Horror movies and space/place.

To understand this article it is of the utmost importance that you’ve seen both Halloween (1978) and The Shining (1980). Otherwise it’ll probably won’t make much sense. Also, this automatically labels this article as a bit of a spoiler for those movies.

I want to write a bit about the usage of ‘space’ and ‘place’ in horror movies. Horror movies are the underdog of the movie industry. We all love them (to some extent) but when we are asked to name a favorite movie the likes of the Exorcist never comes up. It’s always the Shawshank redemption (even though this movie borrows heavily of classic horror movies).

So, right here, right now I want to explain how horror movies use the elements of ‘space’ and ‘place’ to manipulate the audience. But before I do that I have to explain the difference between the two.

Space and place

What’s the difference I use here for space and place? Space is the room you are in. Place is the spot you are inside this room. So, as an example, I’m currently in a coffee shop in Los Angeles (space) and I’m sitting at the left window, second from the door (place).

How do horror movies fit into this? Simple; I argue (and many with me) that the space/place is essential to a good horror movie.

Imagine a slasher movie: the killer is hunting the main girl. There is nobody to help her. She’s locked in a certain space.

The girl is running from the killer and suddenly finds herself in a room full of guns and knives. She’s ready to fight back. She finds herself in a certain place.

The Hitchcockian twist

But none of this is very satisfactory if you don’t incorporate the great director Hitchcock’s sense of suspense.

Suspense, according to Hitchcock, relies heavily on the knowledge of the audience. So the weapon room, in this example, has to be shown to the audience beforehand. Otherwise it would come ‘out of the blue’ and that could harm the movie.

It would be like the killer hunting the girl and she ‘happens’ upon invincible super armor and an infinite shotgun: Bye-Bye-killer.

So this is something to keep in mind when dealing with space and place. If the space is abandoned, the audience needs to know it’s abandoned. If there is, for example, a hiding place somewhere; the audience needs to know or expect this.

Space in a horror movie

So it’s important to know the spaces in a horror movie. These spaces could be a school, a house, a little league field. Anything goes. Places, in this sense, are the lockers in the little league dressing room, the cupboard in the house or the toilets in the school: parts of the whole.

So to take a horror movie-genre trope: the haunted house. In all kinds of horror movies these are houses that are meant to be lived in, yet, nobody’s there. The Shining, House on Haunted Hill, the Haunting, The Others; all big houses and only a handful of people are there.

This unsettles the audience.

Another great trope is the graveyard.  This is a place where we –in real life- don’t usually go because there aren’t a lot of people there and, moreover, the people there aren’t in the mood for talking.

So place, in this sense, is finding a spot on the world map where there are very few people. So, nowadays, we’ve got horror movies in ancient temples, spaceships, at the bottom of the sea, haunted houses, graveyards, off the map places (rural) and whatnot.

Basically, when places are concerned, a horror movie looks for a spot where not a lot of people are present or (when looking a 100 feet) allowed.

Place in a horror movie

Places then are far more interesting.

Sure, the girl can find herself in a graveyard chased by zombies (spaces) and hide inside a small crypt (place). But that’s using the place (graveyard) as the main motive.

If you turn it around and make the place the main motive? Then the space can be anything!

Take Halloween for instance.

This movie takes place in one of the safest spaces in America: the suburbs.

All neat and tidy houses with a freshly cut lawn and fresh paint. Each and every person who lives there has a steady job and is intelligent enough to keep their income.

By introducing a danger into this environment the focus of the movie immediately shifts to spaces. Where can Jamie Lee hide?

Jamie Lee Curtis runs away from her brother Michael Myers in her safe environment. She hides in a room she considers safe. Yet, he finds her. She hides in a smaller room she considers safe. Yet, he finds her. She hides in a closet –holding her legs like a fetus, being as small as she can be. Yet, he finds her. But this time (because she can’t hide any smaller) she fights back.

There is a reason why Halloween shows all those empty rooms at the end of the movie: it underlines the ‘rape’ (for want of a better word) of the safe environment. A safe environment that grew smaller and smaller with each passing minute.

Place + space in a horror movie

Then there’s the combination of space and place.

Take Stanley Kubrick The Shining for instance:

This movie is known for its unreliable placing. For instance, Ullman’s office is in the middle of the hotel –yet it has a window looking out. Danny is riding his tricycle around the hall and after three corners he should be outside the walls and yet he is still in the hotel. The placing (blueprint) of the Overlook Hotel doesn’t make any sense.

This could be intentional or unintentional –nobody really knows.

  I wouldn’t call this Stephen King’s The Shining. Not because King hates the movie. But mainly because Kubrick changed so many things (plus he pictured it) that it really is his signature on the movie –not King’s novella.

What we do know is that The Shining takes place at a scary ‘space’ – a haunted hotel with very few people inside it. Now, considering that the places are unreliable (intentional or not). And the fact that, for the main characters, the places become smaller and smaller (a freezer for Jack, a cupboard for Danny). It is no wonder that The Shining is heralded as one of the best horror movies of all time. It uses the best elements from both space (a haunted spot on the world map with few people in it) and place (destroying the safe environment by shrinking it) to the utmost effect.

Conclusion

What I wanted to try with this little article is for readers to forget all about the blood and gore in a standard horror movie. Horror isn’t about blood, never has been. Horror is about inducing fear into the viewer. One of the best ways of doing this is by taking away that which is reliable. So a house becomes dangerous if it is haunted (space) and more so if it shrinks your safe havens (place). In the end horror has every intention of making you feel uncomfortable and the first trick in the book is to make that what you know scary.