Compare and contrast essay: Horror films

Student name: Maximilian Lim Jake Yang Student ID: 0319604

“If movies are the dreams of the mass culture, horror movies are the nightmares.” Stephen King quoted. Horror movies have influenced a large part of the universal movie culture. They have shaped how we tell stories to each other in reasons to frighten each other. People enjoy offering themselves to sadistic storytellers and have themselves terrified. Fear causes these people to feel excited as bursts of adrenaline are released. And like a drug, adrenaline causes these listeners to want more. For others, they enjoy horror films because they love to test their wits. The films that I chose to compare are the Japanese psychological horror film, Ju On: The grudge and the American supernatural horror film, the conjuring. I chose these two film to compare the style in horror films in different countries and culture.

The first difference shown in both movies is the antagonist. The antagonist shown in Ju On: The Grudge is a family of three and their black cat as spirits that haunt the people who enter their house while the antagonist in The Conjuring is one evil spirit who haunts a family. The main difference between the antagonists is how they are being portrayed in the movie. In the Japanese film, each spirit has its own unique character and share an interesting background. The mother is shown as a fierce spirit who would haunt their victims by attacking them and frightening them. The boy is displayed as a timid spirit who would haunt their victims with his cat. He does not attack them but will leave their victims scared witless just by doing the simplest acts. The antagonists in this movie were inspired by Japanese folklore as they show similar traits as other horrific mythological Japanese characters. In The Conjuring, the antagonist is portrayed as a more common evil demon character that haunts her victims. Unlike the spirits in Ju On, she does not directly attack her victims. She would haunt them by using the surrounding inanimate object. For example, by slamming the door or knocking on a closet door. After a few days, she would possess her victim and take over her body. Not only that, she would rarely show her physical figure to her victims. This would cause the viewers to be curious on what she looks like. Both characters in the films display hints on what their folklores and cultures are like.

The next difference that is shown in both films is the style their story is told. In Ju on, they tell their stories in series of episodes each focused on a certain character. Each episode tells a story on how the spirit haunts each character which leads up to their death. This is a unique way to emphasize each character’s story and the terrifying techniques on how the evil spirit attacks their victims. While in The Conjuring, the story is told in sequence like how a normal story is told. For example, the poltergeist haunts the family throughout the movie as the hauntings get more and more intense.

Moreover, another difference portrayed in these two films is the environment around the movie. The Japanese film shows the everyday Japanese culture throughout the movie. For example, the building the family of evil spirits haunt in is a common Japanese household. People who live in the house practice their normal everyday culture such as, sitting on the

floor with their legs folded underneath their thighs. A normal family household is also shown in the American film with the family practising their western culture.

Besides that, the personality and the character of the victims between the two films are also shown differently. In the Japanese film, the victims are portrayed as clueless characters who are easily manipulated and overwhelmed by the spirits. In the end of each story, the character would be killed by the curse of the evil spirits and none would be able to escape alive. This also emphasizes on how powerful the curse is and how difficult it is to slip out of it. In the Conjuring, characters were smart to call in experts to help ward away the poltergeist. They were brave to fight the ghost even as she has possessed their loved one. In the end of the movie, they successfully fought off the poltergeist and continued to live their lives knowing that they are not being haunted.

In a nutshell, I feel that these two films tell their stories in their own unique styles. Both films have their own interesting ways to convey the frightening hauntings of the poltergeists. The horror genre is like music, like a song, each film has their own special way to feed the audience with emotions and captivate them psychological thrills.