2025美国恐怖·纪录片
导演：Donna Davies
演员：Alexandra Heller·Nicholas 罗克珊·本杰明 阿克拉·库珀
From the silent era until today, the nightmares that have haunted our screen have been sculpted and embodied by women, but many of those artists have gone unrecognised – a historical oversight this documentary duly takes a chainsaw to.
Is horror a man’s world? You might assume so – but you won’t be thinking that way for long once you investigate the vast contribution women have made to horror movies for well over a century. In 2020, award-winning Australian critic Alexandra Heller-Nicholas released the definitive book on the subject: 1000 Women in Horror, 1895–2018, an encyclopaedic work celebrating the many women – filmmakers, actors, producers and technicians – who have shaped the genre since the moment cinema’s light first flickered.
In her complementary documentary, US director Donna Davies interviews a stack of powerhouse women in the horror scene, and assembles a bevy of clips from classic and little-known films that women have left their mark on. From filmmaker and programmer Kier-la Janisse (Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched: A History of Folk Horror, MIFF 2021) and veteran performer Lin Shaye (A Nightmare on Elm Street; the Insidious franchise) to legendary Melbourne film scholars Cerise Howard and Heller-Nicholas herself, interviewees share their personal relationship with horror, addressing each theme the documentary explores sequentially: pregnancy, dolls, ageing, final girls and menstruation, to name just a few. Offering insights into the gender politics often explored through the genre, it’s a discussion that will continue even after you leave the cinema – while the smorgasbord of films referenced will have you scrambling for a pen and paper to take notes.
”Sit down, little boys; the grown-ups are talking.” – Alexandra Heller-Nicholas
