Julian Hanich outlines in his book ‘In cinematic emotion in horror films and thrillers’ the idea that Horror Film, unlike other genres, can connect you to the rest of the audience due to the communal physiological responses the genre derives (from the audience). Though shock and fear is subjective (no one comes to a film as a blank slate, we all have expectations and opinions based on publicity and the films genre) it is often the same moment in horror films that draw specific physiological reactions from the viewer (such as an accelerated heart beat and jumping). This reminds of old footage of 1950’s teenagers watching B Grade science fiction films-they are scream, jump and laugh simultaneously-making the passive viewing of the film more of a communal event. When George Melies first screened footage of a train to an audience, some people left the theatre in fear of being ran over by a train-it seems as though fear, which Hanich believes to be mans strongest, most primal emotion creates a sense of connection within the audience.

Hanich fails to recognise other genres that do the same thing. The first that comes to mind is comedy, often comedy creates a sense of connection through an audience, films are made for the viewers to be continually laughing together. One screening that comes to mind is of Hail Caesar, a recent Coen brothers film, throughout that screening people were laughing at the gags that were meant to be laughed, so when something funny occurred in the film the whole cinema broke out into laughter and then stopped-this created a sense of community. In a very superficial way (and for a very brief time) the film united a group of strangers. Horror (unlike comedy) you can build an immunity too. Horror buffs are less likely to be scared at a viewing of Scream  than I would, simply because I don’t watch much horror. This isn’t the case with comedy, it doesn’t matter how many times you’ve seen a comedy film, if something is funny you will laugh.

Notes on Berberian Sound Studio

• The film sets up many horror conventions such as: contrasting silence with loud, gruesome noises, violence (stabbing cabbages, when I was viewing the film I believed it to be a foreshadowing of what was to come), morally ambiguous characters (the Italian film producers certainly didn’t seem like nice people, they were presented as the type of people who had a mystery behind them). Anyway, the film sets up all of these conventions but none of them are actualised- no one dies and no one is tortured. It was horror in a sense of what the film was trying to achieve, it was trying to unsettle the audience, build up a sense of anticipation- there were certainly allusions to death, but none of these eventuated which is why the film is so interesting (and also why it made a loss at the box office).