I have a fascination with the horror genre however, I would not call myself a fan of the genre. I have seen plenty of horror films at this point. My favorite subgenre of horror is the slasher flick. Slashers started in the 50s and are centered around killers who murder a group of people. Most often the killer is male and wearing a mask but there are exceptions like the first Friday the 13 movies.
I saw Halloween 2018 and while it is not the worst sequel to a beloved horror franchise it would be a mistake to call it good. At best it was a passible movie that did not fuck too much up, yet still had some interesting new things to bring.
For me, the best slasher films are the original Halloween, Friday 13th, and A Nightmare on Elm Street with Jason, Michaell, and Freddy being the best killers in horror cinema. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is also a favorite and might be the best of the bunch.
What connects all these movies is also a continuous need to remake them. They all have modern remakes that are all bad or at least way worse than the original.
Why is this?
What makes a slasher film work?
The classic mistake Hollywood makes when making sequels is they make more or less the same movie but bigger. Take Diehard as an example, the first one was great so the second one should be even bigger. Instead of a building, it’s a whole airport with a lot more bad guys and less charismatic villains. It’s bigger, but not better since the elements of what makes the original film were downplayed.
The killings are not the main reason they are scary
In a good slasher, you think “How are they going to survive?”
In a bad one, you think “Someone has to die”
If you are sitting watching the slasher thinking “When is the killing starting” I think the movie is doing something wrong. I do not believe killings are the main reason why slashers are scary. This might sound totally insane but let me explain.
A good slasher film introduces you to the characters and the environment before unleashing the killer. In the original Halloween Michael can be seen in the background stalking his prey biding his time. The characters feel something is watching them, but they do not know. We as an audience know. The scary part of slashers is the possibility of the murder. The killer might be right behind you, in the closet, or nowhere near. The scary part is that at any time one of the characters might meet a brutal end.
I found Halloween 2018 had a lot more deaths than the originals. However, more is not better in slasher movies. The reason Friday 13th works is because you know the characters so you know who they are. The same goes for Halloween. Having characters you know die is more impactful than if some random guy gets killed off screen like in Halloween 2018.
In Halloween 2018 we see a lot of killings of random people done offscreen. We see their dead bodies mangled in horrific ways. This is a terrible way of doing it. We don’t get the dread since we do not know these characters and we don’t get to see the killings, and while it is not the only reason a slasher movie works, killings are still important.
In Halloween 2018 you follow Michael a lot, which I also think is to the film’s detriment. Again the important thing is the potential of murder, if you know where the killer is you know when the murder will happen.
In Halloween 2018 we see Michael walk from the street to the back of a house. The camera goes in through the window where a worried mother is looking outside. Michael walks up behind her and straps her through the neck. This scene is awful, the kill is too fast and you see it coming from a mile away. The ideal way to start such a scene is to be already inside the house. If we know where Michael is we know when the kill happens. It also doesn’t work since we do not know the character and thus it becomes a scene to further the kill count more so than the film.
Don’t kill the killer
In slashers like Scream where the whole point is that anybody could be the killer and where the killer is a normal person it is more acceptable to kill the killer. However, if the killer is an evil force of nature like Freddy, Michael, or Jason then I would recommend not killing the killer at the end.
The first reason is that if you are going to make sequels and reboots the villain becomes less scary if you know you can kill him. Personally, I think it works better if you escape the killer instead of killing him off. You can also do it like A Nightmare on Elm Street where you think Freddy is dead, but in the last scene of the film, it becomes clear he is very much alive.
Conclusion
I think most modern slashers are bad because they do not take into consideration what makes good horror work. Good horror is the anticipation, the dread of waiting for something to happen.
There is also a lot to be said about the theme of adolescence, sexual frustration, and liberation when it comes to slasher since the killer often kills young horny teenagers. However, I don’t think I can contribute to the discussion.
Slasher movies might be considered a basic subgenre and not worth too much brain power, but I think it is worth exploring facets and digging a bit deeper into why some are better than others.