IF films die, then there must be graveyards for these deceased films.
I think of horror films as dead films. There is no hope—technically—in horror films. There should be no hope in them. Or, they will not be terrifying. If there is a kind of return, a hopeful glance in these terrifying films, it is that evil does not rest. Always at the end of the film, as characters leave the site of dreadful terror, the camera would manage to stay behind to catch a door ajar creaking open, or a window slowly opening as if someone is bidding goodbye to the victims as the house awaits for the next.
For several years now, I have been asked to come up with a list of top 10 most horrifying films of all time. I manage always to come up with 10, although, if allowed, there could be 20 top horror films. But 10 it is. At the top of the deathly heap was always The Exorcist (1973). The film is from the pen of William Peter Blatty and directed by William Friedkin. The film undisputedly resurrected the power of evil—unabashed, gloriously defiant evil.
I believe—and belief is a prerequisite to the power of the macabre—when listing time comes, The Exorcist will once more lord it over the other cinematic minions.
Listing, however, can be tiring. This year, I’m for remembering scenes that terrified me, scenes that came back to me solid in sleep, awakening me and leaving me all sweaty. Actually, I did not sweat when I woke up from those horror film-induced dreams; I just like thinking I did sweat…as in movies.
The exercise of remembering the scariest scenes is part of my desire to know how much of cinema is in our fears. Perhaps, just like John Irving in his book The World According to Garp, it is better to imagine something than to remember something. In this remembrance of the fearful past, I have imagined more than remembered, finding more solace in the imagination than in the memory. The admission to more imagination can be my excuse if I do mix up scenes in one film with those in another. Be that as it may, here is the trip down gothic and gory memory/imagined lane.
I think I was already in high school when I went to the cinema to watch Phantom of the Paradise (1974). It starred Paul Williams who had this scary but bluesy voice. In the film, he plays Swan, a character who is the antagonist to the Phantom. There are many scary scenes in the film, like when Swan locks the Phantom in a recording studio. That is one terrible scene, career-wise. Anyway, that is not part of my remembering. What I feared most then was this scene where the Phantom was playing on the organ an eerie and sad and solemn music. It was not so much the music as the fact that the man had his back turned against the audience—or me. Would he turn around? What would his face look like? He never turned around. The anticipation was the seed of the unease.
It would take several years in the future when I would get to know Lon Chaney, the Phantom of the Opera of the silent-film era. I would also realize that Lon Chaney could transform himself into images of dread. The skills of the makeup artist in that period, when no other technologies were available, enabled the actor to transform himself into incredible creatures.
There was, however, something in Lon Chaney that indicated anxiety and emotional disturbance. YouTube has immortalized Chaney’s dark gift in that majestic unmasking scene where Christine approaches the Phantom from behind to pull the mask from his face. As she is about to touch the mask, Chaney moves. The woman attempts to do it the second time and succeeds. The camera moves in front and seizes the face of the Phantom. The woman falls to the ground and the Phantom comes down from the dais. The camera catches the cadaverous face—a surefire formula for a series of sleepless nights. In another silent film, The Immigrant, Lon Chaney’s Chinese laborer is more terrifying than all the freak bodies he inhabited. Lon Chaney did not just transform; he metamorphosed. Reality, after all, can be spooky.
Outstanding, however, in the nerve-wracking images Lon Chaney conjured was what the actor was always quoted for—the humanizing element deep within the mutilated or anguished figure.
Of all denizens of the ghastly night, Dracula remains the most exploited of them all. Vampires are anomalous personas straddling the exciting and the abominable. Christopher Lee is a favorite. My boyhood was cinematically witnessed by vampires, werewolves and Herculeses. Even as a young boy, I already wondered about the lack of common sense among those who dared venture into the lair of Dracula. Those searching for vampires would often travel miles and miles and, instead of stopping at some inn, would go directly to Dracula’s castle where coffins doubling as daybeds abound. The horizon would dim and I know that before they could bury a stake into the heart of the sleeping throat-slasher, he would wake up and kill them all. Somehow, there would always be Peter Cushing playing, the original vampire slayer. Christoper Lee was good until Peter Cushing came along. Cushing was Van Helsing and Van Helsing was Cushing. With him around, I was assured I could escape the clutches of any vampire. With the aid of silver bullets.
Again, when finally the silent films were resurrected from the dustbin and archives, I would discover Bela Lugosi. “I am Dracula”—that intro uttered in an accent that was certifiably Eastern European (Hungarian really) sealed the fate of the actor.
He is the Undead, now and forever.
YouTube can show us the power of the first Dracula in that scene where Lugosi comes down a super-expanded, grand-as-grand-can-be staircase. With the candelabra in one hand, head tilted for drama, Lugosi/Dracula evokes for us the concept that monsters can be elegant and well-mannered. In that scene, Dracula has stepped out, cape and all, to welcome a stranger who seems lost. Lugosi/Dracula looks into the eyes of the man and bids him welcome. The vampire makes a flamboyant turn worthy of the production design; the man, glassy eyed, follows Dracula. What is the visitor expecting, bed and breakfast? This was the 1930s and gay reading was a mere speck in the universe of film readers then.
The scene of this 1931 movie is again available on YouTube. View the clips and get to know where bookstores and cafes get their inspiration for Halloween window displays. The cobwebs are classic.
The second time a truly mesmerizing scene involving a staircase happens, is when Gloria Swanson as Norma Desmond slithers down one and announces to all that she is ready for her close-up. That was not only terrifying; that was disturbing.
Filipino filmmakers have really never developed the knack for making horror films, or films that make us tremble in fear. Always in theaters, people laugh and giggle during moments that are supposed to scare the bejeezus out of us. For one, we really never took any of the Dracula stories seriously. In the 1970s at the height of the so-called bomba films—movies that were qualified as soft-porn—there was the irrepressible Batuta ni Dracula. In English, that title would be “Dracula’s Nightstick,” right? Now that is hideous.
If Hollywood had Bela Lugosi, Lon Chaney and Boris Karloff, the last one famous for his portrayal of Frankenstein’s monster, the Philippines had Monang Carvajal. She was intimidating even without makeup. Carvajal was dubbed the Queen of Horror Pictures long before Lilia Cuntapay parlayed her aswang charm in indie films.