped in his marriage. His purchase of an antique mirror suggests he is seeking self-awareness associated with his past. What has led to the emotional distance he feels between Marie and himself? Whatever he sees in Marisol is his own image of her; she has no eyes, no mirrors to a soul, because she has no soul. She doesn't exist, except as a delusion he has created out of his need for an emotionally fulfilling relationship. The mirrors of her “eyes” reflect only his own ideas about women, his own fantasies about what a woman should be and how she should behave.

Not surprisingly, her husband's own emotional distance makes Marie withdraw, and, afraid that her relationship with Alan is disintegrating, she becomes paranoid. She appears to blame her children for her failing marriage, because it is at them that she directs her rage. She argues with Alan, but she never attempts to harm him physically; instead, she tries to murder Tim and Kaylie. Consequently, Alan chains her to a wall—but is fettering her intended solely to protect his children or does chaining her also ensure that the distance between them is certain, affording him more time to fantasize about Marisol?

It's interesting that the Russell family's neighbors do not believe Tim's wild tale of his parents' insanity, nor so the authorities. Like the psychiatrist who treats Tim after his arrest for his father's murder, the neighbors may think Tim's ravings the products of insanity.

Was Tim's murder of his father an attempt to protect his mother from Alan? His parents argued. His father's emotional detachment from Marie obviously disturbed her greatly. She'd become withdrawn and paranoid. Finally, she'd snapped, attempting to kill her own children, and Alan had responded not by getting her the help she obviously needed, but by chaining her to a wall. In Freudian terms, the Oedipus complex may have had much to do with Tim's “accidental” killing of his father. The boy might also have been motivated by his concern for his and his sister's safety. If Alan treated their mother in such a manner, he might well treat them in the same way. 

 

Kaylie seems to have a problematic view of men, perhaps as a result of her father's treatment of her mother. They are distant emotionally, and her father seems to be emotionally unfaithful to Marie, an insight on Kaylie's part that causes her to imagine that her father is actually having an affair with Marisol and report this act of infidelity to her mother. When she calls for help, the same masculine voice always answers—her animus, Carl Jung might suggest—but no help is dispatched.

Men are not rescuers. They are more likely to be monsters than knights in white armor. Later, mistaking her fiance for an apparition of her mother, Kaylie will stab him. Does she fear that the example of her mother's withdrawal and paranoia concerning her father will also destroy her relationship with her fiance or does she fear her fiance will be distant and emotionally unfaithful to her, as Alan also been to Marie? In her mind, it seems clear, the guilt of her parents is interchangeable; they are both dangerous monsters.

During the movie, the characters have rare, brief moments of lucidity. During one such moment, Tim and Kaylie realize that their own twisted perceptions of others is causing psychological, interpersonal, and even physical mayhem. They attempt to break the mirror, that is, to escape the lens through which they view the other members of their family. However, their attempt to break through the filters they have created is inept, even absurd, and they remain captives of their own skewed perceptions and interpretations of events.

Eleven years later, Tim is believed to be well again and is released from the mental hospital. However, Kaylie is still deluded, believing the mirror has supernatural powers. The siblings argue, and Tim, whose madness seems only to have been dormant, again comes under the sway of his psychosis, as he and his sister imagine the houseplants are withering. Checking surveillance camera footage, they discover they've performed acts they cannot recall having done and blame their fugue states on the mirror.

Kaylie tries the same pitiful defense mechanism she employed eleven years ago. She telephones for help, but reaches the same mysterious masculine voice that answered her telephone when she was twelve years old. Instead of seeking help from the neighbors, Tim switches on the anchor suspended from the ceiling, but it strikes Kaylie, killing her.

Arrested, he blames the mirror for his actions, just as he'd done eleven years ago. As he is led away by the police, he sees his sister's ghost standing with the spirits of his parents. In his mind, the mirror has claimed another victim—the sister he himself killed, even as he had killed his father, who'd killed his mother. Truly, the mirror has been a “REFLECTION OF EVIL,” the evil of the family's own personal demons.

Although the idea that all the members of a family might go mad at the same time, their delusions, hallucinations, and behaviors reinforcing, sometimes complementing, and interacting with one another, is far-fetched, to say the least, such is horror fiction, a melodramatic genre that is, by both definition and convention, over the top. For those like me who are skeptical of psychoanalytical claims (and of psychoanalysis itself), Freudian and Jungian interpretations of human behavior, as represented in Oculus by the actions of the characters, are likely to seem too neat and tidy and too over the top to be satisfying.

