History Repeats: An Argument    

The 50s were a good time to be a horror fan.  A staggering number of classics, franchise stars, and reboot fodder can be traced back to this era and inform a great deal about the types of stories that resonated with mid 21st century people. Movies about aliens secretly replacing our friends and family, giant animals mutated by radiation, and the looming threat of nuclear war were plentiful and paint a picture of a generation both obsessed with and terrified of technology, progression, and the idea of malignant invading forces invading our homes. 

The impact the Cold War had on the cinema of the 1950s and the 1980s wasn’t just confined to the horror genre, but they were the genre that reflected the fears that were on the average American’s mind and made them easier to digest. Take for example Howard Hawks’ The Thing From Another World (1951), which was later remade by John Carpenter in 1982 as The Thing. Both films share the same plot: The frozen remains of alien organism are excavated by a group of American scientists in Antarctica, who discover that not only is the titular Thing alive, but it also has the ability to shapeshift into any organism it comes into contact with. A slow burn of violence and paranoia ensues as the men try to figure out who among them could be the Thing as moves throughout the base assimilating the men, sowing seeds of distrust as it picks them off one by one. Although the story is the same in both versions, the tone and way both films execute their ideas differ wildly between. In Thing From Another World, the fear stems from the sinister implications of what a shapeshifting creature is capable of doing and how effortlessly it could bring our comfortable social order to its knees by imitating our neighbors. However, in The Thing more focus is put on the infectious quality of the alien itself and how it behaves more like a super intelligent virus, leaving no symptoms until it’s too late. 

It’s not difficult to see both versions of the film as reflections of their respective times; one being a sci-fi reinterpretation of the Red Scare, the other finding its horror from the sentiments born out of the AIDS epidemic. But if you strip them both down to the framework, you’ll find the same story about being unable to trust the people you thought you knew and how that distrust can cause a formerly stable social order to fall apart. Not having all the answers is a powerful fear that anyone can identify with, as is the fear of anything different than what we’re used to. In horror, this otherness is almost always depicted as malevolent; it’s simply in the monster’s nature to do us harm, like the Thing whose ability to copy and replace organisms is milked for as much disgust as possible, a violent and brutal display of the body betraying itself on a cellular level — not unlike that of a terminal illness like AIDS, which had already spread to a number of European countries by the summer of 1982 when The Thing was released. 

And that’s arguably why movies like The Thing still retain their holding power over audiences. Each is a time capsule of the era where the attitudes, thoughts and feelings of the audience are captured through the filmmaking. Even through technological limitations and costume design, we can immediately tell when a movie was filmed, and find hilarity when the year it takes place in obviously is not the one it was shot in. 

Arguably, letting the audience draw their own conclusions from the material is more effective than just telling them what to think by feeding them the details. For a viewer who has lived through 9/11, a film about the attack like Vice (2018, dir. Adam McKay) and Reign Over Me (2007, dir. Mike Binder) would register differently than it would with a viewer who was born after 2001 or is otherwise too young to remember it. The further away the viewer is from that period of history, the deeper the disconnect between the audience and the event becomes. That piece of history is so far into the past that it’s no longer a remembered event, just a footnote that can only be experienced by people who have never lived through it. Without that emotional connection, the film loses much of its impact and relevancy. 

The changes the film industry has undergone throughout COVID-19 exemplify how the foundations of our culture can change in a short period of time. As streaming platforms continue to overtake movie theaters as the definitive filmgoing experience, media conglomerates have taken advantage of the pandemic to create content based around it, including a rapidly growing number of COVID-themed movies. Some, like Songbird (2020, dir. Adam Mason), have sold themselves around the novelty of filming a movie about the COVID pandemic during the actual pandemic. Audience reactions are varied, but what many of them seem to agree upon is that very rarely do any of these movies have something new to say about the pandemic. 

A movie like Songbird concerns itself with reaching a specific demographic — fans of viral outbreak and dystopian fiction — but never does anything to elevate itself above its subject matter. In Songbird’s case, it can never be anything other than a movie about COVID-19 because that’s what it was created to be. Take that foundation away and the rest of the film falls apart. 

