Last night I attended an interesting faculty lecture on horror films of the southwest. I am not a horror film girl at all. But the topic was pretty provocative, and I have heard wonderful things about the professor, so I went.
He showed a few very short clips from films such as Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Constantine, and Hud. (Boy, does a young Paul Newman look awfully fine!) All of these films take place in Texas or New Mexico. The professor's premise is that these films portray the horror of what has happened to the southwest and its citizens because of a changing economy. It used to be that this area was about farms and cattle ranches. As machinery and oil (especially in Texas) have taken over, people have lost their jobs, leading to many of the plot developments in the films.
It's a rather interesting idea to create a horror film as a means of deep social and economic commentary. I traditionally think of horror as nothing but pure entertainment and graphicness for those who like that kind of thing.
Leave it to the academics to find layers I never could have believed existed. But it really did make sense to me as he built and developed his lecture.
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