For us, there are other possible explanations, some of which, as we've suggested, are despair (“the sickness unto death,” as Soren Kierkegaard calls it), death, existential meaninglessness, or absurdity; the inability to sustain a definite self; or a feeling of psychological impotence. There are also artistic possibilities for interpreting the meaning of the abyss. While Jean-Paul Sartre maintains that “hell is other people,” the director of Oculus might amend the philosopher's premise to suggest, as Tennessee Williams, who warned against looking in mirrors, put it, “Hell is yourself.”

Characterization via Tarot

Copyright 2010 by Gary L. Pullman

Using the Tarot deck as a shorthand system for establishing the bases of characters can be as effective as any other approach. Whether the mysticism behind the Tarot deck or the Jungian brand of psychoanalysis, which shares some of the same notions concerning human nature and the human condition as the Tarot tradition proposes, is true or even valid is debatable at best. However, fiction, by definition, is itself not true; it needs only to be true to life, or believable, and whatever approach to personality and human behavior appears plausible is likely to be acceptable to most readers. Psychology, after all, is an inexact science, with many schools of thought concerning why people behave as they do, and fiction has always been pragmatic in electing to use whatever theory, of psychology or any other discipline, might promote its own literary aims. Before psychology existed as a study, writers referenced the theory of the four humors to explain human conduct, and some students of human behavior refer, even today, to the ideas of both Sigmund Freud and Carl Gustav Jung. Horror writers need be no different than other writers.

So, what can horror writers gain from Tarot? The positive aspects of the cards (especially those of the major arcana) provide traits useful for characterizing the good guys and gals of your narrative, while these qualities, reversed (opposed or blocked), suggest possibilities for the characterization of the bad guys and gals.

I won’t go through all 21 of the major arcana cards. Information about them is readily available. To illustrate my point, I will suggest how three of these cards could be employed to create protagonists, antagonists, and other sympathetic or unsympathetic characters.

In most stories, the protagonist is apt to be an embodiment of the Fool, who seeks a new start, embracing life’s possibilities as he (or she) embarks upon a journey, actual or figurative, sometimes without planning all that well, if at all, for the eventualities that are likely to be encountered. The Fool has a profound, albeit perhaps rather naïve, faith in the notion that he’ll be able to get by, that his needs will be fulfilled, that he will be all right regardless of how much he plans, works, or strives. In fact (especially in a horror story), he may not be, of course, and his shortsightedness and spontaneity might help to bring him to misfortune.

Reversed, the Fool is apt either to have trouble getting started upon his adventure (that is, he may suffer from the failure to launch syndrome), or he might get stuck in his ways, failing to find the inspiration that motivates him to continue the adventure he’s undertaken.

When you think about the Fool, chances are you will recall having read about him in a horror novel or seen him in a film of this genre. Gordie LaChance and his buddies, Chris Chambers, Teddy Duchamp, and Vern Tessio, the boys in Stephen King’s The Body (and the movie, Stand By Me, based upon it), come to mind.



The Sun character is the successful, triumphant man or woman who, having discovered a great truth (or maybe several great truths) about life enjoys pleasure and fulfillment. He or she enjoys his or her day in the sun.

According to Jung, the Devil archetype represents the repression of desires, impulses, and other aspects of one’s unconscious that are condemned by society.

Opposed. This character is subject to emotion and superstition and is apt to reason falsely, taking evidence out of context or reaching warped or twisted conclusions about the facts before him or her.

Blocked, the Sun character suffers from confusion, perceiving things as through a glass darkly, and he or she may have trouble interacting with youngsters.

When you think about the Sun, chances are you will recall having read about him in a horror novel or seen him in a film of this genre. Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Willow Rosenberg is an example, as is Smallville’s Lex Luthor.




The Devil card does not refer to Satan or a lesser demon. Rather, this card alludes to unbridled ambition and a lust for power. He or she can be authoritative, powerful, even manipulative and controlling.

Opposed, the Devil character can succumb to temptation.

Blocked, this character is repressed and timid in the face of risk and unwilling to take chances.

When you think about the Devil, chances are you will recall having read about him in a horror novel or seen him in a film of this genre. Victor Frankenstein and Dr. Moreau are examples.

A Dictionary of the Paranormal, the Supernatural, and the Otherworldly (J - L)

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

Note: Unless otherwise noted, definitions are courtesy of dictionary.die.net, an Internet dictionary in the public domain.

