What do you think?
Rate this book
Twenty First Century Horror Films
This lively and illuminating book explores over 100 contemporary horror films, providing insightful and provocative readings of what they mean while including numerous quotes from their creators. Some of these films, including The Babadook , The Green Inferno , It Follows , The Neon Demon , Pride and Prejudice and Zombies , and The Witch , are so recent that this will be one of the first times they are discussed in book form. The book is divided into three main "nightmares," "nations," and "innovations." "Nightmares" looks at new manifestations of traditional fears, including creepy dolls, haunted houses and demonic possession as well as vampires, werewolves, witches and zombies; and also considers more contemporary anxieties such as dread of home invasion and homophobia. "Nations" explores fright films from around the world, including Australia, Canada, Czechoslovakia, France, Germany, India, Japan, Norway, Russia, Serbia, Spain and Sweden as well as the UK and the U.S. "Innovations" focuses on the latest trends in terror from 3D to found-footage films, from Twilight teen romance to torture porn, and from body horror and eco-horror to techno-horror. Parodies, remakes and American adaptations of Asian horror are also discussed.
224 pages, Paperback
Published October 1, 2017
4 people are currently reading
41 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
March 8, 2018
Of all the film genres, horror makes the least sense…. Are horror fans sadists who find pleasure in watching on-screen victims subjected to fear and suffering? … Or are horror fans masochists who derive pleasure from unpleasant or dreadful experiences?
Professor Keesey asks the right questions in his skimpy 5 page intro then never answers them. Instead he provides around 100 fairly dubious summaries/interpretations of recent horror movies and that’s it, no further overview or judicial summing up about such major issues as torture porn or misogyny. And the individual film summaries are missing a whole major dimension, the moral one. Oh yeah, that one, that pesky but so human dimension.
He quotes Roger Ebert on the movie Wolf Creek
There is a line and this movie crosses it. I don’t know where the line is, but it’s way north of Wolf Creek. There is a role for violence in film, but what the hell is the purpose of this sadistic celebration of pain and cruelty?
But even when Prof Keesey is interpreting such famous way-north-of-the-line movies as Martyrs, The Human Centipede 1 and 2 or I Spit on Your Grave (both versions) he sidesteps the moral question. At the end of discussing The Human Centipede, for instance, he says
In a sense, Martin [the perp] has never stopped being the traumatised child abused by his father, and no amount of agony inflicted on others has lessened his own, or blocked him from feeling at least some empathy for their suffering… The Human Centipede 2 is a film of vicious depravity – and of tears.
Well, how corny, in the end. If there is a moral to this depiction of vicious depravity I guess it’s hey, you grown up abused kids, don’t try this at home. Torturing random people will not make the pain go away. This banality avoids answering the question - should this film have been made in the first place? Except as a freak show to make a few bucks, like any old Victorian freak show.
Discussing the excellent found footage movie Cloverfield, Prof Keesey falls into another trap. This movie, made in 2008, is all about the attack on New York by a giant monster which actually seems to be a drunken giant monster, reeling around and smashing up skyscrapers like you and your pals used to do at chucking out time on a Saturday night. The prof sees Cloverfield’s monster as a metaphor for the 9/11 attacks. He pushes this idea to ridiculous lengths. The monster can be seen as Osama Bin Laden; then there are the smaller spider-type creatures that fall off the monster’s back and kill people. But this reading
tells us nothing about what motivated the men who followed bin Laden’s orders or about how people become radicalised into serving as suicide bombers
And again
When the creature decapitates the Statue of Liberty, leaving the headless body standing in New York Harbor, we are reminded of the beheadings on the jihadist videos.
Oh, we are? I think seeing a movie like this as a giant metaphor is completely wrongheaded. Cloverfield doesn’t say a single thing about 9/11 except that when an incomprehensible catastrophe happened in New York everybody panicked and many people died. This we knew.
Discussing Martyrs, the professor makes no mention that this is the most controversial of all the “extreme French horror” films, no mention of whether the plot makes any kind of sense (it doesn’t) or if the movie justifies the amount of (as usual young female) suffering it depicts. It's almost like he shrinks from any form of moral comment in this, the most potentially immoral of genres.
Oh well, this is still a listing of many possibly interesting horror movies I’d never heard of, so it’s good for that.
