Come sink your teeth into a few queer questions about horror films that rub many queer fans the right way. Let’s take up Halberstam’s (1995) call to look for queer bodies in horror film that “present a monstrous arrangement of skin, flesh, social mores, pleasures, dangers and wounds.” We will take “queer forms of pleasure” in Hillyer’s Dracula’s Daughter (1936) and Bruce LaBruce’s Otto; or Up with Dead People (2008).

Equal parts special-effects marvel and revelation of cultural anxieties, the colossal movie monster has fascinated audiences since perhaps its most famous incarnation in King Kong (1933). From gargantuan radioactive ants in the 1950’s classic THEM! (1954) to the resurrected t-rex in Jurassic Park (1993), these giants seem unstoppable. But are they even possible? Nature has rules, after all. In this talk, movie monsters meet physics—and the news isn’t very good for the monsters.

L’effet spécial est indissociable du cinéma de genre et particulièrement du cinéma d’horreur qui, de par sa nature, ne peut pas ne pas montrer. Des trucs horrificos-comiques de Méliès (fondus, arrêts de manivelle, surimpressions, etc.) aux disparitions et autres transformations du cinéma actuel qui sont directement réalisées à l’intérieur du plan (les maquillages, maquettes, etc.) ou ajoutées par ordinateur (morphing, blue screen, etc.), les innovations techniques ont permis de sans cesse repousser les limites de ce qui est possible de montrer à l’écran. Les effets spéciaux ont également modifié l’esthétique cinématographique en imposant de nouveaux modes de filmage et de montage. L’art du montage d’une scène à effets consiste entre autre à trouver un équilibre entre le vrai et le faux permettant d’apprécier la virtuosité du metteur en scène ou de l’effet en lui-même. Tel un baron Frankenstein, le cinéaste morcelle l’action (plans et effets spéciaux) et la recoud par le montage (transitions, effets, mise en scène) afin soit de tromper le spectateur, soit de l’épater par les prouesses techniques accomplies. Pour qu’un effet soit réussi, il doit être filmé puis monté de la bonne manière. Comprendre la nature des effets spéciaux (son esthétique, sa technologie, son public), c’est donc par extension saisir un peu mieux le médium cinématographique, le genre horrifique et comment ce dernier (s’) est construit. Le cours se divisera en trois volets : historique, esthétique et théorique. Dans un premier temps, nous définirons ce qu’est un effet spécial puis nous inscrirons son existence et sa pratique à l’intérieur de l’histoire plus globale du cinéma et celle du cinéma de genre. Nous explorerons ensuite comment les techniques d’effets spéciaux ont transformé le genre horrifique aux niveaux esthétique, narratif et thématique. Finalement, nous aborderons les questionnements théoriques qui surgissent à propos ou en périphérie de l’effet spécial (qu’il s’agisse du cinéma des attractions ou de l’approche psychanalytique). Projections: Inferno (Giuseppe de Liguoro, 1919, Italie), The Thing (John Carpenter, 1982, États-Unis), troisième titre à determiner.

From “freaks” to “creepers,” Hollywood horror has capitalized on the “crip” body for decades. From disability as metaphor, plot device, or the manifestation of monstrosity itself, we’ll explore “freakshows” and “abnormal” bodies in films, and ask what bodies on screen can suggest about broader ideological shifts in American culture in the 1930s-40s. In this course, Cory Legassic draws links between Browning’s Freaks (1932) and Universal’s “Creeper” films, and the fall of the studio system with the 1949 Hollywood Anti-Trust Act.

