CHAPTER TWO
Jeffrey Bullins
It is a dark, rainy night. A single car drives along a winding country road. Its destination is an asylum for the criminally insane. Dr. Loomis is traveling there to oversee the transfer of a dangerous, violent patient, Michael Myers, described by Loomis as “evil, pure evil.” This setting is the second scene in John Carpenter’s 1978 film Halloween. Produced on a low budget, it has become one of the most successful independent films of all time and introduced the iconic masked killer, Michael Myers. Likewise, its style and themes are conventions within the horror genre and it is an example of the “slasher” subgenre, movies that feature killers stalking babysitters, campers, sorority girls, and so on.1
These stalking killers are also tied together via another horror genre meme: mental illness. Myers escapes from the asylum in Halloween, Jason’s mother speaks in her son’s voice in Friday the 13th (dir. Sean Cunningham, 1980), and Norman Bates channels his mother in Psycho (dir. Alfred Hitchcock, 1960). Historically, the horror genre is full of antagonists who are presented or described as mentally ill. The implication of the ills’ danger is inescapable, and when asked if Myers should ever be released from the asylum, Dr. Loomis replies, “Never, never, never.”
According to Dr. Loomis’s learned assessment, there is no hope for Myers’s rehabilitation. Eventually, Loomis murders Michael to save society from Michael’s evil, not because the psychiatrist is psychopathic, like Michael, and not because he belongs to the same class of sinister cinema psychiatrists immortalized by Drs. Caligari and Mabuse.2
Halloween spawned seven sequels, a remake, and a remake sequel. The Friday the 13th series is another long-standing franchise featuring the mentally unstable Jason. Psycho had three sequels, a remake, and the recent television program Bates Motel. It seems audiences have a fascination with these types of characters, though most would likely be unable to determine if the behavior exhibited by these characters is plausible. Nonetheless, using insanity to explain why a character is exhibiting extreme antisocial behavior is a favorite device of the horror genre, which accomplishes its goal of fear with the audience frightfully pondering, “Could this actually happen!?”3
Where mental illness is historically used in horror films to simplify the reason for an antagonist, contemporary horror films are moving away from the simplistic “insane masked psychopath” meme and exploring the origins of these killers. With these characters, focus is often put on a past trauma that has caused their illness, thus explaining abnormality in psychodynamic terms and potentially garnering sympathy or personal identification from the viewer. Of course, these characters are still antagonists, but are now presented contextually.
Instead of beginning with Myers’s escape from a mental hospital, the 2007 remake of Halloween (dir. Rob Zombie) features a lengthy backstory detailing his troubled childhood. Contemporary horror films’ inclusion of back-story allows the audience insight and understanding about their antagonists. Though it does not justify his actions, perhaps the killer is not simply “pure evil,” but has been driven to this behavior by past trauma. This chapter contains an analysis of these two contrasting ways in which the horror genre presents mental illness: the known killer vs. the masked. Discussion follows on how the evolution of mental illness representation in the horror genre moved from the inherent, unexplained evilness of Halloween’s (1978) masked “Shape,” and Black Christmas’s (dir. Bob Clark, 1974) unseen Billy to the explicit elucidation of both in their 21st-century remakes.
While mentally ill antagonists are obviously a mainstay in horror, early genre films from the 1930s featured mostly supernatural threats such as vampires, mummies, and wolfmen. Though during this time the trope of the “mad” scientist was developed with characters such as Drs. Caligari and Frankenstein creating external monstrous threats. The “madness” that explains their behavior also sets a precedent for later negative representations of mental illness.
The theme of external threats continued into the 1950s with Cold War–era, atomic-age “creature features” such as Them! (dir. Gordon Douglas, 1954) and The Blob (dir. Irvin Yeaworth 1958). With 1960’s Psycho, however, a shift occurs in the genre from external, fantastic antagonism to internal threats. Psycho is considered a classic within the horror genre and with it emerges mental illness as a prevalent device in the horror genre. Instead of a “mad scientist” creating an antagonist, the “madman” is the antagonist. The extreme popularity of Psycho caused a trend of followers such as Homicidal (dir. William Castle, 1961), Paranoiac (dir. Freddie Francis, 1963), Maniac (dir. Michael Carreras 1963), and Hysteria (dir. Freddie Francis, 1965).
Otto Wahl notes that this time was a turning point where we see “psychotic killers who are not merely scientists gone mad, who kill repeatedly, and whose murders are accounted for almost solely by their insanity.”4 Thus, mental illness becomes the primary identifier for these villains. Andrew Tudor also points to the statistic that the vast majority of films featuring psychotics, over 90 percent, were released after 1960.5 The appearance of psychotics on screen in the 1960s directly correlates to the “slasher” killer of the 1970s, an antagonist also commonly identified based upon his/her mental illness.
