Home | Reviews | Chats | About | Articles

The Yank-Lime Pie Story

Yankee Origins: Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3

Limey Origins: Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3

31/10/2009

Limey Origins
Part Two: A 90's Child into Classic Horror

By Limey

I think it is safe to say that this has been much harder for me to write than part one in our Origins trilogy, which is why it has taken me an entire year to finally complete it. OK, so that isn't strictly true; I've only been writing for a week or so but it has definitely been a greater challenge to write than the first article in the series.

The greatest challenge came in the form of simply deciding what point I was trying to make. That I was born in 1987 and became a fan of a genre that during the last nine years – or what would traditionally be called ‘my decade' – has regular topped the box office and home video charts hardly seemed article worthy.

It all became clear when I reminded myself that the majority of those chart toppers are remakes of the very films that made me a horror fan. While far too young to legally watch them to begin with, I nevertheless spent my early years becoming familiar with many classic horror films and franchises, particularly those of the eighties.

The eighties are where my horror education came grinding to a halt, too. I was dimly aware that the genre had lost some of its appeal by the time the nineties were in full swing. There were a few small successes, both financially and creatively, but for most of the decade, horror found itself out in the cold.

This lack of support for the genre at both studio and audience level finally came to an end with the release of Scream, an extremely rare example of a nineties horror movie that found both financial and creative success. It may have parodied previous slasher flicks but it also paid homage to them and its success looked to be the rebirth of the genre - and in some ways I suppose it was.

However, the renaissance was not all that many had been hoping for. Horror was back, but as a pale imitation of itself where the studios tried to emulate the success of Scream by releasing one glossy, shallow, ‘witty' teen flick after another. Whereas in the past the never ending franchises had at least been started by a film that strived to be creative, this new subgenre had a very basic formula that everyone followed.

Thankfully, it didn't last very long and after a brief transition period which saw the release of greats like The Blair Witch Project and some more generic teen flicks, it looked like the horror genre was now on its way to a creative rebirth as well.

Intelligent films with a story to tell were being released all over the world, many original and a few remakes that were done for the right reasons – because there was still something worth saying and technological improvements to be made. Yes, there were still some poor decisions being made and some cheap, soulless films being released, but for the most part things seemed to be on the up.

Then two things happened: First was Saw, a film that surely took everyone by surprise and received an enormous amount of attention and success. The desire to repeat that success was as strong as it ever has been, however, and it spawned a never ending series of films reminiscent of the eighties.

While there is a part of me that loves having a franchise like those I grew up watching on home video to call my own, there is still something a little bit sad about the yearly entry into the series. I enjoy them, but they have long since stopped even trying to do something new and their continued success has led to less time and money being given to new, fresh horror stories.

The second death knell for creativity was when studios realised they could remake practically any horror movie ever made and make a shed load of money. Whereas the majority of remakes of the past were at least attempting to pay tribute to and improve upon the original, the majority today are content with being direct copies of movies that did not need remaking in the first place.

And that is my point. I grew up at time when horror was a much maligned genre, and just when it seemed like the good of the nineteen eighties – the creativity – was set to turn things around, it was joined by the bad – the endless sequels – before finally the eighties themselves made a comeback in the form of remakes that had left the most important aspect of a film – its soul – two decades in the past.

That is how things stand today. There are still good horror films to be found, but the days when the most successful movies were also the best have yet to return.

©2009, 2008 Yank-Lime Pie. All rights reserved.