Professor Keesey asks the right questions in his skimpy 5 page intro then never answers them. Instead he provides around 100 fairly dubious summaries/interpretations of recent horror movies and that’s it, no further overview or judicial summing up about such major issues as torture porn or misogyny. And the individual film summaries are missing a whole major dimension, the moral one. Oh yeah, that one, that pesky but so human dimension.
He quotes Roger Ebert on the movie Wolf Creek
There is a line and this movie crosses it. I don’t know where the line is, but it’s way north of Wolf Creek. There is a role for violence in film, but what the hell is the purpose of this sadistic celebration of pain and cruelty?
But even when Prof Keesey is interpreting such famous way-north-of-the-line movies as Martyrs, The Human Centipede 1 and 2 or I Spit on Your Grave (both versions) he sidesteps the moral question. At the end of discussing The Human Centipede, for instance, he says
In a sense, Martin [the perp] has never stopped being the traumatised child abused by his father, and no amount of agony inflicted on others has lessened his own, or blocked him from feeling at least some empathy for their suffering… The Human Centipede 2 is a film of vicious depravity – and of tears.
Well, how corny, in the end. If there is a moral to this depiction of vicious depravity I guess it’s hey, you grown up abused kids, don’t try this at home. Torturing random people will not make the pain go away. This banality avoids answering the question - should this film have been made in the first place? Except as a freak show to make a few bucks, like any old Victorian freak show.
Discussing the excellent found footage movie Cloverfield, Prof Keesey falls into another trap. This movie, made in 2008, is all about the attack on New York by a giant monster which actually seems to be a drunken giant monster, reeling around and smashing up skyscrapers like you and your pals used to do at chucking out time on a Saturday night. The prof sees Cloverfield’s monster as a metaphor for the 9/11 attacks. He pushes this idea to ridiculous lengths. The monster can be seen as Osama Bin Laden; then there are the smaller spider-type creatures that fall off the monster’s back and kill people. But this reading
tells us nothing about what motivated the men who followed bin Laden’s orders or about how people become radicalised into serving as suicide bombers
And again
When the creature decapitates the Statue of Liberty, leaving the headless body standing in New York Harbor, we are reminded of the beheadings on the jihadist videos.
Oh, we are? I think seeing a movie like this as a giant metaphor is completely wrongheaded. Cloverfield doesn’t say a single thing about 9/11 except that when an incomprehensible catastrophe happened in New York everybody panicked and many people died. This we knew.
Discussing Martyrs, the professor makes no mention that this is the most controversial of all the “extreme French horror” films, no mention of whether the plot makes any kind of sense (it doesn’t) or if the movie justifies the amount of (as usual young female) suffering it depicts. It's almost like he shrinks from any form of moral comment in this, the most potentially immoral of genres.
Oh well, this is still a listing of many possibly interesting horror movies I’d never heard of, so it’s good for that.
December 31, 2021
A useful, if sometimes frustrating book, this overview of two decades of horror films covers a strong selection of the most significant and interesting films (including some overlooked gems like Under the Shadow) with just a few omissions. However, the way Keesey writes about them can be irritating. For starters, there's no real critical opinion given so the reader is left to guess at the quality of the film being discussed. This could, for example, leave some poor sod intrigued by Keesey's description of 2002's Feardotcom, actually suffering through a genuinely atrocious film without any real warning of just how bad it is. Thanks, Douglas. Also, in summarising the films' plots and examining what Keesey sees as the main themes, there's often a tendency to over-analyse their content. For example, Keesey writes about Eli Roth's Green Inferno, suggesting it's a vehicle for Roth to explore his feelings about Jewish suffering in the Holocaust. This might be news to Roth himself, who says he set out to make a dangerous film, the way they used to be in the '70s and '80s. What Roth actually did was shamelessly rip off Cannibal Holocaust, right down to an identical ending. Sometimes a horror film is just that, a horror film.
January 25, 2018
There is no shortage of books that focus on horror films’ golden age of the 1970s and 1980s. Keesey brings us right up to the present with a look at horror films since 2000. Horror films reflect the social issues of the time, so it’s interesting to see this examined so currently.
The book covers over 100 films. For each entry, the author gives a synopsis and then explores the wider meanings represented with the film. The book is divided into three major sections.
Nightmares – This is a look at films that examine the more traditional horror staples, such as zombies, haunted houses, or dolls. Films in this area, for example under “Mother related horror,” include The Babadook and Inside.
