How Does the Horror Genre Represent Gender?

It has been suggested that horror is a progressive genre in terms of its representation of gender, whereas others think it is as conservative as many other genres. To investigate this I will be looking at three films from the genre; Halloween (1978), The Shining (1982) and Eden Lake (2008).

One of the ways we can establish how the horror genre represents gender is to look at the characters and their visibility. This is important because traditionally males have a much higher visibility in the media than females and therefore for the horror genre to be progressive the visibility needs to be more equal. In the film Halloween there seems to be a fairly even split between the sexes with six females and six males, although the size of their roles do vary. This is quite significantly different to the character ratio in The Shining. In this film men outnumber women 2:1, which is much more conservative than the ratio in Halloween. This is surprising considering the amount of females in the media is supposed to be growing and yet The Shining was made in 1982 and Halloween in 1978. Eden Lake continues this pattern further because again there is a 2:1 male to female ratio. This film was made in 2008 and therefore would suggest that as time goes on horror films are becoming more male dominated.

In the media women are generally represented to fit into one or more of four principal roles. These roles are: sexual, domestic, consumer and familiar. We can see evidence of these roles in Halloween. The main protagonist's friends Lynda and Annie are seen in a sexual role. Lynda is seen with a boyfriend before and after sex, Annie is seen in her underwear and is killed as she leaves to meet her boyfriend (As seen in the video to the right).

During the course of the film there are lots of females doing domestic work such as babysitting, cooking etc. The familial role is also seen as the women in the film are defined through their relationships with other characters, usually men. An example of this is Annie's dad being the sheriff; she becomes the sheriff's daughter, just as Judith Myers is known principally as killer Mike Myers sister. We don't see any females in the role of the consumer in this film, or in The Shining, although the other three roles are there as well. Wendy is domestic as she is portrayed as a passive, weak, submissive housewife, although occasionally she is seen in overalls doing Jacks work. She is also seen in a familial role because she is defined through her relationships with men, she is a wife to Jack and a mother to Danny. The woman in the bath fulfils the sexual role. We are supposed to see her from Jack's point of view as a young, sexy, naked woman. There is also no obvious consumer role in Eden Lake. However the women do once again fit the other three roles. The main protagonist, Jenny, although employed has a stereotypical 'caring' job, making her familial. Further to this she accepts her boyfriend's engagement ring implying she would like to marry him. She is also seen as sexual to some extent, although this isn't a particularly laboured point. Another of the characters in Eden Lake, Paige, could be seen to subvert the usual female roles because she is quite aggressive to outsiders; however she is very submissive within the gang. Overall every female in these films seem to fit one or more of the roles, therefore again suggesting horror films are quite conservative.

Another way we can see how gender is represented within the genre is to look at how the male gaze is used. The genre would be progressive if there wasn't a male gaze being used to objectify the women in the films. In Halloween, although minor female characters like Lynda and Annie are objectified, the film still offers a principle point of identification with a female. This female, Laurie, is seen as androgynous for several reasons. First of all there is her name, which could be used for a male, then there is the fact she is not sexualised and finally that she has a 'masculine' look and costume. However there is a sexualised murder at the start of the film, which we see from the murderer's perspective. The point of identification in Halloween is similar to the one in The Shining. In The Shining we identify with Wendy for much of the film however like Laurie we don't objectify her. There is a character we do objectify and that is the naked woman in the bath. However this initial objectification is undermined by her subsequent switch to a dead body. In Eden Lake there is also a female point of identification as opposed to the objectification of her. The gang members do look at her in a sexual way however camerawork and editing makes the audience understand how she feels instead of them. The fact that all three films have a final girl who we identify with is a progressive idea, which could be seen as able to override the conservative notion of having a few minor characters objectified. Carol Clover looked at this idea in her book 'Men, Women and Chainsaws' and she believes having a female point of identification instead of a male gaze is important, despite the fact the audience for horror films is thought to be primarily male.
Finally we can look at any narrative issues that may have had an effect on how gender is represented. In Halloween teenagers appear to be punished for having sex, such as in the cases of Judith, Annie, Lynda and her boyfriend, which is a very conservative idea. In terms of murders more women than men die as three women die and only two men do. The narrative issues in The Shining are quite similar, involving things like the final girl getting away. However whilst the deaths in The Shining are more gender even the percentage of females who die is much higher. The deaths in Eden Lake go the opposite way to Halloween, with more males dying. However all the females with named roles do die (or have implied deaths), whereas many of the males survive. Concerning narrative issues there doesn't seem to be a pattern in the gender of the people who die, however the fact more males die in the newer film would suggest it is progressive.


How the horror genre represents gender can be broken down into several categories so there isn't likely to ever be one complete answer. However from looking at the three different films I think overall the genre is too conservative in its approach to be considered anything else, despite its progressive elements. I think this because although there are things that could be considered progressive, like having a female point of identification, the fact is the genre still contains a lot of conservative elements like the roles the genders fall into and the visibility of women compared to men.