Megan Boyle

Teen punishment is a theme which features in Cabin in the Woods. The five main characters are a group of teenage friends who indulge in activities such as drugs and pre-marital sex and this is what they are punished for. We are aware of this as the first character to die is the blonde slut who is actually killed in a scene where she is being promiscuous with her boyfriend and is therefore punished for this. Furthermore the virgin survives in the film suggesting that her purity saved her. Moreover, the lab is controlled by adults who are sacrificing the teenagers for their youth to the Ancient Gods. They are therefore being punished for being young. Within the film the two female characters represent two different types of women, the blonde slut and the virgin. The film suggests that being promiscuous is wrong, hence why the blonde slut dies first, and therefore being pure is good and why the virgin survives. In the film, if the virgin dies at all, she has to be the last to die. Th...

Cabin in the Woods is a horror which features a combination of the typical conventions from a variety of subgenres. These subgenres include, slasher, zombies, monsters, werewolves and splatter. The film uses the iconic stock characters of a slasher. The film features 5 teenagers who indulge in certain activities such as drugs and sex. The teenagers are killed as a sacrifice to the Gods, however they do not know this until the end. Their killings are controlled in a technical lab underneath the cabin which is run and controlled by adults who are making the sacrifice. They are killed by the order of adults for their youth and therefore this can be viewed as teen punishment.   The teenagers include the blonde slut who is typically the first to die for being promiscuous, therefore supporting this common convention. It also features the final girl, the virgin who survives. However this convention of a slasher is challenged as another male character survives too. However, unlike a us...

TREATMENT:   A young couple and their two friends go on a holiday to a mountain lodge. The lodge is owned by a man in his 40’s who is a psychopath and takes his guests as victims. In the first night of their stay, the friends hear noises coming from an attic which is locked when they check it out. The attic is where the torture takes place and contains all types of tools and implements. The psychopath drugs the guests by spiking their drinks and they wake up terrified to find themselves individually strapped to chairs in a dark room. The psychopath enters the attic and it soon becomes clear to them what is going to happen. They realise that he doesn’t torture them to gain information but purely because he can and enjoys it. The last surviving friend escapes struggles to fight the psychopath but somehow manages to strap him in one of the chairs where he uses his own tools to kill him.

Within horror films, there are 12 icons of horror which are represented through either mise-en-scene, symbolism or iconography. All three of these are interlinked in some way. Light and colours are two icons of horror which are symbolic of certain themes, feelings etc. For example the colour red is often associated with things such as blood, and normally light can represent hope.  Other icons of horror which are symbolic include mirrors such as broken mirrors which can connote shattered personalities. In addition, doors and windows can mean entrapment or freedom. Moreover, tunnels and corridors can often represent the passage to other life, death or resurrection. Religious symbols are another icon of horror which can be associated with psychological horror films of possession and man fighting inner and outer demons. Symbols of death are a common occurrence in many horror films such as coffins, graveyards etc. Weapons and masks are both mise-en-scene icons of horror which are mainl...