A Carnivalesque Analysis of the Monster Child from Early Slapstick to the Nazified Children of Modern Horror
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BEWARE! CHILDREN AT PLAY: A CARNIVALESQUE ANALYSIS OF THE MONSTER CHILD FROM EARLY SLAPSTICK TO THE NAZIFIED CHILDREN OF MODERN HORROR Submitted by Craig Alan Frederick Martin, BA (Hons), MA https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8596-6482 A thesis submitted in total fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy March 2020 Faculty of Arts, School of Culture and Communication, Screen and Cultural Studies Program The University of Melbourne Abstract Monster child narratives often use a formula in which normative power relations between adults and children are temporarily inverted as the child outsmarts the adult, leading to a rupture in the social order. Where children are ordinarily subordinate to adults, this relationship is reversed as the monster child exerts dominance over their elders. Applying Mikhail Bakhtin’s carnival theory, this thesis argues that the monster child figure commonly thought of as a horror movie villain began its life on screen in early silent screen comedy. Through qualitative analysis of a range of case study films from the silent era through to the emergence of horror-themed monster child films produced in the mid- 1950s, close comparative analysis of these texts is used to support the claim that the monster children in early silent comedies and later modern horror films have a shared heritage. Such a claim warrants the question, why did the monster child migrate from comedy to horror? The contention put forward in this thesis is that during World War II dark representations of Hitler Youth in Hollywood wartime propaganda films played a significant role in the child monster trope moving from comedy to horror. Although only a brief period, the cluster of Hitler Youth-themed films produced by Hollywood presented the Nazified child as a particularly heinous malfeasant. This new screen villain proved dynamic and durable, resurfacing after the war as a devious Aryan fiend in the horror-themed monster child films that began to emerge in cinema in the mid-1950s. The monster child seen in contemporary horror is a combination of the narrative formula of early silent comedies featuring child monsters playing pranks on unwary adults, and 2 the dark villainy of the Hitler Youth. In tracing the trajectory of the child monster from comedy to horror, the thesis proposes that its carnivalesque character altered during World War II as it came to be associated with the anti-carnivalesque Hitler Youth. The anti-carnivalesque superficially engages with elements of the carnival so that where carnival is dialogic, celebrating an explosion of heteroglossia that embraces culture at the margins, the anti-carnivalesque is monologic and seeks to centralise and contain culture within a singular unified worldview. Following the war, the monster child returned to a carnivalesque state by undermining the social order just as it had in early cinema, however the character had radically transformed during the war so that in the postwar period it sported the Nordic physical features of the Hitler Youth and exhibited a sadism that would increase as the monster child moved further into the horror genre. Yet even as the postwar monster child became noticeably Nazified with its blond hair and contempt for adult authority, the comic origins of the monster child in silent cinema were also legible in its return to carnivalesque narratives in which the monster child overturns the social order. 3 Declaration i. The Thesis comprises only my original work towards the PhD. ii. Due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used. iii. The thesis does not exceed the word limit exclusive of table, maps, bibliographies, figures, and appendices. Craig Martin 4 Acknowledgements I begin by thanking my supervisor Professor Angela Ndalianis for her good humour and undying enthusiasm for this project. Her canny insights fuelled by a breadth and depth of knowledge across an exhaustive array of fields is both impressive and intimidating. Angela’s creativity and gentle coaxing have been invaluable, but mostly I appreciate her friendship. On losing two family members during my candidacy, Angela provided support and sympathy but also stoked my will and determination to continue. I also want to thank my associate supervisor Dr Wendy Haslem for her consistently kind encouragement and provocative questions. To Anna Dzenis at La Trobe University I also offer my sincerest thanks for being that person who somehow knows exactly what to say at the right time. I am also deeply grateful to Drs Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, Mark Freeman, Eloise Ross, and Tyson Wils who have shaped me as a researcher and writer and given me their friendship and support. Thanks