J

Joan of Arc (or, possibly, Leelee Sobrieski)

Joan of Arc--a Roman Catholic saint, formerly burned by the church as a heretic, who successfully led the French army against the English invaders and the Burgundian rebels to enthrone King Charles IV (the author).

Juggernaut--originally, an embodiment of the Hindu god Vishnu; now, any unstoppable force (the author).

Jung, Carl--a psychoanalyst and a one-time follower of Sigmund Freud; Jung developed the theory of a racial, or “collective unconscious” in which archetypes are stored (the author).

K

Kabbalah--A body of mystical teachings of rabbinical origin, often based on an esoteric interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures (American Heritage Dictionary).

Karma--in Hinduism and Buddhism, Hinduism and Buddhism, the effects of a person's actions that determine his destiny in his next incarnation.

Ketamine

Ketamine anesthetic--a dissociative anesthetic that may cause so-called near-death experiences (the author).

King, Stephen--a contemporary best-selling author of short stories, novels, and screenplays in the horror genre. He has also written non-fiction articles and books.

Kirlian photography--the photographing of objects which exhibit a halo, or aura, effect as a result of the images created on a photographic plate due to high-voltage electric fields, pressures, moisture, and other natural conditions (the author; The Skeptic’s Dictionary).

L

Lamarckian evolution--“A theory of biological evolution holding that species evolve by the inheritance of traits acquired or modified through the use or disuse of body parts” (“Lamarckism: Definition and Much More from Answers.com”).

Lamia--a monster capable of assuming a woman's form, who was said to devour human beings or suck their blood; a vampire; a sorceress; a witch.

Ley lines--“alignments of a number of places of geography interest, such as ancient megaliths” (Wikipedia).

Lie detector--a device that, by monitoring various physiological processes and conditions, such as blood pressure, heart rate, and muscle contractions, is said to be able to detect whether a person is telling the truth or lying; its results are not admissible as evidence in court proceedings and are controversial among scientists and other experts (the author).

Life after death (afterlife)--existence is some state that extends beyond the death of the physical body, as is a matter of faith in many religions (the author).

Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln, Abraham--16th president of the United States, whose term occurred during the American Civil War; Lincoln had a prophetic dream in which he foresaw his assassination, which followed several days later (the author)

Loch Ness monster--a sea-serpent-like animal, perhaps a plesiosaur, said to inhabit Scotland’s Loch Ness (the author).

Logical positivism--“a 20th century philosophical movement that holds characteristically that all meaningful statements are either analytic or conclusively verifiable or at least confirmable by observation and experiment and that metaphysical theories are therefore strictly meaningless —called also logical empiricism” (Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary).

Lucid dreaming--a dream during which the dreamer recognizes that he or she is asleep and dreaming and in which he or she may consciously interact with the dream images (the author).

Lycanthropy--in folklore, the magical ability of a person to assume the characteristics of a wolf; in medicine, a kind of erratic melancholy, in which the patient imagines himself a wolf, and imitates the actions of that animal.

Fear: A Cultural History: A Partial Review and Summary, Part 2

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

In Fear: A Cultural History, Joanna Bourke summarizes emotionology, or the study of human emotions, which “aims to show how emotions were classified and recognized within particular cultures,” summarizing various psychological theories as to what constitutes an emotion and as to what circumstances are involved in the production of the passions. For Knight Dunlap, of Johns Hopkins University, she says, emotions are specific responses that people make to situations. One may fear or be angry with someone else who threatens him or her, depending upon whether the threatened person perceives the other person as having “greater power.” According to Bourke, the fact, Dunlap contends, that a person can respond emotionally in two or more ways shows that the emotions are responses to situations, not “psychological entities” with “unique affective processes.” Instead, Bourke, stating Dunlap’s case for him, emotions are to be regarded as “nothing more than teleological constructs.”

The definition of any particular emotion, such as fear, depends not only upon “the situation in which the emotion appears,” Dunlap argues, but also upon “the psychological and philosophical theory of the commentator.” A case in point is that of a boy given to tantrums:

In their history of anger, Carol and Peter Stearns. . . observed that ‘a tantrum in a society that has nor word for the phenomenon is a different experience for both parent and child than is a tantrum that is labeled, and labeled with a judgmental connotation.’ As the words changed, so too did the meaning of the emotion within a particular culture.

Her chapter on “Nightmares” reviews, in summary fashion, how this phenomenon has been considered through history. First, nightmares were regarded as “communication with the ‘other world.’”

