Protestant Horror Aesthetic
Sleepy Hollow directed by Tim Burton, 1999
Villainy wears many masks, none so dangerous as the mask of virtue.
I’ve seen a few posts presenting the case that Catholicism is inherently more compatible with the Gothic than Protestantism. That the imagery found inside a Catholic church invokes feelings of Gothic horror in ways that Protestant places of worship do not.
And I do not disagree. But there are horror stories that are predicated on a Protestant aesthetic. Stories in which the horror is specifically Calvinist in nature. Stories in which, rather than statues of Christ crying rubies and the stigmata and sexual repression, you have empty crosses in snow white sanctuaries and self abnegation and also sexual repression. So much sexual repression.
The Witch directed by Robert Eggers, 2015
Wouldst thou like the taste of butter . . . wouldst thou like to live deliciously?
The horror of The Witch is the Puritanism itself. This most rigid version of Calvinism is presented as so bleak, so cruel, so hopeless that it becomes perfectly logical that a good girl would trade her soul for the mere offer of deliciousness.
The Night of the Hunter directed by Charles Laughton, 1955
What religion do you profess, preacher?
The religion the Almighty and me worked out betwixt us.
In The Night of the Hunter, a serial murderer and con man takes on the mantle of itinerant preacher to worm his way into the household of an unfortunate widow. In one of the most chilling scenes, the preacher scolds his new wife for expecting sex on their wedding night. The film subverts the threat of rape with chaste shame and humiliation. The preacher uses Biblical language to manipulate, scold, and confuse. The preacher’s own repressed sexuality is as frightening as if he were a rapist.
Carrie directed by Brian de Palma, 1976
Carrie doesn’t make this list. While her mother’s rantings are perfect pitch Baptist preacher, there is also a lot of Catholic imagery happening. Margaret’s death is staged to recall the martrydom of St. Sebastian. I’m not sure what kind of Christian she’s supposed to be. The horror is definitely religious and fundamentalist, but it’s some kind of mix between Catholic and First Southern Hills Gothic Missionary Non-Denominational. Or something.
Feel free to add to this list. I would especially like to see some non-U.S. films or novels that utilize a Protestant Horror Aesthetic. With all the wars and murder that happened during the Reformation, there must be some.
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