Genre ResearchThe genre of horror is purposely used to bring out and reveal the negative emotions within the audience. Horror films aim to prey on the audiences biggest fears. Films that come under this particular genre usually include the use of supernatural events, creatures and locations. These factors are used to its strengths to bring out and express the REAL fears of the viewer. This genre can also overlap into other genres of film such as fantasy, thriller and supernatural. These are called sub-genres which the directors of the film purposely insert into their films to help branch out and appeal to a wider audience. Also, the directors who make the film are given the ability to add more variety to the movie they are attempting to create. This sets them apart from other movies, making them less predictable, maintaining the attention of the audience and making themselves unique. Horror movies use the audiences fears as fuel to plan out the storyline of the film. The fear of the audience is used as an advantage as it presents certain aspects such a way that it gives the audience a shock (for example, making them scream or jump in fright/terror). If there are too many scares within the film, then the film would become too predictable and boring to the audience, therefore throughout the duration of the film, the attention of the viewer must be maintained. Obviously, everyone has their various fears. Therefore, the director must pick common and general fears that the majority of the audience will find scary. The directors aim when producing a horror film is to attempt to affect as many people in the audience as possible. However in doing this, the director must ensure that the level of fear is still high, whilst still affecting the audience. Horror films can also feature some kind of evil presence or a scary situation (such as abnormal activity), which will generally have a supernatural origin. Mentioning this, Even though the genre of supernatural is involved within a film of horror, it is still deemed or classed as a horror film due to the conventions that are used.Some examples of themes and elements that are used in the horror genre include: Vampires, werewolves, haunted houses, demons, gore, serial killers, ghosts and spirit. Even though these films involve these themes and elements, it still does not mean just because a film includes these, that it is a horror. Even though these conventions are being portrayed throughout the film, to be classed as a horror, they must strike fear into the body of the audience. This is how the true effects of the film are shown, by the audiences reaction.From the list above of the various conventions that are shown throughout horror films, you can see that these themes and elements are extremely common. The reason for this is that it gives the director a better chance of portraying fear towards the audience at a high level of fear, focusing on the fear of that certain element or theme, which is the genres aim. Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horror_film

The top 10 films in the genre of horror1) The Exorcist (1973)2) Psycho (1960)3) Alien (1979)4) The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)5) Rosemarys Baby (1968)6) The Shining (1980)7) Jaws (1975)8) The Thing (1982)9) Silence of the Lambs (1991)10) Night of the Living Dead(1968)

Fatima Batool