Psycho and its contemporaries therefore mark a change from how mental illness or psychosis is presented onscreen. “If the ‘madman’ (or mad scientist) occupies a different universe, the psychotic is firmly in this one.”6 After all, the character of Norman Bates, as well as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre’s (dir. Tobe Hooper, 1974) Leatherface, is allegedly based on the actual serial killer Ed Gein. Basing a fictional character on reality may add to the fright factor of a horror film, but it perpetuates incorrect perceptions of mental illness. Hal Arkowitz states that the mentally ill are actually only responsible for three to five percent of violent crime.7 Likewise, Rob Whitley claimed in a 2011 study at the Douglas Institute that the mentally ill are actually more likely to be a victim rather than a perpetrator of violent crime.8 Yet most genre films would imply that the asylum walls are all that is protecting the public from rampaging killers.
Throughout the genre’s history, horror films have depicted characters with mental illness in various manners, but two contrasting archetypes are especially notable due to their transformation over the past 30 years: the known killer and the one who is faceless. Psycho’s Bates is an example of this first type of mentally ill antagonist. He is neither a shadowy figure nor does he wear a mask. Though we see the face of this character from the point of his introduction, Bates is indeed only exposed as mentally ill at the climax of the film. Other notable villains with a face are Silence of the Lamb’s (dir. Jonathan Demme, 1991) Hannibal Lecter, The Cell’s (dir. Tarsem Singh, 2000) Carl Stargher, and American Psycho’s (dir. Mary Harron, 2000) Patrick Bateman.
The “slasher” subgenre holds a large number of the second classification of characters: faceless killers. These films feature literally masked killers and seem unconcerned with any personal identification. Halloween’s Michael Myers, described as simply being “pure evil,” is a principal example. Also included would be Friday the 13th’s Jason Voorhees, Black Christmas’s (1974) Billy, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre’s Leatherface, and many others all the way through the Scream (dir. Wes Craven, 1996) and I Know What You Did Last Summer (dir. Jim Gillespie, 1997) franchises of the late 1990s. In the early 21st century, we also see remakes of Halloween, Friday the 13th, Black Christmas, and Texas Chainsaw. What separates the masked killers of the 1970s and 1980s, though, from their contemporary versions is the inclusion of backstory and, in most cases, a revealed face. Previously “faceless” killers are now exposed and explained.
Where the original Halloween was content to have Myers as an “evil” escaped mental patient, the 2007 remake attempts to show why he was there in the first place. The famous point-of-view opening of the original, in which Myers kills his sister, does not extrapolate as to why he did it; the fact he was just born “evil” is enough. Black Christmas’s Billy breaks into a sorority house and starts killing indiscriminately. It isn’t until the 2006 remake that he is determined to be an escaped mental patient. Many early slasher films seem content to use the “insanity” excuse for their killers, with contemporary versions giving further explanation and thus allowing the audience the opportunity to identify with a previously “inhuman” character. Mental illness is thus the explanation as to why violent characters act the way they do, even though this lacks any realistic evidence.
The introduction and evolution of the mentally ill killer appears to be a product not only of cultural and social changes of the time, but also psychological research and the public’s awareness of it. The majority of the viewing public is most likely aware of but unfamiliar with the realities of mental illness. Like fictional portrayals, sensationalized media coverage of real-world events can influence the public’s opinion of it. In discussing tragic events such as a mass shooting at Virginia Tech and an attempt on the life of an Arizona congresswoman, Arkowitz states, “These events and the accompanying media coverage have probably fed the public’s perception that most profoundly mentally ill people are violent. Surveys show that 60 to 80 percent of the public believes that those diagnosed with schizophrenia, in particular, are likely to commit violent acts.”9 Likewise, the tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School on December 14, 2012, sparked discussions on not just gun control but about the mentally ill, the effectiveness of their treatment, and efforts to make sure they do not have access to firearms. This latter point again suggesting that it is not a matter of if, but when, a mentally ill individual will commit a violent act.
