Pagan Films Part II - Projecting the Horror


Looking at portrayal of Pagans in horror films

No discussion of Pagan film would be complete without touching on horror films.

Just as the "good" Christian rituals shown in horror films are High Church, Paganism and magick gets lumped in with all the things that "good Christians" are supposed to despise and fight against.

You know, sex, drugs, and blood.

Seriously though, in the typical horror film (so brilliantly set up in Scary Movie), it's pretty much a given that the first person to get naked is going to die. And if they are sexually promiscuous, it will be very bloody. And if they are homosexual (unless they are the villain), there will be some sort of not-so-subtle pun about their activities.

That is the key to understanding the horror film. It's not an attack on anybody, at least not directly. They are morality tales. These films are literally fear projections. When your theology is based on dualistic principles (of God OR not of God), everything that your religion doesn't approve of gets mixed together "on the other side."

Pagans and magick just get lumped in with all the other shadowy stuff that they are not allowed to deal with. These films are pretty gory, it's the name of the game with this genre. That doesn't mean they don't have some interesting ideas.

Don't get insulted because they are not attacking you as a Pagan, they are attacking their own fears. Horror films will seldom give Pagans a fair shake.

But then, they give mainstream religions a worse one.

Every one of these films deals with the areas of life that "aren't covered," showing a spotlight on the failings.

Projecting the fear. We just get in the way.

We're not alone there either. I wasn't aware of it for a long time, but almost every bisexual woman in film or television is sexually insatiable, incapable of forming healthy long term relationships, and often homicidal. Devout Christians are almost invariably shown as prudes, woefully out of touch, and usually intolerant of any other faith. Businessmen are almost always EEEVIILLLL!

Posted: Fri - July 28, 2006 at 04:56 PM
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