Matrix #83: Terror!

Turn it off!

“I just don’t understand you,” Joe said to me after we’d turned Blindness off after our second attempt at watching it. “It’s so random,” he says, “why you can watch one thing and not another. You can watch corpses and blood and dead bodies but not this?”

It certainly might seem random, as I’m not always able to articulate the reasons why I don’t want to watch a particular film. But there are certain traits that these movies share. That was when I first conceived of the Matrix Movie List of Terror: movies that I’m too terrified to watch, that I dare not watch, that I will not subject myself to. I mean, what is the whole point of wanting to be terrorized by a movie? I just don’t get it.

Horror films are most obviously associated with terror, and what distinguishes the two terms seems almost ephemeral. There is extreme anxiety in both, sure, but horror as a genre encompasses films that are not necessarily terrifying (like those great old Karloff/Legosi silent films). And I’m not one who simply dislikes a genre – I like a good horror film, in fact, the feeling of prickles cold on my neck, hands sweaty. I’m quite fond of many Japanese horror films, for instance. I admire how a really good thrill is constructed through mood and editing, as in Ringu or A Tale of Two Sisters. And we recently watched a Mario Bava masterpiece, Black Sunday, which featured truly horrible scenes such as a woman getting a spiked iron mask nailed onto her face. Aghhhhhhh!

Most of these films are so over the top that I know they are not real. Camp and comedy are excellent distancing devices, classic techniques that allow the audience to step back from the abyss with relief, knowing that although what they are watching is horrible and terrifying, it’s still just a movie. A good horror makes me laugh as well as squirm, even if I’m just laughing to let off steam.

We’re watching Da Vinci’s Inquest right now, that long-running classic of Canadian television. I’d never seen the show before and was sucked right in. There is a lot of aftermath of violence: murder, suicide, even infant rape in one particularly gruesome episode (I felt it might have gone too far with that one). But it’s all aftermath, and the corpses are simply grisly objects, clues in a puzzle to be solved. We take the same detached tone as the coroner, the pathologists and the murder unit.

So what am I unwilling to watch? What is unbearable?

My List of Terror includes horror movies, thrillers, a movie about terrorism, a religious drama, and some documentaries:

Blindness is the movie version of a book by José Saramago, about a plague of blindness and the rapid decay of societal order that follows. It’s a book that I read and loved, though its subject matter is dark and depressing indeed. But reading is not the same as seeing, and the pleasure of prose, of well-written words and the long followed-through thought on the page provides an aesthetic steam valve. The thought of actually seeing some of those scenes, especially one involving mass rape, was a bit too much to bear. Perhaps I was prejudiced by that thought alone. I wanted to stay open-minded about it, though, and tried to watch the film anyways. It was too clean-looking, with too many stars in it, for one. Too pretty, maybe. But getting to that scene, the men hitting those women in the face in silhouette, that just made me want to turn it off. So we did.

United 93’s tagline: “September 11, 2001. Four planes were hijacked. Three of them reached their target. This is the story of the fourth.” I‘ve heard it is actually a very good film, striking the right tone, no big stars to distract, very measured and respectful. Joe saw it and agrees. I don’t want to see it anyways. I’ve heard about the people on that plane, calling home to say goodbye, and for a moment, I’m with them, calling Joe to say goodbye, and it breaks me down everytime. I can’t bear to be with them for more than that moment, never mind almost two hours.

Polytechnique by Denis Villeneuve is on the list for similar reasons. By all accounts, it is very well-done, and has been compared to another poetic and meditative approach to the subject of a school shooting, Gus Van Sant’s Elephant, which I’ve seen and liked. Why this and not that, indeed? I like Villeneuve’s work, and I’m not against seeing Polytechnique, necessarily, but it seems too close to the bone still, an open wound I’d rather let heal than disturb.

Then there are the horror films. The Amityville Horror I’ve always had a fear of, ever since it came out when I was a kid. I’d been reading ghost stories and movies about hauntings and demons always scared me way more than zombies or ax murderers. Amityville was “a true story.” I was scared shitless of it, and even though I could probably watch it now, I’d just rather not. Same deal with The Exorcist and The Omen – though I think I’ve actually seen The Exorcist but blocked most of it out.

Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer, is supposed to be a very, in fact, too realistic and graphic depiction of a serial killer. Like I need to live that out. No thanks!

Films like Saw and 8MM both seem entirely tasteless to me, morally and aesthetically, particularly 8MM’s use of a snuff film as a plot device.. Maybe if I thought they’d be any good, it might be another story, but I won’t be bothered to find out.

The same can be said for the last two entries, both purportedly documentaries. Executions is a real documentary, Faces of Death part stock footage, part faked. I’m not sure which is worse, but both seem too exploitative for words. I’ve heard arguments about Executions being a great argument against the death penalty, but I don’t know that you need to partake in it to be against it.

And finally, Mel Gibson’s Jesus movie, what was it? Oh yeah, The Passion of the Christ. Two hours of straight sadism and torture. Don’t want to see it, nope. My mother, a devout church lady, saw it with her church, can you imagine? My mother said everybody should see that film to know what Jesus went through for us. I can’t believe her church made her do that! She said she couldn’t sleep for weeks afterwards. But I’m not going to have that problem, because regardless of what my mother says, I’m not going to see it.

I can tell you what each of these movies have in common, besides my unwillingness to put myself through the wringer for the sake of entertainment: It is the portrayal of the prolonged suffering of others, first and foremost. Whether it’s the ultimate in exploitation, or done with the utmost respect, I still have trouble with it. Some might argue that it’s the elements of catharsis, or consciousness-raising, or “looking into the face of the abyss” – that kind of thing, that might justify viewing these films. Okay, maybe. But as Nietschze’s oft-used aphorism (popular especially in horror movies) points out, the abyss looks back… and when you battle monsters, you must take care not to become one yourself.

The Matrix Top Ten Movie List of Terror: movies I’m too terrified to watch!

Blindness (2008) – Fernando Meirelles
United 93 (2006) – Paul Greengrass
Polytechnique (2009) – Denis Villeneuve
Amityville Horror (1979) – Stuart Rosenberg
The Exorcist (1973) – William Friedkin
Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986) – John McNaughton
8 mm (1999) – Joel Schumacher
Faces of Death (1978) – John Alan Schwartz
Executions (1995) – David Herman, Arun Kumar, David Monaghan
The Passion of the Christ (2004) – Mel Gibson