It is often the case that in order to make a villain extra scary, you need to give them something that is off about them. Use the uncanny valley, make them scarred or deformed in some way or even make them act off in order to clue you in that this person is a horrible person. Yet in horror, this takes two paths for as often as the villain is deformed and disabled, so to is the hero. The creature in Frankenstein was a monster in terms of looks, but within he was an intelligent, gentle creature that was only hating in his condition. Lately we’ve had a rush of movies featuring disabilities and as someone with a few disabilities, I thought I would examine the topic in as broad a way as possible. Note, we will not touch on mental disability here though it is a very obvious one taken in horror movies but that is only because I will write about it as a future topic. Without further delay, let’s step into a few horror features that use physical disability as part of the plot.
As mentioned previously in the gore post, one of the major things used for the gruesome gross out is physical deformities. Let’s face it, humans are animals and animals tend to not go near anything that looks like it may be diseased or dead. When there is something very wrong with someone, we recoil on instinct even when immediately afterward we cringe at ourselves for being so insensitive. It’s a horrible truth, but a truth nonetheless. As someone with a physical deformity that you have to look for, I can mostly get through life without it being noticed, then someone gets a good look at my eyes and, in the most extreme cases, yells in shock. I’m used to it, but it’s still kind of annoying.
Yet there are bits of horror that thrive on this and the most obvious being the Freak Show trope. A carnival of all these deformed and odd people in one place? Perfect spot for some horror and none emphasize it more than Todd Browning’s Freaks. What was interesting about it is that all the “freaks” in the movie were actual carnival performers who did their acts on the screen as part of the movie. Of course, nowadays that has been taken over in popular minds by American Horror Story which featured the same gimmick. It was started with Freaks which focused on not just the shock value of its actors, but on the fact that it was the normal people causing more horror. The plot is someone trying to get a freakshow performer’s inheritance by marrying them, but of course, nothing goes to plan. Yet what I find to be the crueler thing to happen to this feature, is how it was edited down due to the sensibilities of the time and how it was received. It also suffered a huge backlash for showing these people including one review from Variety claiming that the story does not work because “it is impossible for the normal man or woman to sympathize with the aspiring midget”. Needless to say, despite all the controversy to the point of a 30 year ban in England for being too exploitative, it is a classic if only for making the true monsters the “normal” people.
More modern horror movies have recently decided to deal with both deafness and blindness, less visible disabilities but certainly debilitating enough to cause issues with a protagonist. The funny thing is, the two recent ones involving deaf people (Hush and A Quiet Place) both have one of the protagonists as the deaf person while the two more recent movies featuring blind people (Don’t Breathe and Get Out) have them cast as villains. I am not sure why this split exists, but in either case the tropes tend to be similar. The scariest moments of both types of features are when the disabled person does not notice something is there that a normal person would, be it a killer in Hush or a victim in Don’t Breathe. They both put a twist onto an old format: the home invasion horror movie. It fixes the usual issues of “well why didn’t she just call?” or “how could he not see that person right there?” by putting a new issue out there. Yet there are advantages shown too, as both disabled characters use their disability as an ability. Hush’s protagonist uses her deaf fire alarm as a weapon and Don’t Breathe’s antagonist uses cutting the lights to his advantage. Disabled characters allow a lot of opportunities for a creative writer who wants the story to go in a different direction than most.
Yet there is a bit of caution to that suggestion, as we must avoid what Freaks was accused of doing: exploiting a person for a plot device. They are not a trend, they are real people who have these actual issues. While you can write with a disabled person in mind, remember that they are also their own human. Sure your character may be deaf, but what do they do? How did they get into this situation? Where is their family? Do they have a relationship with someone? How did they lose their hearing? All of these things are important questions, and all character related questions are how you go beyond just a plot device and developing a real character who just so happens to have issues.
I pass this off to you then, what sort of disabled characters in film do you like that were not mentioned in here? I only mentioned it in passing, but Get Out’s blind art seller was among my favorites as the metaphor of “color blind” made it for me, especially considering he really did not care about what the protagonist looked like, he just wanted his eyes. That added layer of meaning just makes the reveal all the more amusing to me. Let me know what you think and I will see you all next Food Thursday.