Later, they were understood as being effects of bodily states and processes. (Remember Ebenezer Scrooge’s explanation of the cause of his nightmarish visits by ghosts as resulting from a bit of undigested potato?)

Subsequently, evolutionary psychologists believed that the past is to blame for “all kinds of fear, including those inspired by. . . nightmares.” One of their number, G. Stanley Hall, thought that the history of the human race is “recapitulated” in every infant. Emotions have survival value; therefore, through evolution, they were retained”: “fear of eyes dated from the time when human ancestors competed for survival with other large-eyed animals,” Hall declares.

Psychoanalysis regarded nightmares as “latent content” that, in a relaxed state, during sleep, the ego allowed to go unrepressed, and it surfaced, as it were, from the unconscious mind, albeit in a disguised state. What the dreamer recalled upon awakening was the dream’s “manifest content.” The purpose of dreams was to express concealed wishes, and, once their manifest content was identified, with the help of a competent psychoanalyst, Freud claimed, “the disguised fulfillment of wishes would become obvious.” For Carl Jung, a one-time follower of Freud, dreams, including nightmares, “contain images and symbols shared by all humanity,” Bourke reminds her readers, arising from the “collective unconscious” that the members of the human species shared with one another, a product (somehow) of evolution and genetics.

William H. R. Rivers, an anthropologist and psychologist, working with victims of “shell shock,” or, as it is known today, post-traumatic stress syndrome, realized that his patients did not wish to relive the terrors they’d faced upon the battlefield and that, consequently, their “nightmares could not be reconciled,” as Bourke observes, “with Freud’s assertion that dreams were a form of wish-fulfillment.” Instead, she tells her readers, Rivers “maintained that the dream was ‘the attempted solution of a conflict’” that plagued the patient’s waking life.

Nathaniel Kleitman’s research suggests that dreams are more likely to be physiological processes than mental activities. A physiologist himself, Kleitman identified four stages of sleep, three of which are characterized by what he calls “non-rapid eye movement,” or NREM, and one of which features “rapid eye movement,” or REM. On the average, a person “experienced four or five REM periods during a sleep of six to eight hours,” during which periods they have dreams, including nightmares. However, more disturbing dreams that mere nightmares, called “terror dreams” or “an incubus attack” (now generally known as “night terrors”) occur “in Stages 3 and 4, before the REM period.” Kleitman’s research has had a profound impact upon the understanding of dreams, as Bourke points out:

. . . Fundamentally, dreams, nightmares and terror dreams were stripped of significant ‘meaning.’ For some neuroscientists dreams and nightmares were a way the brain rid itself of unimportant information. Dreams stopped the brain from becoming overloaded. We dream in order to forget. Others regarded dream images as the result of random bursts from nerve cells in the brainstem during REM sleep: they were simply the brain’s attempt to make sense of stray signals generated by the lower brain.

The upshot of emotionology?

. . . the natural and social sciences were informed by extremely different, even contradictory theories about the nature of emotions such as fear. . . . Clearly the answer to the question: ‘What is fear?’ depends as much upon the psychological and philosophical theory of the commentator as it does on the situation in which the emotion emerges.

For those who are not well informed about the alleged nature and significance of dreams, especially nightmares, Bourke’s review of the psychological and philosophical theories is both amusing and enlightening, although there is nothing new here for those who are already familiar with this material. Nevertheless, Bourke’s review is a remedy for those who, devoid of critical thinking abilities, fall prey to psychobabble by those whose own views are by no means certain foundations for psychological inquiry, analysis, or therapy. If dreams are nothing more than instances of what might be called the brain’s indigestion of neural signals (perhaps Scrooge was closer to the truth than Freud), one can toss out one’s dream dictionaries and any theories, such as those of Freud and Jung, upon which the use of such alleged reference works are based. To paraphrase William Shakespeare, the cause of our dreams is in our bodies, not in our minds.

On that note, we will pause, taking up Bourke’s survey of the subject of fear again in future posts.

Everyday Horrors: Crawlspaces

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

Not every house has one, but, for those that do, the crawlspace can be a source of anxiety, or even fear. In some cases, it may be a font of pure, unadulterated terror. Not quite a basement--in fact, not really even part of the house--the crawlspace, as its name implies, makes one crawl, belly down, and vulnerable, in a close, confined space. Already, just thinking about such a situation, causes the hackles to rise. Maybe it’s not necessary, one thinks, to thaw the frozen water pipe under the house or to investigate the strange scratching, clawing sound that seems, when one is seated in the cozy comfort of one’s well-lighted living room, to come from down there.