It’s debatable if Songbird could have benefited from the creation of its own fictional virus. We can only speculate what sort of story it could have come up with had it simply taken all the feelings living in quarantine can inspire and did something with that instead of showing a salacious version of the world we’ve been living in for the last year and a half, but it would have at least stood on its own feet instead of relying upon help to be propped up. Contrast it with a film like A Quiet Place (2018, John Krasinksi), which also dealt with survivors struggling with isolation and loss in the wake of an apocalyptic nightmare involving a mysterious threat that grinds society to a halt. Instead of a virus, it’s a species of blind monsters who force humanity to change their lifestyles, living in silence to avoid attracting the creatures who hunt by sound. The story centers around the Abbott family’s efforts to survive on their isolated farm while trying to rebuild something resembling a normal life. However, the real focus is how the family copes with the grief of losing a child. By the end of the film, the audience is so deeply invested with the Abbotts’ survival that their wellbeing becomes just as desired as a glimpse of the monsters themselves, who are shot deliberately out-of-focus for much of the film. 

Ideally, film should be used as a method to preserve mankind’s history as much as it is a source of entertainment. Movies’ ability to connect people with the past and present is an asset that is proven to be profitable. However, achieving mainstream success is a bit more elusive, especially in an age where audiences are getting more frugal with the media they consume. Every film is struggling to be the one that’s talked about for years or at least months to come — films like Songbird and other COVID-themed movies have attempted to achieve this relevancy, but as it’s already been proven, audiences care about the content of their message just as much as the overall construction of the movie itself. Filmmakers and studios would benefit from a broad stroke approach to filmmaking and by letting audiences provide their own interpretations to the material, allowing them to claim the film as their own by giving them an platform to project their emotions and experiences onto. 

Like the 1950s, the 2020s are a good time to be watching films. But they have also been a time where we’ve had to reexamine our media consumption practices by becoming more particular with what we watch and the kinds of stories we choose to tell. Film gives us the power to make sure history is never forgotten, but to see a diluted version of it turns what could otherwise be an insightful look into the past that inspires us to think deeper about the world and ourselves into exploitation and quick, cheap way to turn a profit. 

The 50s were a good time to be a horror fan.  A staggering number of classics, franchise stars, and reboot fodder can be traced back to this era and inform a great deal about the types of stories that resonated with mid 21st century people. Movies about aliens secretly replacing our friends and family, giant animals mutated by radiation, and the looming threat of nuclear war were plentiful and paint a picture of a generation both obsessed with and terrified of technology, progression, and the idea of malignant invading forces invading our homes. 

The impact the Cold War had on the cinema of the 1950s and the 1980s wasn’t just confined to the horror genre, but they were the genre that reflected the fears that were on the average American’s mind and made them easier to digest. Take for example Howard Hawks’ The Thing From Another World (1951), which was later remade by John Carpenter in 1982 as The Thing. Both films share the same plot: The frozen remains of alien organism are excavated by a group of American scientists in Antarctica, who discover that not only is the titular Thing alive, but it also has the ability to shapeshift into any organism it comes into contact with. A slow burn of violence and paranoia ensues as the men try to figure out who among them could be the Thing as moves throughout the base assimilating the men, sowing seeds of distrust as it picks them off one by one. Although the story is the same in both versions, the tone and way both films execute their ideas differ wildly between. In Thing From Another World, the fear stems from the sinister implications of what a shapeshifting creature is capable of doing and how effortlessly it could bring our comfortable social order to its knees by imitating our neighbors. However, in The Thing more focus is put on the infectious quality of the alien itself and how it behaves more like a super intelligent virus, leaving no symptoms until it’s too late. 

It’s not difficult to see both versions of the film as reflections of their respective times; one being a sci-fi reinterpretation of the Red Scare, the other finding its horror from the sentiments born out of the AIDS epidemic. But if you strip them both down to the framework, you’ll find the same story about being unable to trust the people you thought you knew and how that distrust can cause a formerly stable social order to fall apart. Not having all the answers is a powerful fear that anyone can identify with, as is the fear of anything different than what we’re used to. In horror, this otherness is almost always depicted as malevolent; it’s simply in the monster’s nature to do us harm, like the Thing whose ability to copy and replace organisms is milked for as much disgust as possible, a violent and brutal display of the body betraying itself on a cellular level — not unlike that of a terminal illness like AIDS, which had already spread to a number of European countries by the summer of 1982 when The Thing was released. 

