Horror movies used to be chilling and frightening, but lately, fans have been disappointed by the unsettling details in current films. Why has slasher become overly nauseating and revolting?
In 1896, horror originated with Georges Méliès. His 3-minute creation, Le Manoir du Diable (The Haunted Castle, or The House of the Devil), is considered the first horror film. According to NYFA, the film consisted of cauldrons, animated skeletons, ghosts, transforming bats, and, ultimately, an incarnation of the Devil. Méliès wanted his work to be wondrous, supernatural, and a vision of “what was to come.” While not intending to be scary, his work frightened viewers. Soon after these initial reactions, the genre “horror” was created and continues to this day. Now, there are various types of horror, some being physiological, paranormal, religious, supernatural, and the infamous slasher.
Slasher is what people think of when they hear the word horror. Bloody, gruesome details and stomach-turning gore are what define slasher movies. In the last decade, horror directors have flooded the market with these films. However, directors have changed the way these movies are made. They now have low-quality plots, unnecessary gore made purely for shock value, and too much blood. This makes them sickening and dull, giving the genre a bad reputation. When asked about these issues, Eden Baldassarre, freshman, stated, “Horror movies lost their creativity. They’re all boring and have the same things.” Fans don’t want to watch an hour and a half of murder, but instead want compelling stories that slowly scare you throughout the movie. Besides the flaws, not all of these movies are terrible.
Halloween, Scream, and Saw, to name a few, are the golden age of slasher movies. They have in-depth stories and remarkable quality, which shows in the way they were made. In contrast, slasher movies have replaced captivating stories with off-putting amounts of body gore. Examples are the Terrifier (2016-2024) movies. These movies are about a serial killer, “Art the Clown,” played by David Howard Thornton, killing people in brutal and horrific ways. The first 2twomovies were already disgusting and hard to watch, but the third was so gruesomely violent that some viewers vomited in the theater, according to Screen Rant. The directors of Terrifier have admitted to intentionally making their movies heavily disturbing to test how far they can push their viewers to watch and how much they can stomach.
There’s one quality about these movies that fans dislike the most: they’re too gory. No movie needs to have a scene of a woman’s skin being ripped off and then being covered in salt, like in Terrifier 2 (2022). The goriest movies in the past few years haven’t been getting the best ratings. One example of these —the most disgusting movie ever made —is A Serbian Film (2010), with a rating of 4.9 on IMDb. The film can only be described as “sickening, psychotic, and disturbing.” It was supposed to be a political statement, but it only captured traumatizing, realistic crimes. This film consists of many scenes depicting graphic sexual abuse, including one of a newborn, the main character’s wife and son, and more, according to the Refused Classification. Questionable fans call people “soft” for not enjoying this film because it’s “peak disturbance” and “just the right amount of horror.”
Nothing is entertaining about these films. Because they’re made for shock value, they’re far too stomach-churning to think about and don’t add quality to their plots, completely forgetting the point of entertainment. No one should have to worry about vomiting while watching a movie. Horror movies used to be entertaining and exciting to watch, but they’ve become tests to see how much you can stomach. Fans have become appalled and disappointed with writers. All horror fans can do is hope that directors learn from their mistakes and go back to producing like they used to.
