by Harry Heuser
Beyond the certifiably Gothic figures of Frankenstein and his hybrid creature, of Dr. Jekyll and his shadowy double Mr. Hyde, and the shapeshifting medieval throwback of Dracula, how does the imagination, spirit or mode we might call ‘gothic’ manifest itself? How is ‘gothic’ distinguished or even distinct from genre markers such as ‘horror’ or ‘romance’? How can the term ‘gothic’ be meaningful applied to Film Noir or murder mysteries? How does it escape detection or respond to psychoanalytic treatment?
With Significant Othering, my third A Festival of ‘(Neo-)gothic’ Film—following Treacherous Territories in 2019 and Uneasy Threshold in 2021—I am inviting debates about the boundaries and definitions of the ‘gothic’ mode in relation to genre Gothic. Through a chronological lineup of movies—some classic and canonical, others low-budget ‘programmers’ or unapologetic schlock—I aim to explore the status and development of the thriller by tracing its characters, the narratives they inhabit and the visualisation to which they are subjected, to the romantic fictions of eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in order to chart the survival, revivals and rivals of—or existential threats to—the gothic imagination.
Particular attention will be paid to female characters—as victims, victors and villains—and the ‘otherings’ to which they are subjected as spouses or siblings, as objects of desire or as subjects and suspects operating—or made to serve as—the other within systems of heteronormativity as performed, reinforced or challenged in motion pictures from the silent era and pre-code Hollywood to the collapse of the studio system.
While the screenings are open to Aberystwyth University students and staff only, I aim to discuss the films in a series of blog posts, as I have in conjunction with the previous festival, Uneasy Threshold. Those earlier posts can be accessed here as well.
18 Oct. 2023 The Lodger (dir. Alfred Hitchcock, 1927)
Uneasy Threshold”: The Lodger (1927), Trespassing and the Unhomely
25 Oct. 2023 The Old Dark House (dir. James Whale, 1932)
“Uneasy Threshold”: The Old Dark House (1932), “wildest Wales” and the Benighted Kingdom
1 Nov. 2023 The Island of Lost Souls (Erle C. Kenton, 1932)
8 Nov. 2023 Cat People (dir. Jacques Tourneur, 1942)
15 Nov. 2023 The Uninvited (dir. Lewis Allen, 1944)
“Uneasy Threshold”: The Uninvited (1944), the Sensed and the Understood
22 Nov. 2023 The Dark Mirror (dir. Robert Siodmak, 1946)
29 Nov. 2023 The Secret Beyond the Door (dir. Fritz Lang, 1947)
“Uneasy Threshold”: The Snake Pit (1948), Shock Treatment and a Straitjacket for Female Aspiration
6 Dec. 2023 Homicidal (dir. William Castle, 1961)
Harry Heuser 