also to fellow cinephiles Lee Gambin, Jarrod McEwan and Aaron Rourke, all of whom are just insane enough to have followed my research journey with interest and enthusiasm. I express love and gratitude for my longsuffering family whose patience and constancy seem to know no bounds, and to my longtime partner Robert Kosic, whose quiet kindness and endless support has been my rock. And finally, to my father Alan Carter Martin and my brother Philip Roy Martin, I dedicate this thesis. I miss you more with each passing day. 5 Table of Contents ABSTRACT 2 DECLARATION 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS 6 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 8 TEMPLATE FOR LISTING THIRD PARTY COPYRIGHT MATERIAL IN THESIS PREFACE 9 INTRODUCTION 11 THE ROLE OF INNOCENCE 23 CRITICAL SUMMARY OF RELEVANT LITERATURE 30 THEORISING THE CARNIVALESQUE MONSTER CHILD 50 INVERSION AND UNCROWNING 54 MASKS AND PARODY 56 FESTIVAL OF THE GROTESQUE 59 CARNIVAL COMEDY AND HORROR 62 CARNIVAL SYNTAX IN THE MONSTER CHILD FILM 65 METHODOLOGY 68 CHAPTER BREAKDOWN 70 CHAPTER ONE EARLY FILM AND THE CARNIVAL CONVENTIONS OF CHILD MONSTROSITY 75 1.1 THE CARNIVALESQUE MONSTER CHILD IN EARLY CINEMA 78 1.2 L’ARROSEUR ARROSE AND CARNIVALESQUE CONVENTIONS 86 1.3 COMIC STRIP ORIGINS 92 1.4 HATS AND CARNIVALESQUE UNCROWNING 99 SUMMARY 110 CHAPTER TWO ADAPTING THE AMERICAN BAD BOY BOOK 111 2.1 ALDRICH’S STORY OF A BAD BOY 118 2.2 TWAIN’S BAD BOYS 130 2.3 TOM AND SID SAWYER ON SCREEN 138 2.4 PECK’S BAD BOY 147 SUMMARY 163 6 CHAPTER THREE DISNEY IN DEUTSCHLAND: PINOCCHIO AND EDUCATION FOR DEATH 165 3.1 WALT DISNEY: NAZI SYMPATHISER? 178 3.2 PINOCCHIO, NAZISM & PLEASURE ISLAND 186 3.3 KRISTALLNACHT AND ROTHENBERG 197 3.5 EDUCATION FOR DEATH 206 SUMMARY 218 CHAPTER FOUR HOLLYWOOD’S HITLER YOUTH AND TOMORROW THE WORLD 220 4.1 TOMORROW THE WORLD FROM STAGE TO SCREEN 231 4.2 EMIL BRUCKNER: THE MOST MONSTROUS HITLER YOUTH 242 4.2 EMIL, ASSIMILATION AND THE AMERICAN MELTING POT 251 SUMMARY 274 CHAPTER FIVE THE CONTINUITY OF THE MONSTER CHILD: POSTWAR HITLER YOUTH HORROR AND THE BAD SEED 276 5.1 VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED 278 5.2 THE BAD SEED AND THE MONSTER CHILD FILM 289 5.3 THE INFLUENCE OF EMIL BRUCKNER AND TOMORROW THE WORLD 300 5.4 DENAZIFICATION AND THE ENDURING PRESENCE OF HITLER YOUTH 313 5.5 HITLER YOUTH RHODA 319 5.6 THE CARNIVALESQUE HORROR OF THE BAD SEED 332 SUMMARY 338 CONCLUSION 340 WORKS CITED 347 FILMS CITED 387 APPENDIX A: HITLER YOUTH IN WARTIME HOLLYWOOD 395 I THE MAN I MARRIED (1940) 395 II FOUR SONS (1940) 401 III HITLER’S CHILDREN (1943) 404 IV THE WHITE CLIFFS OF DOVER (1944) 411 V THEY LIVE IN FEAR (1944) 416 APPENDIX B: LIST OF FILMS FEATURING MONSTER CHILDREN 422 7 List of Illustrations FIGURE 1 CHRISTOPH. “UN ARROSEUR PUBLIC”, LE PETIT FRANÇAIS ILLUSTRÉ, NO.23, 3 AUG. 1989. 94 FIGURE 2 AUZOLLE. CINÉMATOGRAPHE LUMIÈRE POSTER, 1896. 94 FIGURE 3 GIBEY. “FAIT DIVERS” LA CARICATURE, 2 JUNE 1888. 99 FIGURE 4 FIRESIDE DANCE IN THE STOLEN GUY (FITZHAMON 1955) 126 FIGURE 5 FIRESIDE DANCE IN LORD OF THE FLIES (BROOK 1963) 126 FIGURE 6 LAMPWICK’S SHADOW IN PINOCCHIO (LUSKE 1940) 196 FIGURE 7 LAMPWICK’S SHADOW IN PINOCCHIO (LUSKE 1940) 196 FIGURE 8 ROTHENBERG OB DER TAUBER 201 FIGURE 9 NAZI OFFICER IN EDUCATION FOR DEATH (GERNONIMI 1943) 212 FIGURE 10 APE-LIKE GOON IN PINOCCHIO (LUSKE 1940) 212 FIGURE 11 NAZI OFFICER SHADOW IN EDUCATION FOR DEATH (GERNONIMI 1943) 213 FIGURE 12 SHADOW OF THE COACHMAN IN PINOCCHIO (LUSKE 1940) 213 FIGURE 13 INNOCENT HANS IN EDUCATION FOR DEATH (GERNONIMI 1943) 214 FIGURE 14 NAZIFIED HANS IN EDUCATION FOR DEATH (GERNONIMI 1943) 214 FIGURE 15 SHATTERED WINDOW IN PINOCCHIO (LUSKE 1940) 215 FIGURE 16 SHATTERED WINDOW IN EDUCATION FOR DEATH (GERNONIMI 1943) 215 FIGURE 17 HANS THE NAZI SLAVE IN EDUCATION FOR DEATH (GERNONIMI 1943) 216 FIGURE 18 FRONT AND BACK COVER OF “TOMORROW THE WORLD” IN NO. 10 EDITION OF COMIC CAVALCADE. 241 FIGURE 19 VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED (RILLA 1960) POSTER 287 FIGURE 20 RHODA’S CONTEMPT FOR MRS BREEDLOVE IN THE BAD SEED (LEROY 1956) 326 8 Template for Listing Third Party Copyright Material in Thesis Preface Citation Information for Third party copyright material Location Permission of item in granted thesis Y/N p. 94 N Christophe, “Un arroseur public”, Le Petit Français Illustré, n°23, 1ère année, 3 août 1889. http://www.topfferiana.fr/2010/10/arroseurs-arroses/ p. 94 N Cinematographe Lumiere-COPY (0000-2345-COPY) by Marcellin Auzolle. https://fordimages.archivea.com/perl/frameAndServeImage.pl?imageID=21 3146&imageWidth=350 p. 99 N A. Sorel, « Fait divers », La Caricature, n° 376, 12 mars 1887. Source: Gallica.bnf.fr http://www.topfferiana.fr/2010/10/arroseurs-arroses/ p. 126 N The Stolen Guy. Directed by Lewin Fitzhamon, 1900, British Film Institute. p. 126 N Lord of the Flies. Directed by Peter Brook 1963), DVD, Umbrella Entertainment, 2018.