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The Cinematic Boogeyman: the Folkloric Roots of the Slasher Villain

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The Cinematic Boogeyman: the Folkloric Roots of the Slasher Villain The Cinematic Boogeyman: The Folkloric Roots of the Slasher Villain Kevin McGuiness Interdisciplinary Humanities PhD Program Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Faculty of Humanities, Brock University St. Catharines, Ontario © 2019 i Abstract This doctoral thesis complements earlier scholarship by Marina Warner concerning the Boogeyman as a figure representative of monstrosity and otherness by assessing these topics through an interdisciplinary lens. Employing a methodological approach that incorporates research from the fields of psychology, philosophy, and film studies, I analyse the Boogeyman within the context of the traditional fairytale and the modern horror film, and thereby reveal the key facets of this figure in the Western cultural imaginary. Specifically, I demonstrate that the villains of the contemporary slasher film (a subgenre of the horror film) are cinematic manifestations of the folkloric Boogeyman through a comparison of their physical and psychological attributes. Examining the archetypal properties of these characters, I argue that the traits that characterize the Boogeyman are the result of the fact that he is a composite of three archetypal forms: the collective Shadow, the Terrible Father, and the Death-Demon. I address three key questions: (1) what particular physical and psychological qualities are associated with the Boogeyman; (2) how the persona of the Boogeyman is constituted in the public consciousness; and (3) what moral, philosophical, and psychological role does he serve in Western culture. Over the course of this thesis, I demonstrate the fact that the Boogeyman represents the amalgamation of three archetypal components. Firstly, he embodies the role of the collective Shadow and functions to personify violent and anarchic characteristics that are repressed by the community and projected onto monstrous figures in the popular consciousness. Secondly, he is a manifestation of the negative attributes associated with the archetypal Father (referred to ii in literature as the ―Terrible Father‖) who punishes individuals that defy hegemonic values. Finally, he is a cultural embodiment of the Death-Demon, a conceptual figure that personifies anxieties related to death, and the degeneration of the body. This thesis provides a comparative analysis of a series of case studies that clearly illustrate the characteristics synonymous with the Boogeyman in the Western cultural imaginary. I begin with an examination of Bluebeard, a homicidal villain featured in Charles Perrault‘s 1697 collection of fairytales titled Histoires ou contes du temps passé. In her seminal text No Go the Bogeyman, Warner posits Bluebeard as a clear example of the folkloric Boogeyman due to the fact that he is physically grotesque and morally repugnant. In Perrault‘s story, Bluebeard is a villain who marries and then murders a series of women for disobeying him, and subsequently stores their bodies in his private chamber. Extrapolating the salient characteristics of Bluebeard as the folkloric Boogeyman, I assess these traits under an archetypal lens and demonstrate that Bluebeard/the folkloric Boogeyman is a manifestation of the collective Shadow, the Terrible Father, and the Death-Demon. After determining the archetypal properties of the folkloric Boogeyman, I highlight the presence of these same qualities in popular villains from the contemporary American slasher films of the 1970s and ‘80s. Specifically, these characters include Michael Myers from Halloween (1978), Jason Voorhees of Friday the 13th (1980), and Freddy Krueger featured in A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984). Through my analysis of these terrifying figures, I situate them within a larger archetypal context of monstrosity and simultaneously establish their role as cinematic manifestations of the folkloric Boogeyman. This examination reveals the placement of the Boogeyman within the iii cultural imaginary as a violent disciplinarian who reinforces moral boundaries through sadistic acts of violence and paradoxically brings both chaos and harmony to the collective by preserving social borders. By extension, I demonstrate the link between the slasher film and the fairytale, both of which serve a didactic function, imparting hegemonic values to the public concerning sexual politics, social propriety, and moderation. Keywords: Michael Myers; Jason Voorhees; Freddy Krueger; Boogeyman; Bluebeard; monstrosity; otherness; slasher film; archetype iv Preface As this thesis outlines my perspective on the themes of monstrosity and otherness, I believe it would be wise to include a brief overview of my theoretical positioning and methodological preconceptions. My background is rooted predominantly in visual culture and my research is therefore concerned with the structural nature of artistic and filmic works. Specifically, my training entails a Master of Arts in the field of Comparative Literature and Arts and, as a result, I find myself fascinated by overarching themes that transcend social and temporal boundaries. In my research, I have found that the presence of common motifs among works from disparate locations is often explained by the presence of the archetype. These innate forms based on universal characters and themes populate the human psyche and result in structured modes of thought that recur over long periods of time based on cyclical modes of behaviour. The notion of the archetype, developed by the Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung, has been a prevalent theme in my work over the years and provided the foundation for much of my research in the field of art history and film analysis. Though Jung‘s concept has been criticized for neglecting to account for social issues related to race, class, and gender, I firmly believe that it is the most fruitful method for examining cultural artefacts separated by large spans of time and space. At its core, the archetype hints at a global community, one that is predicated on the innate psychological mechanisms of the human mind. The universal vocabulary of visual language that Jung proposed is particularly relevant to researchers in the field of comparative studies, as it provides the tools to analyze texts that cross cultural, national, political, and social borders. v Though the notion of composing a thesis in 2019 that utilizes a Structuralist methodology may strike certain readers as anomalous, I not only found that Jung‘s writings provided intriguing insights about the case studies I was researching, but also lent itself to an interdisciplinary approach. Since the archetype is deeply influenced by extrinsic factors, I was able to merge Jung‘s writings with contemporary theoretical research from the fields of philosophy, feminist studies, and film studies. By observing the way scholarship from these various disciplines interacted, I have generated new perceptions concerning the phenomenon of the Boogeyman and his ominous presence in the Western cultural imaginary. This thesis therefore entails an amalgamation of disparate areas of research that do not traditionally correspond with one another. By merging these modes of inquiry, I have been astounded at the degree of intellectual synchronicity that became increasingly self-evident as this thesis progressed. The alchemical nature of this interdisciplinary research accounts for the numerous mutations that this thesis underwent during its gestation and the enormous challenges and rewards that this work produced. vi Table of Contents Abstract .................................................................................................................. i Preface .................................................................................................................... iv Table of Contents .................................................................................................. vi List of Figures ........................................................................................................ viii Introduction: The Boogeyman and the Cultural Imaginary .................................. 1 Chapter 1: The Man in the Shadows: Defining the Boogeyman .......................... 48 I. Defining the Darkness ...................................................................................... 48 II. Folktales and Fairytales ................................................................................... 49 III. What is the Boogeyman? ............................................................................... 53 IV. Bluebeard ....................................................................................................... 57 V. Archetypal Criticism ....................................................................................... 64 VI. The Development of the Slasher Film ........................................................... 69 VII. The Structure of the Slasher Film ................................................................. 84 VIII. The Cinematic Boogeyman ......................................................................... 96 IX. The Slasher Film and the Fairytale ................................................................ 103 Chapter 2: The Dweller in Darkness: The Boogeyman as the Archetypal Shadow .................................................................................................................... 108 I. The Ghosts of the Mind .................................................................................... 108 II. The Collective Unconscious...........................................................................
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