And that’s arguably why movies like The Thing still retain their holding power over audiences. Each is a time capsule of the era where the attitudes, thoughts and feelings of the audience are captured through the filmmaking. Even through technological limitations and costume design, we can immediately tell when a movie was filmed, and find hilarity when the year it takes place in obviously is not the one it was shot in. 

Arguably, letting the audience draw their own conclusions from the material is more effective than just telling them what to think by feeding them the details. For a viewer who has lived through 9/11, a film about the attack like Vice (2018, dir. Adam McKay) and Reign Over Me (2007, dir. Mike Binder) would register differently than it would with a viewer who was born after 2001 or is otherwise too young to remember it. The further away the viewer is from that period of history, the deeper the disconnect between the audience and the event becomes. That piece of history is so far into the past that it’s no longer a remembered event, just a footnote that can only be experienced by people who have never lived through it. Without that emotional connection, the film loses much of its impact and relevancy. 

The changes the film industry has undergone throughout COVID-19 exemplify how the foundations of our culture can change in a short period of time. As streaming platforms continue to overtake movie theaters as the definitive filmgoing experience, media conglomerates have taken advantage of the pandemic to create content based around it, including a rapidly growing number of COVID-themed movies. Some, like Songbird (2020, dir. Adam Mason), have sold themselves around the novelty of filming a movie about the COVID pandemic during the actual pandemic. Audience reactions are varied, but what many of them seem to agree upon is that very rarely do any of these movies have something new to say about the pandemic. 

A movie like Songbird concerns itself with reaching a specific demographic — fans of viral outbreak and dystopian fiction — but never does anything to elevate itself above its subject matter. In Songbird’s case, it can never be anything other than a movie about COVID-19 because that’s what it was created to be. Take that foundation away and the rest of the film falls apart. 

It’s debatable if Songbird could have benefited from the creation of its own fictional virus. We can only speculate what sort of story it could have come up with had it simply taken all the feelings living in quarantine can inspire and did something with that instead of showing a salacious version of the world we’ve been living in for the last year and a half, but it would have at least stood on its own feet instead of relying upon help to be propped up. Contrast it with a film like A Quiet Place (2018, John Krasinksi), which also dealt with survivors struggling with isolation and loss in the wake of an apocalyptic nightmare involving a mysterious threat that grinds society to a halt. Instead of a virus, it’s a species of blind monsters who force humanity to change their lifestyles, living in silence to avoid attracting the creatures who hunt by sound. The story centers around the Abbott family’s efforts to survive on their isolated farm while trying to rebuild something resembling a normal life. However, the real focus is how the family copes with the grief of losing a child. By the end of the film, the audience is so deeply invested with the Abbotts’ survival that their wellbeing becomes just as desired as a glimpse of the monsters themselves, who are shot deliberately out-of-focus for much of the film. 

Ideally, film should be used as a method to preserve mankind’s history as much as it is a source of entertainment. Movies’ ability to connect people with the past and present is an asset that is proven to be profitable. However, achieving mainstream success is a bit more elusive, especially in an age where audiences are getting more frugal with the media they consume. Every film is struggling to be the one that’s talked about for years or at least months to come — films like Songbird and other COVID-themed movies have attempted to achieve this relevancy, but as it’s already been proven, audiences care about the content of their message just as much as the overall construction of the movie itself. Filmmakers and studios would benefit from a broad stroke approach to filmmaking and by letting audiences provide their own interpretations to the material, allowing them to claim the film as their own by giving them an platform to project their emotions and experiences onto. 

Like the 1950s, the 2020s are a good time to be watching films. But they have also been a time where we’ve had to reexamine our media consumption practices by becoming more particular with what we watch and the kinds of stories we choose to tell. Film gives us the power to make sure history is never forgotten, but to see a diluted version of it turns what could otherwise be an insightful look into the past that inspires us to think deeper about the world and ourselves into exploitation and quick, cheap way to turn a profit.