One of the most frightening aspects of the crawlspace has already been cited--it requires that one crawl, belly down, vulnerable, in a close, confined space in which standing or, in many cases, even sitting, is impossible. The crawlspace is dimly lit, too, by only the flashlight that one has in hand (or mouth), and, dropped--or, perhaps, snatched away--the bulb could shatter, leaving one in utter darkness, with over a ton of house above one, the residence become, perhaps, a tomb. Another disturbing aspect of the crawlspace is that, often, it offers only one way out--the small square or rectangular opening through which one entered. To escape, should escape become necessary, one would have to go back the way that he or she came--and what if the thing--the animal or creature, or monster--is behind one? It’s a safe bet, in a horror story, at least, that whatever’s in the crawlspace with the character will be not only far stronger than he or she, but also much nimbler and sprier. It will be able to dash and dart around inside the narrow space, so that, regardless of the direction a retreating homeowner (or maintenance worker) takes, the thing would already be there, cutting off the escape route.

And, as TV game show barkers are fond of barking, “That’s not all!” Like the basement, the crawlspace has cthuluian associations. Psychologically, it is connected to the Freudian id or the Jungian unconscious, individual and, possibly, collective. In the depths of this underground world, so to speak, there be monsters--the uncivilized, impulses of our animal ancestry, bestial and untamed--and dead bodies--the dark, sometimes sinister thoughts, desires, emotions, temptations, and experiences we have rejected and “buried,” more or less alive and kicking. And, as Xander Harris tells Buffy Summers, in Buffy the Vampire Slayer's “Dead Man’s Party” episode, one “can’t just bury things,” because “they’ll come right back to get you.”

The ground upon which one lies, the vulnerable belly exposed to whatever may lie beneath, is a thin skin between the everyday world of the normal and the ordinary, governed by conscience, reason, cultural traditions, laws, and social mores and a hidden, subterranean world of the unknown, the untamed, the uncivilized, and the alien, where anything may lie in wait, albeit, whatever form the buried bodies take, they will almost certainly be hideous, repulsive, and hostile rather than beautiful, attractive, and friendly. At any moment, whatever lurks below may penetrate this thin layer between sanity and madness, reason and absurdity, love and fear, hope and despair. Cut off from family, friends, and society, one is trapped, alone in the dark, in the confines of a space as close and inescapable as the grave. It would be ironic for a residence to be transformed into a tomb, but fate loves irony, and this same transformation has occurred not merely once, but several times.

The lowly crawlspace (sorry, but I couldn’t resist!) has appeared, as a major player, in several movies (and in one of my own short stories). One such film is Crawlspace, which was released in 1986. The Internet Movie Database (IMDb) offers a succinct summary of the plot: “A man who runs an apartment house for women is the demented son of a Nazi surgeon who has the house equipped with secret passageways, hidden rooms and torture and murder devices.”

A crawlspace also played a significant role in another movie of the same title, released in 1972. In this one, a homeless youth takes up residence in the crawlspace of a lonely, childless couple who befriended him. When he makes enemies by destroying a store, local residents avenge themselves upon the disturbed youth and the parents whom he’s adopted.

In yet another Crawlspace movie, released in 2000 as part of Pendulum Pictures’ Mental Maniacs DVD set, a sadistic kidnapper, wearing what might be a mask of human flesh, torments first one, and then another, man whom he traps in the crawlspace beneath his house. The second is Mike, who awakens “to find that he is trapped with no way out. A 'phone rings and the games begin. The captor calls himself ‘The Director’ and he claims to be directing a reality show in which Mike's life is at stake. If Mike is alive after three days of mayhem, he will be set free.”

In the horror films to date, crawlspaces have been interpreted primarily as metaphors for helplessness and have been subsumed under the labels of the slasher film, in which a crazed serial killer stalks and slashes nubile teens, and the splatter film, which focuses upon blood, guts, and gore, both of which are sometimes called “torture porn” by critics who find little, if any, socially redeeming value in their exploitation of bloodlust and its effects. The most disturbing aspect of the crawlspace, however--and the one that qualifies it for inclusion as an “Everyday Horror”--is the simple fact that many houses--perhaps yours--feature one of these twilight zones in which the near and dear connect with the distant and the feared.


“Everyday Horrors: Crawlspaces” is part of a series of “everyday horrors” that will be featured on Chillers and Thrillers: The Fiction of Fear. These “everyday horrors” continue, in many cases, to appear in horror fiction, literary, cinematographic, and otherwise.

