Chapter 1 Acknowledgments Chapter 2 Introduction Part 3 Horror, Tragedy, and Pleasure Chapter 4 The General Theory of Horrific Appeal Chapter 5 The Mastery of Hannibal Lecter Chapter 6 The Livid Nightmare: Trauma, Anxiety, and the Ethical Aesthetics of Horror Chapter 7 Aristotelian Reflections on Horror and Tragedy in An American Werewolf in London and The Sixth Sense Part 8 Horror's Philosopher-Auteurs Chapter 9 Heidegger, the Uncanny, and Jacques Tourneur's Horror Films Chapter 10 Hitchcock Made Only One Horror Film: Matters of Time, Space, Causality, and the Schopenhauerian Will Chapter 11 What You Can't See Can Hurt You: Of Invisible and Hollow Men Part 12 Philosophical (Horror) Investigations Chapter 13 On the Question of the Horror Film Chapter 14 An Event-Based Definition of Art-Horror Chapter 15 Haunting the House From Within: Disbelief Mitigation and Spatial Experience Chapter 16 Murder as Art/ The Art of Murder: Aestheticizing Violence in Modern Cinematic Horror Part 17 Horror and Reality Chapter 18 The Slasher's Blood Lust Chapter 19 American Psycho: Horror, Satire, Aesthetics, and Identification Chapter 20 Real Horror Part 21 Bibliography Chapter 22 Index Chapter 23 About the Contributors
Steven Jay Schneider is a Ph.D. candidate in Philosophy at Harvard University and in Cinema Studies at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. He has published widely on the horror film and related genres, and is author of the forthcoming Designing Fear: An Aesthetics of Cinematic Horror. Steven is editor of New Hollywood Violence and The Horror and Psychoanalysis: Freud's Worst Nightmares, and co-editor of Understanding Film Genres and Horror International, all forthcoming. For more information, please visit his "website". Daniel Shaw is Professor of Philosophy and Film at Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania. He is Editor of the journal Film and Philosophy, and secretary-treasurer of its sponsor organization, the Society for the Philosophic Study of the Contemporary Visual Arts. He has published articles in The Journal of Value Inquiry, Kinoeye, and Film/Literature Quarterly. His reviews also appear periodically in the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism and in Choice magazine.
This philosophical collection provides an interesting perspective
on the film horror genre that would prove beneficial for cinema
studies, film history, and film genre courses. Recommended.
*CHOICE*
...a collection of essays on the philosophic underpinnings of films
like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer,
and An American Werewolf in London...
*Northeast News Gleaner*
The horror film is a fascinating genre from many perspectives, not
least of them the philosophical. For those interested in a
philosophical approach to horror, read this book! In Dark Thoughts,
the editors gather together a remarkable set of essays by
philosophers and film scholars, among them well-known names and
relative newcomers. Along the way, Dark Thoughts explores the major
issues raised by the horror film, and it does so from diverse
perspectives. The approaches range from the psychoanalytic to the
cognitive, from Nietsche and Heidegger to Carroll and Freeland.
This is a welcome and useful addition to the literature on the
horror film.
*Carl Plantinga, editor of Passionate Views: Film, Cognition, and
Emotion*
If you look at cinema through a philosophic prism however, and
agree Schneider and Shaw's introductory contention that horror
cinema is "simply a natural extension of a philosopher's
inclination to wonder," then you will find the issues reiase by
Carroll and those who follow in his footsteps, enlightening.
*Video Watchdog*
With this important collection in hand, you can stop whistling in
the dark and start thinking seriously about scary movies. Why do we
voluntarily watch films that shock, frighten, and horrify? Why do
we actually like Hannibal Lecter and other monsters
andmonstrosities? What defines the horror movie as a genre? What
are its connections to tragedy? The essays in this book draw
insightfully on classic sources including Plato, Aristotle, Hume,
Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Freud, and Heidegger to answer these
andother terrifying questions. In addition, all the major
contemporary theorists in the philosophy of horror are represented,
including Noël Carroll, Cynthia Freeland, and Robert Solomon The
resulting fusion of classic and contemporary insight is this unique
and enlightening volume, Dark Thoughts.
*William Irwin, King's College, Pennsylvania*
With this important collection in hand, you can stop whistling in
the dark and start thinking seriously about scary movies. Why do we
voluntarily watch films that shock, frighten, and horrify? Why do
we actually like Hannibal Lecter and other monsters and
monstrosities? What defines the horror movie as a genre? What are
its connections to tragedy? The essays in this book draw
insightfully on classic sources including Plato, Aristotle, Hume,
Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Freud, and Heidegger to answer these and
other terrifying questions. In addition, all the major contemporary
theorists in the philosophy of horror are represented, including
Noël Carroll, Cynthia Freeland, and Robert Solomon The resulting
fusion of classic and contemporary insight is this unique and
enlightening volume, Dark Thoughts.
*William Irwin, King's College, Pennsylvania*
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