Return of the Repressed

Freud invented the term "return of the repressed" to explain the existence of neurotic (mental disorders involving distress) symptoms. He said that basic, primal urges derived from a persons ID, such as the desire to kill, extreme rage etc, have to be repressed so that a person can become part of society. However when this is done the urge doesn’t disappear. Instead it is constantly trying to re-enter awareness and be put into action. The Ego would try and prevent it from being expressed but it would disguise itself and surface as a symptom.

This can be linked to horror films because certain characters could often be said to be suffering from the return of the repressed, especially when there is an event in childhood that could cause them to kill. This implies before they killed they were repressing a desire to do so, for various reasons. Then for whatever reason their Ego fails to keep the desire repressed and they kill. This could be said to be happening in Halloween. As Michael Myers picks a knife up upon entering the house it is likely that the things he sees through the window he recognizes as something he has seen before. This causes his repressed feelings to break through his Ego under disguise and express themselves in his murders. The transformation of a person to a werewolf could also be seen as a return of the repressed. When a person is bitten in a horror film they more often than not go into denial and repress the event. Then the next time there is a full moon the “return of the repressed” is shown in the transformation and subsequent activities. This idea can also be linked to horror in a more general sense. In the film 'The Fog' the founders of a town murder a boat of lepers. The founders, and therefore the town itself, then must repress this event so they can function as part of society. However the murdered lepers can't be repressed and return in the form of ghosts or 'fog' in order to seek vengeance on the town that killed them.

There are even links of the "return of the repressed" within the Gothic literature from which horror has it roots. Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde could be seen as an interpretation of this. Dr Jekyll is a respectable man and therefore may have to repress even more urges than most of society. So when his ID finds a way to release his urges through the potion, he transforms into an entirely different person which eventually overcomes him. This clip shows how happy Dr Jekyll's evil side is to be free.