Inner Demons

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman

 

To be alone is to be alone with one’s inner demons, with what plagues or haunts oneself. Perhaps a person doesn’t even know that he or she is possessed, as it were, by an inner demon of some sort (but, most likely, this individual’s friends, if he or she has any, will know).

 

For most people, the phrase “inner demons” refers to emotional obsessions or semi-conscious impulses, such as rage or a tendency toward alcoholism or some other sort of addiction. According to psychoanalyst Carl Jung, these inner demons are aspects of the shadow archetype. The shadow consists of those aspects of the self that one denies and represses. A good example of this archetype is the rogue slayer Faith, a character who appears in the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Faith is Buffy’s shadow--the aspects of herself that she denies expression and the temptations she faces in repressing the impulses to behave according to the desires of these potential selves. Dutiful and responsible, Buffy longs for the carefree (or seemingly carefree) lifestyle that the footloose, if irresponsible, Faith projects. Unhindered by the concerns for morality, Faith has a simple philosophy, which she expresses in bold, if amusing, proverbs and slogans of her own devise. Concerning sex, for example, Faith says, “Get some; get gone.” Her use of Xander Harris as a “sex toy” shows that she is serious about the implications of this statement, that it is a principle by which she actually does operate. Her superhuman powers makes her above the law, Faith tells Buffy, just as Buffy’s own superhuman powers as a fellow slayer make Buffy above the law. They are laws unto themselves, Faith argues. Faith and Buffy, as Nietzschean supermen, as it were, are not bound by the traditional expectations and requirements of the herd. Buffy and Faith are wolves. Although Buffy ultimately rejects Faith’s views, she is tempted to live according to Faith’s philosophy, which seems to follow the dictum laid out by Aleister Crowley: “Do as thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.” In an episode of the series, Faith, stealing from a store, gives Buffy a shopping hint: “Want. Take. Have.” Crashing a hand through a display case, Buffy retrieves an item of merchandise--a crossbow. “Want. Take Have. I think I’m getting it,” she says, smiling as she echoes Faith’s philosophy. As Buffy’s shadow, Faith is a foil to Buffy--a character who, by demonstrating traits opposite to those of the main character, highlights the protagonist’s characteristics. Faith’s amoral nature and her willingness to live as she pleases, even if her irresponsible behavior results in tragedies for others, contrasts sharply with Buffy’s sense of duty and need to take responsibility for herself and others, even at the cost of her own life, if need be. Joss Whedon, the series’ creator, and the others on his writing team were adroit in the use of both character types, such as the foil, and archetypes, such as the shadow, and their use of these types of characters and archetypes adds a dimension of depth to a show that, otherwise, would have been nothing beyond the ordinary fare offered by weekly television series. To view a character’s inner demons, make a two-column chart. In the left column, list the character’s expressed traits (the ones that make up his or her personality as it is known to him or her and to others). In the second column, list the opposites of these traits; these will be the repressed traits that, together, make up the character’s shadow. (A thesaurus is a useful tool in ascertaining opposites traits, because it will list antonyms as well as synonyms.) Here’s an example, based upon the character of Buffy Summers: 

 

EXPRESSED TRAITS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . REPRESSED TRAITS (Buffy, as Persona).

 

(Faith, as Shadow) Dutiful . . . . . . . . . . . . . Rebellious Responsible . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Irresponsible Careful. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Negligent Humorous. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Snide Altruistic. . . . . . . . .  . . . . . . . . . . . . . Selfish Heroic*

Anti-heroic* *See "Beowulf as the Prototypical Monster Killer" 

 

The list could be extended, but you get the point. (By the way, it’s important to notice that the traits of the character that represents the persona, or public self [Buffy, in this case], and the traits of its shadow, the repressed self [Faith, in this case], need not be mutually exclusive. The characters can share some attributes. For example, both Buffy and Faith are strong, agile, skilled at combat, courageous, witty, popular, and attractive. It’s important to observe that the shadow’s shadow, so to speak, will be the character whose traits contrast his or her own--for example, just as Faith is Buffy’s shadow, Buffy is Faith’s shadow. In the story, however, the viewer or the reader will not be likely to consider the protagonist’s being the shadow of the lesser character, the foil.) 

 

By employing archetypes and stock characters in a similar way, you can add depth (and interest), to say nothing of drama, to your horror story, just as Whedon and his show’s fellow writers did with Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

This technique is not limited to the psychological level. As we shall see in a later post, it can be employed on the social level as well