A Few Ways Into Scream

A few ways to read ʻScreamʼ (and potentially use it in an Independent Study...)

GENRE Postmodernist remaking of horror genre - Baudrillardʼs simulacra and hyper-reality; self consciousness, intertextuality for an audience of smarks. Character of Randy is particularly important here. Fantasy mode - pure escapism? Or a deeper realism? AUDIENCE Psychoanalytical reading. Bruce Kuhnʼs idea that horror allows us access to our own fears or desires; Robin Wood on the freedom of horror. IDEOLOGY ʻWhen the Woman Looksʼ, Linda Williams - why do women shield their eyes? Is gender hegemony being reinforced and taught? Are dominant ideologies concerning feminine sexuality being reinforced? GENDER Male Gaze (Laura Mulvey) Carol Clover - Her Body, Himself - female sexuality is punished; only the boyish ʻFinal Girlʼ is saved. SOCIAL CONTEXT Barbara Klinger - the ʻlocus of horrorʼ shifts over time. What IS the ʻlocus of horrorʼ in Scream? Teenagers, poisoned by the media they consume. Completely immersed in a world of violent movies they seem to have lost the ability to distinguish between fantasy and reality. Baudrillardʼs ideas about simulacra and hyper-reality are obviously very relevant here. The social context - the very late twentieth century fear of teens and the conviction that they were ʻout of controlʼ, that their minds were twisted by a violent media (and family breakdown also - abandonment by the mother figure, particularly) - is what is being expressed (and satirised - in true postmodern style, remember that Wes Craven is responsible for a large number of the very movies, the ʻvideo nastiesʼ, which are apparently being blamed for warping teen minds).