I pass on to you, the Cinematical Seven: Horror Movie Gimmicks that Always Work...Hawthorne style! The Cinematical author (Richard von Busack) included illustrative Nathaniel Hawthorne quotes which I will put here also. I'm trying not to plagiarize anyone here! Everyone must become an avid reader of Cinematical (like I am!) after reading this post! You will self-destruct otherwise!
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1. Compulsion through prophecy; death or misery foretold
"Why were you threatening me this morning?" Omar says. Death replies, "I wasn't threatening you. I was just surprised to see you in the marketplace so far from here, when we had an appointment in Samarra today."
2. Misbehaving pictures and photographs
Hawthorne's "The Prophetic Picture" is a forbear of Wilde's novel, in which a wedding portrait manifests clues of a murder to come in years afterwards.
3. Children
no quote/annocdote mentioned
4. Abandonment
"The sunbeam that comes through a round hole in the shutter of a darkened room, where a dead man sits in solitude."
5. What's behind the door?
"In an old house, a mysterious knocking might be heard on the wall, where had formerly been a doorway, now bricked up."
6. The knife
I'm paraphrasing (General Patton), but it was something to the extent that "nothing really puts the fear in a man like the thought that his guts will be explored by cold steel." This quote is not by Hawthorne, but good nonetheless.
7. Madness
The best ending of any terror tale, and that's because the story doesn't really end. It loops back, guaranteed to echo in the hero until death. (von Busack's words, not Hawthorne's but again, good stuff)
I believe that to be a spot-on list. Can anyone else think of any more?
2 comments:
Children - one's own are evil incarnate at many points throughout their lifetime. But even more evil than Damian, is The Bad Seed. Classic evil kid.
yep, the little crumb-crushers pop up pretty often in the horror genre
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