Nations – This section is a global look at horror films and movements from a number of countries. I really enjoyed this section of the book since it covers titles that are sometimes overlooked. There were some obvious choices, including Wolf Creek for Australia and Dead Snow for Norway. However, the selections it highlighted from Iran, India, and Hungary are new to me so I’ll now seek them out.
Innovations – Here Keesey covers the new horror trends of the period from torture porn to self-aware slashers and found footage. This examines contemporary issues, such as the environment, home invasion, modern economics, and getting old.
This isn’t a “best of” book. The focus is on what each film says about our society and the times we live in. It also offers a look at the movements in horror over the last 17 years. It covers a lot of films with thought provoking insight from the author. With the limitations set by such a short time period, movies are discussed here that may not warrant inclusion when retrospective books are written about this era of horror films in the future. This book has interesting things to say and if you enjoy reading about horror films, you should like this.
The book covers over 100 films. For each entry, the author gives a synopsis and then explores the wider meanings represented with the film. The book is divided into three major sections.
Nightmares – This is a look at films that examine the more traditional horror staples, such as zombies, haunted houses, or dolls. Films in this area, for example under “Mother related horror,” include The Babadook and Inside.
Nations – This section is a global look at horror films and movements from a number of countries. I really enjoyed this section of the book since it covers titles that are sometimes overlooked. There were some obvious choices, including Wolf Creek for Australia and Dead Snow for Norway. However, the selections it highlighted from Iran, India, and Hungary are new to me so I’ll now seek them out.
Innovations – Here Keesey covers the new horror trends of the period from torture porn to self-aware slashers and found footage. This examines contemporary issues, such as the environment, home invasion, modern economics, and getting old.
This isn’t a “best of” book. The focus is on what each film says about our society and the times we live in. It also offers a look at the movements in horror over the last 17 years. It covers a lot of films with thought provoking insight from the author. With the limitations set by such a short time period, movies are discussed here that may not warrant inclusion when retrospective books are written about this era of horror films in the future. This book has interesting things to say and if you enjoy reading about horror films, you should like this.
May 21, 2019
I collect movie reference books, both technical and recreational, the more in depth the better. I am always on the lookout for something new and I have just picked up a new collection of horror studies that restricts its scope to only films made since the year 2000. Douglas Keesey’s Twenty First Century Horror Films is a collection of thoughtful essays that study over one hundred titles from around the world and breaks them down for themes and meaning. Several titles include excerpts from interviews with the filmmakers in order to receive additional information directly from the source. Many of these movies have never been included in book format before and that in itself is an incentive to check out this new addition.
You can read ZigZag's full review at Horror DNA by clicking here.
You can read ZigZag's full review at Horror DNA by clicking here.
August 14, 2022
There is a lot to unpack from this book. Firstly, I do not envy the writer for having seen all of those movies. Some were so stomach churning, even a quick commentary on the symbolisms and techniques used in the film could not hide the gross factor.
Admittedly there were some commentaries that were difficult to grasp without having seen the film, but overall, I find many of the writer's comments enlightening. More than a handful have made me think deeper about the films that I have seen. For example his comment that 'Ringu' (The Ring) symbolises the cycle of abuse because a victim of the seven-day curse must pass on the curse to another victim in order to survive. Hmmm.
Will be re-reading this book for many years to come.
Admittedly there were some commentaries that were difficult to grasp without having seen the film, but overall, I find many of the writer's comments enlightening. More than a handful have made me think deeper about the films that I have seen. For example his comment that 'Ringu' (The Ring) symbolises the cycle of abuse because a victim of the seven-day curse must pass on the curse to another victim in order to survive. Hmmm.
Will be re-reading this book for many years to come.
April 3, 2018
Plot summaries and nothing more. hugely disappointed.
March 27, 2019
Nice insight to the chosen horror films
Informative and insightful in many ways. I don't agree with a couple of commentary, but it was enjoyable to read.
Informative and insightful in many ways. I don't agree with a couple of commentary, but it was enjoyable to read.
August 22, 2018
In the opening note of Twenty First Century Horror Films, author Douglas Keesey writes that “This book gives explanations of what these movies mean.” Such an assertion is a bold move for any film critic to make. And one which I am not sure the collection is wholly successful in achieving – after all, what does Keesey mean by this?
To continue reading, please click here!
To continue reading, please click here!
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews