Horror lurks on a hostile terrain, and that landscape is
unquestionably most hostile toward women. Throughout most of the genre’s
history, women have usually been present to shriek, get slaughtered, show their
bodies, and huddle in a corner while some dude tussles with the monster. This
is a particularly sorry situation since it was a woman—Mary Shelley—who invented
the horror genre as we now know it two centuries ago.
Meg Hafdahl and Kelly Florence are two horror fans well
aware of this problem. Their new book The
Science of Women in Horror: The Special Effects, Stunts, and True Stories
Behind Your Favorite Fright Films mainly functions as an entertaining movie
and TV guide for feminist horror fans frustrated by the lack of non-insulting viewing
options. The writers basically whittle their list of feminist-friendly horrors
down to a skimpy 29 films, which probably would not fill the first ten pages of
the usual horror guide. So, as their book’s unwieldy title suggests, they pack
their pages with much more than the standard starred recommendations. The Science of Women in Horror offers
some interesting tangents related to the real life science, history, and
psychology behind the films; analyses (a reading of A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night as a sort of horror/western is
particularly compelling); making-of details; and interviews with actresses,
filmmakers, and fellow horror fans.
