I am writing about the films Twilight (Directed by Catherine Hardwicke in 2008) and Stakeland (Directed by Jim Mickle in 2010), the main focus of my essay is the development of the horror genre and I will be comparing what people would class as a conventional horror film to a unconventional version of it, and then go into depth on how they’ve have gone from one extreme to another of being shown very masculated to very emasculated, what I mean by emasculated is very humanised and not threatening at all, which is not a convention of the genre. The conventions of the Horror Genre been completely broken and the idea of a Vampire’s have been completely broken, this is shown through the costume and the camerawork although there is the stereotypical make-up used, for example the pale face. I will continue to write about how some scenes show this in the two films. The fact that Twilight has a Female director and Stakeland has a Male director could be reasons behind there extremes, as the male and female have different preferences from films and they wanted to express them.
One scene from Twilight, which shows vampires as very emasculated, is that they consider themselves as ‘Vegetarians’. This is because they only kill animals and not all the time only when they need to shown in one of the scenes in which Edward introduces Bella to his family and they speak to her about it then continue to say that they consider themselves as 'Vegaterians'. In Stakeland people fear nightfall, as the vampires are mindless killing machines that kill anything that move and it has become a apocalyptic future were people are trying to get to a safe zone, they move round in groups for safety and fear even one. One scene that backs up this point from Stakeland is when they tie up a pregnant women kill her baby and let her bleed to death like an animal.
In both Twilight and Stakeland one typical Vampire stereotype that is broken in the use of costume. For example you would expect a long black cape, smart suit, black shoes and maybe a medallion. Twilight has dressed them in your typical every day clothes which completely emasculated them as they look exactly the same as the humans it also takes aspects of fear from it. Stakeland has had a very different approach to the costume, they have took something you would associate with 'zombies' for example dirty and ripped clothing. In fact it seems as if they have based the Vampires on Zombies in some of the things they do. The make up is also that of a zombie as they do not gave the clean pale face with a bit of blood dripping from the edge of there mouth, it is more dark dirty skin with blood splattered all over there face and also in there hair, their teeth are rotting but still have the fangs. The scene which shows this would be the opening scene as once the vampire kills Martins family you get a close up of his face.
One convention broken in Stakeland is The Final Girl that you would find in a horror film. This is because although there is a female in it she does not survive all the way through and instead of coming down to one female, there are a couple of male's in the end. Although in Twilight there is a final girl 'confrontation' but she loses and it falls down to the male to come and save the day, which ends up in a fight to the death and he wins, the scene in Twilight is when she gets lead to an abandoned dance studio by the 'bad vampire' James and she tries to run but cant and tries to fight but gets knocked down then bit and as James bit Bella Edward and his family come to rescue and kill James and then Edward saves Bella . So in this case one convention is broke in both, or changed in some way. I believe that the reasons behind this for Stakeland could be because the film has been made in such a hyper masculated they did not want to have a female come out as superior and wanted to make sure man is more successful and comes out on top. The reasons behind it in Twilight could be because it is more of a love story it was a more fitting and stereotypical ending to be saved by the one she loves to prove his worth and strength to her.
When you are first introduced to the vampires in Twilight you develop no fear. This is because when they are first introduced, the main character Bella looks out the window of the school cafeteria and see’s them all walk past. It is in slow motion and you get to see all of them individually in some detail, which takes the fear out of them, it implies in some ways that it is normal to be a vampire as it is only her that is interested in it. They are all dressed in typical teenager clothes jeans, top, jackets and trainers, this scene also breaks one of the biggest conventions surrounding the genre the fact that they are out in the day light and they are not dying let alone being injured. It is a very different experience when you are first introduced to the vampires in Stakeland. In the scene you see the main character Martin and his family hiding in a barn and there dog runs of and Martin chases there dog and then hears screams, when he goes to the barn he see’s his family dead and the baby getting eaten alive by a Vampire. This shows them as brutal savage creatures the complete opposite of humanized, the lighting in the scene is very low key too and the shots are mainly of the faces this shows there fear. Its as if Stakeland is trying to counteract the effect Twilight has had on the genre by making everything hyper masculine about vampires. The reason for the change from Twilight could be because they have set out to make a Romance but replaced the characters with Vampires to get a wider audience and its also something knew that hasn't been done before which would intrigue even more people to come and watch it to see what it is like.
One of the scenes in Twilight were you really see that vampires have been Emasculated, in the scene Bella is standing in the car park and a car skids out of control Edward then uses his ‘Vampire Powers’ to save her they then pause and gaze into each others eyes. This shows vampires as extremely humanised as they are not supposed to have emotions and feelings; it is mainly shown through the camera work as it has a close up of the two gazing deeply into each other’s eyes. A scene from Stakeland is when Mister saves a nun from two bandits. When he is killing them he looks at the nun and pauses for a second and the camera focuses on him and has a close up of his face showing his emotion. This backs up my point as he is human and he is showing emotion over a person. In Twilight they even go as far as developing the emotions so when Bella is in trouble he believes it is his duty to protect her. In one scene they find out a very ‘vicious’ more ‘traditional’ vampire is hunting her. Edward and his family then protect her. This shows them very humanized as they all have developed emotions and feelings and it is not just one.
Stakeland is an independent film this means that it does not have a large budget this means that it cannot rely on CGI to carry the film, they get around this by putting heavy violence and gore into the film itself. This would compare to Twilight as it is a big budget hollywood movie which means they have access to a lot of CGI, for example instead of having Edward burn in the sunlight in the scene where he reveals himself as a vampire to Bella, his body sparkles, in another scene he carries Bella on his back jumping from tree to tree.
In Stakeland and Twilight the way that the Vampire is shown in the horror genre has changed completely, spiraling of in many different directions from being shown very masculine and feminine. During the film however you do see some of the traditional representations of a Vampire in both for example in Twilight they bite the neck and in Stakeland they can’t go out during the day. One thing that could of influenced this is the fact that the director of Twilight was a Women and the director of Stakeland was man so they could of expressed there views on what they believe vampires to be through the films. Another reason behind this is the fact that following your typical genre conventions is becoming boring and predictable this means films makers have to mix up the conventions to make it interesting again to keep the audience guessing.
