Tony Williams. Hearths of Darkness: The Family in the American Horror Film. Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1996. 320 pp. $43.00, cloth, ISBN 978-0-8386-3564-3.
Reviewed by Philip L. Simpson
Published on H-PCAACA (September, 1997)
Tony Williams's Hearths of Darkness follows book resembles Vera Dika's intriguing 1990 the development of what he calls the American Games of Terror: Halloween, Friday the 13th, and "family horror flm" from the 1930s through the the Films of the Stalker Cycle. Williams also draws early 1990s. Professor Williams argues that the from a refreshingly eclectic pool of sources, rang‐ cinematic horror genre deliberately subverts the ing from the works of Christian Metz to the pages idealized position of the family unit in American of Cinefantastique. Generally, the book succeeds ideology. The genre does so through subjecting in its stated purpose: to illustrate one cinematic representative families to brutal assaults by hor‐ genre's narrative ambivalence toward family ex‐ rifc and/or supernatural elements and, more of‐ istence within material, capitalistic culture. ten than not, demonstrating the beleaguered fam‐ Williams begins by examining the 1930s Uni‐ ily possesses an equal capacity for violence and versal horror cycle, comprised of flms such as indeed is itself culpable in the cultural attitudes Frankenstein, Dracula, The Wolf Man, and the that perpetuate violence. various resultant sequels. Williams asserts that While other critics such as Robin Wood have the monstrous protagonists of these flms are em‐ also focused on the family horror flm, Williams bodiments of "alternatives that [capitalist patriar‐ expands and updates the basic premise to include chal] society rejects" (p. 31) and therefore must be many of the signifcant, well-known American destroyed by the ideological order whose basic horror flms of the past six decades, including the structuring unit-the family-is threatened by the 1930s Universal and 1940s Val Lewton produc‐ invading Other. Thus, the flms' seemingly irrele‐ tions. However, the most valuable part of vant portrayals of mundane domesticity are cen‐ Williams's book is its refreshing survey of some of tral to the thematic agenda. Superfcially, the the regrettably under-scrutinized flms in the monsters appear as external threats to the idyllic genre, such as Larry Cohen's It's Alive series or family, but actually "articulate deep tensions al‐ Michael Mann's Manhunter. In this strategy, the ready within the family" (p. 32). Williams con‐ H-Net Reviews cludes that the Universal movies, existing within a However, this is not to say that American cin‐ wider 1930s American cultural discourse, parallel ema refused to confront the pressing issues of the the era's isolationist retreat from the supposedly day, particularly the Vietnam War, but rather that corrupting infuence of foreign cultures. Howev‐ the flms did so obliquely, often through family er, the movies (and the culture that produced horror themes. Williams, who has elsewhere them) perhaps unwittingly reveal the uneasy sus‐ worked extensively with cinematic depictions of picion that one's own problems really originate the Vietnam War, points to movies such as George much closer to home. Romero's Night of the Living Dead and Wes Williams then moves on to the classic RKO Craven's The Hills Have Eyes as allegorical treat‐ 1940s horror flms, such as The Cat People and I ments of American wartime ideology victimizing Walked with a Zombie. He observes that World its own true believers. Williams locates such War II had done much to strip away "the isola‐ 1970s cinematic guerrilla radicalism primarily tionist innocence of America" (p. 51), which re‐ within low-budget, independent horror flms sulted in a frmer cinematic willingness to explore freed of major studio limitations. The flms of Lar‐ the darker side of the American character. The ry Cohen, obviously one of Williams's favorite di‐ flm noir genre, in which Williams locates the rectors, receive lengthy treatment because their RKO Val Lewton flms, is representative of the al‐ redemptive acceptance of the monstrous. tered national mood. Lewton's horror movies shift Williams concludes by noting the increasingly the emphasis away from external, supernatural apocalyptic or millennial tone of later `70s, `80s, assaults upon the family and instead suggest that and `90s horror cinema. He sees this trend as in‐ the family itself is a web of victims and victimiz‐ dicative of a general cultural acknowledgment of ers perpetuating generational violence. the limitations of American missionary idealism. The stage has thus been set, Williams argues, As Williams says, "With the decline of belief in for the 1950s horror cycle, which will directly in‐ myths and institutions, a religiously inspired (but dict the family unit as the origin of monstrosity. secularized) sense of living in the `last days' Alfred Hitchcock, of course, through the success emerged, a mood modern horror best embodies" of Psycho, is the most well-known director of fam‐ (p. 183). The material or social causes of violence ily horror movies, but Williams singles out for are downplayed in more recent horror movies, analysis more neglected flms, such as Walter while spectacularly gory or violent efects are Grauman's 1964 Lady in a Cage: a flm that per‐ fetishized. Any ideologies that are afrmed seem haps even more than Hitchcock's work "presents conservative, even brutally reactionary. For ex‐ family, urban society, religion, and capitalist de‐ ample, the 1980s Halloween, Friday the 13th, and cay as interconnecting threads within an oppres‐ Nightmare on Elm Street flms attempt to reassert sive existence" (p. 90). At this point, Williams says, patriarchal power over transgressive youths, es‐ many Hollywood flm-makers, faced with the pecially females. The late 1980s and `90s cinema commercially unviable prospect of producing of serial murder, represented by what Williams genuinely radical flms that called for the abolish‐ amusingly calls the "visually impoverished, the‐ ment of the authoritative family unit, returned to matically redundant text" (p. 255) of The Silence of the safer practice of scapegoating an outside su‐ the Lambs, typically champions law-enforcement pernatural force or Other for the ills besetting patriarchies. Even so, Williams makes a strong American society. The result: the "Satanic assault" case that no matter how superfcially conserva‐ movies (e.g., The Exorcist, The Omen) of the 1970s. tive, the family horror flm does not seriously ad‐
2 H-Net Reviews vocate a return to the self-destructive, patriarchal models of family existence. For the most part, readers will enjoy the scope and fast pace of Williams's coverage. Some readers may argue that a few of Williams's state‐ ments about socio-economic or cultural trends, while intellectually provocative, are overly broad or unsubstantiated. As a matter of personal taste, the individual reader can also quibble about some of the works Williams chooses to exclude or in‐ clude in support of his thesis. However, Williams's general strategy of concentrating on a mix of canonical and lesser- known flms for commen‐ tary is a sound one. Overall, the book surveys a diverse collection of horror movies and does so quite efectively. Williams critically engages many flms that have been inexplicably neglected or dismissed by other scholars in the feld. This alone makes the book a worthwhile companion to the broader focused horror studies by writers such as Noel Carroll, Barbara Creed, and Carol Clover. For those inter‐ ested in the cinematic horror genre, Williams fur‐ nishes not only a fascinating thesis but some won‐ derful suggestions for further movie viewing. As American politicians incessantly urge a "return to traditional family values," Williams convincingly demonstrates that an unspoken but deep cultural ambivalence toward family existence often fnds its most radical expression in the horror movie. This review is copyrighted (c) 1997 by H-Net and the Popular Culture and the American Cul‐ ture Associations. It may be reproduced electroni‐ cally for educational or scholarly use. The Associ‐ ations reserve print rights and permissions. (Con‐ tact: P.C.Rollins at the following electronic ad‐ dress: [email protected])
If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at https://networks.h-net.org/h-pcaaca
3 H-Net Reviews
Citation: Philip L. Simpson. Review of Williams, Tony. Hearths of Darkness: The Family in the American Horror Film. H-PCAACA, H-Net Reviews. September, 1997.
URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=1291
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
4