Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Part I The Industrial Context of the Splat Pack
- 1 Introducing the Splat Pack
- 2 Politics and the horror film: an industry studies intervention
- 3 The DVD revolution and the horror film, take one: from trash to art to collectable
- 4 The DVD revolution and the horror film, take two: rise of the ‘Unrated’
- Part II The Splat Pack on DVD
- Afterword
- Bibliography
- Filmography
- DVD supplemental material referenced
- Index
2 - Politics and the horror film: an industry studies intervention
from Part I - The Industrial Context of the Splat Pack
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 August 2016
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Part I The Industrial Context of the Splat Pack
- 1 Introducing the Splat Pack
- 2 Politics and the horror film: an industry studies intervention
- 3 The DVD revolution and the horror film, take one: from trash to art to collectable
- 4 The DVD revolution and the horror film, take two: rise of the ‘Unrated’
- Part II The Splat Pack on DVD
- Afterword
- Bibliography
- Filmography
- DVD supplemental material referenced
- Index
Summary
REVISITING THE ‘GOLDEN AGE’
Films by directors from the horror film's ‘Golden Age’ in the late 1960s and early 1970s set the standard for Splat Pack directors. Splat Packers like Roth, Aja and Marshall have often noted their admiration of films from the 1970s because of their uncompromising ferociousness, bloody gore and subversive stance. A media industry study analysis reveals, however, that they are less subversive when considered in their industrial context. Many scholars have read ‘Golden Age’ horror films as symptoms of a country in trauma after the violence of Vietnam and the disillusionment of Watergate. These readings are incomplete, however, without an acknowledgement that the success of ‘politically progressive’ fare such as Night of the Living Dead and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre also represented Hollywood's willingness to rely on independent productions during a time of transition for the film industry. While the studios were rebounding from a crippling recession, Hollywood was also making the transition from a film industry to a horizontal media industry. A key element in this transition was television, a medium that had profound implications for how Hollywood made, packaged and sold films. Writing about the study of film genre, Steve Neale has called for film scholars to ‘[go] beyond film content to study advertising, the star system, and studio policy, and so on in relation to the production of films’ (2003: 180–1). Given this imperative, it is important to offer an overview of the economic situation that gave rise to the ‘Golden Age’ of horror films.
The glut of horror films featuring new levels of adult content released during the ‘Golden Age’ and the films of the Splat Pack were both facilitated by economic decisions and changes in industry self-regulation. Jack Valenti, then president of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), created a new ratings system in 1968 that helped Hollywood attract audiences into cinemas. This shift in industry self-regulation foreshadows the flood of ‘Unrated’ films on DVD which followed in the wake of the ‘DVD revolution’ that encouraged the wave of films from the Splat Pack. Television also plays a part in engendering the films of horror's ‘Golden Age’ as well as those of the Splat Pack.
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- Information
- Selling the Splat PackThe DVD Revolution and the American Horror Film, pp. 27 - 47Publisher: Edinburgh University PressPrint publication year: 2014