Just as a juicy headline attracts readers, the horror genre is also cashing in on the public’s misguided view of mental illness. Horror is, of course, not the only genre that features stories about mental illness or is set in mental hospitals, but it has historically treated mental illness as almost exclusively negative. The evil, escaped mental patient is an easy go-to for an antagonist, so much so that, in the case of films such as Halloween (1978), The Driller Killer (dir. Abel Ferrara, 1979), and When a Stranger Calls (dir. Fred Walton, 1979), further explanation or backstory may not be necessary. Wahl states, “Along with the notion that mentally disordered characters are fundamentally evil rather than ill, there is also the frequent suggestion that those with mental illnesses do not get better with treatment—and thus they remain violent and dangerous.”10
While films in other genres may attempt to depict mental illness in a more positive way than horror, their impact with regard to public opinion may be no better. A study by George Domino into reactions by college students to One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (dir. Milos Forman, 1975) revealed those who had seen the film had more negative opinions about mental illness than those who had not seen it. Further, students who then watched a documentary with a more realistic portrayal of mental illness claimed their opinions of it became even more negative. Referencing this study, Priscilla March notes, “non-stigmatizing information does not counteract the effects of dramatic portrayals of the violent as mentally ill.”11
These negative opinions do not stop at the doorway to the movie theater, but translate directly to the real world. In an extensive study by Wahl on the stigma of mental illness, the effectiveness of positive portrayals is questioned by stating, “The media’s coverage of mental illness and policies affecting people with these illnesses are still largely stigmatizing and discriminatory.”12 What follows is daily discrimination targeted towards the mentally ill. In the same study, one patient recounts taking her son to see the Nickelodeon children’s movie Good Burger (dir. Brian Robbins, 1997). As innocuous as the film may seem, she was surprised and upset by a scene in the middle of the film that had the characters going to “Demented Hills Asylum” where patients were hyperbolically abnormal. While humor at the expense of mental illness may seem harmless to some, this patient was genuinely offended and worried if the depiction of mental illness in the film would influence her son’s opinion of her. As long as opinions and representations of mental illness continue to be misguided, it follows that films will exploit them to meet their ends: horror to frighten or comedy to amuse.
A 1984 study by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) determined that “thirty to forty million Americans, in any given six-month period, will be suffering from a diagnosable mental disorder and that, over the course of a lifetime, one out of every five citizens in this country will experience a significant mental illness.”13 That NIMH study was completed over 30 years ago. Since that time, prescriptions for psychotropic medications have soared, so much so that antipsychotic medications number among the most popular and profitable medications on the market.14 Mental illness is something, therefore, that could affect any range of persons. The potential for mental illness in anyone is what feeds the horror genre’s convention of the psychopathic killer. He is at once an external, malignant force and an internal representation. Contemporary horror films subsequently mix these two by providing previously masked antagonists with faces, backstories, and identifiability.
By the time Halloween was released in 1978, identification with the antagonist was not readily apparent, nor was it part of the film’s focus. From the beginning of the film, we understand that Myers is an evil, external force. He is a faceless killer, escaped from the mental hospital. There is very little to which the audience can connect. Therefore, the viewer instead must side with Dr. Loomis and accept the fact that Myers is evil. This is not the case in the 2007 remake where Myers is given a face and close to an hour’s worth of backstory. Here one sees a turn towards a method of characterization that humanizes and gives a face to the antagonist.
In his discussion of the original and remade Halloween movies, Andrew Nelson makes the claim that Myers is presented as a fantastic, unexplainable force in the original but in the remake is demystified using “pop psychology.” He goes on to state that in the remake Myers “rather than being an entity… is a character.”15 Thus, Myers is given a face both literally and figuratively. Instead of having to accept him as simply “evil,” we are now given reasons as to why he behaves as he does. Likewise, in films such as Silence of the Lambs, The Cell, and Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning (dir. Jonathan Liebesman, 2006), the conventional theme of “early trauma and horrific child abuse creates a monstrous adult”16 is evident. However, just because an audience is given reasons as to why an antagonist exhibits extreme antisocial behavior does not mean that its opinion of mental illness is improved.
Like Halloween, the remake of Black Christmas (dir. Glen Morgan, 2006) gives extensive backstory to the killer. In the 1974 original, the antagonist, Billy, is unseen through the majority of the film, though there is extensive use of point-of-view (POV) shots. The opening of the film features a POV of Billy climbing into the attic of a sorority house, where he will go on to terrorize and kill the residents. This is the only introduction to the killer that the audience gets. Like Myers, he is faceless, and though we know that he is a person, he maintains externality due to his anonymity. 2006’s Black Christmas gives a full backstory to Billy. He is an escaped mental patient who is returning to his childhood home where he endured trauma and abuse. Like Halloween (2007), the audience is shown traumatizing events from the antagonist’s childhood. Billy suffers from untreated jaundice that causes his skin to appear yellow and is kept in the attic. While there, he sires his sister-daughter with whom he later teams up in order to terrorize the coeds. Though the convention of adding backstory here is similar to that of Halloween, adding the elements of physical deformity and incest seems to distance the audience from an otherwise more identifiable character. Here we see an antagonist whose actions are explained, but who remains alienated from the viewer. Similar to Loomis’s attitude toward Myers at the beginning of the original Halloween, Billy is to be locked up in an asylum with no hope of release. While in the remake of Halloween the audience sees Myers attempt rehabilitation and therapy, Billy merely waits for his opportunity to escape his hospital and begin killing.