In the post-WWII comics industry, superheroes were on the decline and horror stories, particularly those published by William Gaines’ EC Comics, were on the rise. These graphic morality tales — including such familiar titles as Tales from the Crypt, The Vault of Horror and The Haunt of Fear – inspired a rabid readership, but they also attracted the attention of social interest groups that accused these books of corrupting young minds. Psychiatrist Fredric Wertham, who led the public crusade against comics, argued not just that horror comics had a negative influence on their readers, but that comics as a medium was fundamentally degenerative. This lecture will historicize the rise and fall of the horror genre in post-war comics and interrogate, using specific examples from the comics, the arguments made against the medium. When possible, we will look specifically at comics that would later be adapted cinematically and/or televisually in order to compare and contrast different modes of representation. Screenings may include clips from Tales from the Crypt (dir. Freddie Francis, 1972), The Vault of Horror (dir. Roy Ward Baker, 1973), Creepshow (dir. George Romero, 1982), and Tales from the Crypt (HBO, 1989-1996).

Starting with ideas from Sigmund Freud and Anthony Vidler, this class considers homesickness as a cornerstone of the uncanny and as the imaginative center of what we will loosely call haunted house films from German Expressionism to the slasher and beyond. We will feel our way through sick, seeing, and beckoning homes: diseased structures shaped by troubled perspectives and characterized by irrational angles and impossible relations between interior and exterior. Simultaneously we will think about homesickness in the more conventional sense of the word, as we examine the narrative importance of nostalgia and the compulsion to return to safe spaces and slaughterhouses alike. Films and shows for discussion include Robert Wise’s The Haunting, the X-Files episode “Home” (1996) and Tobe Hooper’s The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974).

BASHA: FILM POSTERS Rare North American Exhibit as part of the Fantasia Film Festival Co-presented by The Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies and Spectacular Optical Friday July 26-Sunday August 4, 2013 J.A. de Seve Cinema Foyer Talk by Daniel Bird: Friday July 26, 3:30pm-4:30-pm Barbara ‘Basia’ Baranowska – best known in North America for her poster for Andrzej Zulawski’s POSSESSION – is the unsung hero of Polish poster art. Whereas the likes of Jan Lenica developed a distinct, often instantly recognizable style, Barbara Baranowska was a chameleon (as reflected in her alternating use of ‘Basia’, ‘Basha’ and ‘Bacha’ as her professional name). She donned a variety of graphic personae – from the sometimes brutal cut outs of her early Polish book jackets to voluptuous, almost psychedelic surrealism of her French film posters. -Text by Curator Daniel Bird

A filmmaker ridiculed by film critics and genre fans alike, Jean Rollin (1938-2010) has only recently begun to find acceptance in his native France. Rollin was first discussed in a positive light in the Anglo-Saxon world by British author David Pirie, who championed him as a pioneer of the sex-vampire movie in his book The Vampire Cinema (1977). However, genre fans in North America only began to see Rollin’s films in earnest when a mail-order company called Video Search of Miami released “special edition” VHS tapes of his films in 1995. Rollin’s films have been described in often paradoxical ways, from poetic and literary, to absurdist and oneiric, to technically inept and narratively impenetrable. Hence, Rollin films occupy a liminal space in film history – where art-house horror mixes with sexual taboo, where the fantastique tradition mixes with the “serial film,” and where lyricism mixes with the macabre – resulting in a disarmingly unique and personal cinematic vision. This three-week course will examine the career of Jean Rollin (aka Michel Gentil) within the specific trajectories that inform his oeuvres as a French genre filmmaker: the history of the French fantastique, the impact of the surrealist movement, the historical (and political) context of sexploitation and pornography in the 1970s and 1980s, and finally, an aspect rarely discussed about his work, the influence of the Parisian Grand-Guignol theatre (1897-1962). Note: Some of the reading material for this course will be in French.

“The universe is not only queerer than we imagine, but it is queerer than we can imagine.” — J. B. S. Haldane Can we travel through time? Can we slow the ticking of a clock? Could we watch our sun age a billion years and turn to dust, all between lunch and dinner? The answer to each of these questions, surprisingly, is ‘yes’ (mostly). Of course, movies love to play with time, but are they playing fair? This two-class course punctuated by a dazzling arrray of film and TV clips will explore time in science-fiction and in science-fact. To understand time we will dive into physics by exploring the basics of theories like Relativity and Quantum Mechanics, but we won’t dive too deep. No background in science or mathematics is required, but there will be select readings.