Alexandrea Callaghan

One of my favorite things about studying film is studying genre, tropes and patterns. I feel like it makes me a better screenwriter and a better critic. Studying these things helps us understand structure, pacing, expectations and how to subvert them. We are going to start with a genre that I’ve been fascinated with since I was a relatively young child, Horror. My obsession with horror movies began when I was 9 years old and I sat on the couch to watch a movie with my father, he assured and reassured me that the movie was rated PG13, the movie was The Ferryman and I spent the next few hours watching him play video games because I was terrified to walk down the 5 foot dark hallway by myself. But that experience set off a scary movie kick that lasted a few years and followed me into adulthood. So what I would like to do is lay out the history of the horror genre and study how it has evolved, some of its most iconic installments and its best and worst additions.