The addition of the element of Billy’s physical abnormality follows a trend observed by Wahl in which “those with mental illnesses are recognizably different from others in both manner and appearance, they stand out as deviant and bizarre.”17 While it would be difficult to try and determine if a person is mentally ill by just examining their appearance, the suggestion of physical change due to mental illness adds to the otherness of the character. While Myers’s and Friday the 13th’s Jason’s faces are obscured by masks, it is still understood that they hide physical deformities. Likewise, in the 1978 film, Dr. Loomis, in speaking of meeting Myers, claims that he had “the blackest eyes. The devil’s eyes….What was living behind that boy’s eyes was purely and simply evil.” In the remake Dr. Loomis states dramatically, “These are the eyes of a psychopath.”
Suggesting that mental abnormalities may manifest as physical allows the viewer the comfort of knowing they are not like the character on screen. Thus a contradiction appears between giving the audience knowledge and understanding of the character, but at the same time using physical difference as a separator. Tudor comments, “The typical threat, that of psychosis, is internal—generated within human beings—although in other respects the psychotic’s relation to his or her victims is much the same as that of any externally threatening monster.”18
It is noteworthy that the examples above concern male escapees from mental institutions, largely because men are overrepresented in such tropes about escaped mental patients and also because males in general are perceived to be more lethal than females, making their threats all the more ominous. Films such as Fatal Attraction (dir. Adrien Lyne, 1987) temporarily deflected attention onto temporarily psychotic female assailants, such as Glenn Close’s portrayal of Beth, a jilted book editor who pursues her one-night stand with a vengeance. In spite of her imbalance, Beth is not fully psychotic—she functions well enough in the real world to hold an impressive position at a publishing company. Before the action starts, she lives in a world that is far away from the institutions inhabited by incarcerated killers like Michael Myers.
Wahl notes, “Films about mentally ill villains provide the fear, suspense, and sometimes dramatic special effects necessary to engage paying audiences.”19 Though simplistic categorization of antagonists as “evil” has changed via backstory extrapolation, mental illness remains an explanation for their behavior. One must remember that these sensationalized depictions of mental illness are used to fill those theater seats, and as long as misconceptions continue, then the meme of the escaped mental patient will persist in the horror film.
Notes
1. See related studies in Jeffrey Bullins, “Know Your Killer: Changing Portrayals of Psychosis in Horror Films,” in A History of Evil in American Popular Culture: What Hannibal Lecter, Steven King and Zombies Reveal about America (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2014). Editors Sharon Packer and Jody Pennington focus on the evilness of Michael Myers, whereas this essay focuses on the stereotyped portrayals of male escaped mental patients in movies.
2. Sharon Packer, Cinema’s Sinister Psychiatrists (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2012).
3. Other studies such as Patricia Owen’s “Portrayals of Schizophrenia by Entertainment Media: A Content Analysis of Contemporary Movies” featured in the Psychiatric Services 2012 journal have used empirical data to determine that stereotypes of the mentally ill are rampant in film and television, and that these stereotypes contribute to negative opinions. However, beyond identifying this issue, less has been said about the underlying reasons as to why this persists and how to combat it. Much research from the mental health community tends to focus on psychiatric issues and their prevalence in media, but do not consider factors from a media studies perspective such as historical film conventions, audience’s expectations and receptions, and industry economics.
4. Otto Wahl, Media Madness (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1995), 56.
5. Andrew Tudor, Monsters and Mad Scientists: A Cultural History of the Horror Movie (Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell, 1989), 20.
6. James Marriott, Horror Films (London: Virgin Books, 2004), 83.
7. Hal Arkowitz, “Deranged and Dangerous?” Scientific American Mind 22 (2011): 3, accessed November 15, 2011, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/deranged-and-dangerous/.
8. Rob Whitley, “Myths of Madness: Media Representations of Mental Illness,” last modified January 13, 2012, http://www.youtube.com/user/recoverymentalhealth, 8:55.
9. Arkowitz, “Deranged and Dangerous,” 1.
10. Wahl, Media Madness, 76.
11. Priscilla March, “Ethical Responses to Media Depictions of Mental Illness,” Journal of Humanistic Counseling, Education and Development (1999): 70–79, 70.
12. Otto Wahl, Telling Is Risky Business (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1999), x.
13. Wahl, Media Madness, 47.
14. Allen Francis, Saving Normal (New York: William Morrow, 2013).
15. Andrew Nelson, “Traumatic Childhood Now Included,” in American Horror Film, ed. Steffen Hantke (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2010), 107.
16. Nelson, “Traumatic Childhood,” 126.
17. Wahl, Media Madness, 37.
18. Tudor, Monsters and Mad Scientists, 10.
19. Wahl, Media Madness, 58.