We are a little under a month removed the Halloween
season that is known for its scary horror films. Horror is one of my favorite
genres because I love being on the edge of my seat and imagine what I would do
if I were placed in the weird predicaments the characters find themselves in.
The problem that lies in this genre though is that it marginalizes a big part
of its audience, black people. The representation of black people in horror is
poor and troublesome, if represented at all. The running joke amongst the black
community is there is no need to go see horror films because the one black
person is going to die first. Complex magazine did a study to show that this is
not always true, in their study of fifty horror films the black character only
died first ten percent of the time although that killed a preconceived notion
of the horror genre in a small sample size, it does not address the numerous
problems that are present[1].
The mortality rate of black characters is extremely high for the small amount
of representation they have. The roles of black characters often play up
stereotypes of being comedic relief with very little background given in their
back stories outside of being cordial with their white companions in the film.
The more we have talked in class, the more I have come to the realization that
this is a lot like the master narrative except it is taking place on a cinema
screen. Most horror films are from the perspective of bland characters as we
learn their background the black character is sprinkled in just enough to not
forget about his presence with his comedic relief until his untimely death. The
black character is deemed unimportant to the ultimate success of the white lone
survivor much like the master narrative and was a grand martyr ultimately
leading to the demise of the killer.
The only time to my knowledge that the minority makes it to the end of a horror
film are in Wayans Brothers spoofs or when the film has a black director. Get Out, a film by Jordan Peele,
continued this trend of letting the black character live while amending the
common practice of his contemporaries of using the black character as screen
candy to add a little color to the screen. Peele flips the script on Hollywood by
utilizing Chris, the leading black character, by giving him a story arc, shows
emotion, and is hardly ever used for comedic relief in this slow burn horror
discussing racial dynamics in interracial relationships in America. It became
the highest grossing film this year. This would be the opposite of the master
narrative, the black man reclaiming his stake in a world that has marginalized
him since the genre’s inception.
[1] Barone, Matt. “Fact Check: Do Black Characters Always Die
First in Horror Movies?” Complex, Complex, 20 Oct. 2016,
www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/10/black-characters-horror-movies/.
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Hey, this is a very interesting post. Get Out obviously references many tenets of the horror genre, but I think that the parallels it draws most are with zombie films. The film uses the zombie genre rather heavily as a metaphor for the existence of black people trapped in a hegemonic society that crafts a performative role for them. In addition, this choice to so heavily draw from the zombie film is doubtless a reference to George Romero's 1968 film Night of the Living Dead. In that film, the protagonist, Ben, is a black man who manages to be the sole survivor of his group under the onslaught of the white Zombies only to be mistaken for a zombie by the police and killed. While this film does not truly allow the black character to live until the end of the film, it does make important statements about race. Importantly, the black hero survives the attacks of the dead whites. And obviously, the film ends with a display of white violence, making a statement about race relations in the country. Get out draws heavily on this film, using many of its themes to show black people resisting destruction at the hands of white people.
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