This book redefines the landscape of horror cinema by exploring the intersection of microbiology and film. Microbiology and Horror Cinema delves into the chilling world of pathogensfunguses, bacteria, parasites, and virusesand their influence on the narrative and visual conventions of both classic and contemporary horror films. By examining movies like The Exorcist, Annabelle, The Wicker Man, The Skeleton Key, and Crawl, this monograph offers a fresh perspective on how these microscopic threats shape our understanding of fear and embodiment.
The chapters investigate such critical themes as the representation of disease, the impact of infection on human and non-human bodies, and the cultural significance of these narratives in the context of global health crises. Readers will encounter thought-provoking analyses that challenge traditional interpretations of horror, inviting them to consider the invisible yet pervasive anxieties that these films evoke. This book is a must-read for anyone interested in the evolving discourse on horror cinema and infectious disease, as it provides a unique epidemiological lens through which to view these unsettling stories.
Scholars, students, and enthusiasts of film studies, cultural studies, medical humanities, and microbiology will find Microbiology and Horror Cinema an invaluable resource. It offers a compelling exploration of how horror films reflect and amplify our deepest fears about disease and contagion.
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Chapter
1. The Slime of All My Yesterdays: Or Putting the Crud in
Fungal Recrudescence in William Lustigs Maniac.
Chapter 2 Some Things in
Their Most Natural State Have the Most Vivid Colors: Folk Horror and Fungal
Overgrowth in the Unholy Trinity.
Chapter 3 Evil against Evil: Parable
and Behavior-Altering Parasitism in William Friedkins The Exorcist.
Chapter
4 Of One Mysterious Household: Endoparasites and Embodiment in Dario
Argentos Three Mothers Trilogy.
Chapter 5 Sometimes Its More of a
Trade: Blackness, Bacterial Infection, and Iain Softleys The Skeleton Key.-
Chapter 6 See You Later, Alligator: Natural Disasters and Necrotizing
Bacterial Disease in Alexandre Ajas Crawl.
Chapter 7 Danger! Do Not Touch
Anything!: Viral Transmission, Tactile Object Disrecognition, and the
Annabelle Series.
Chapter 8 New Faces, Other Minds: Viral Vectors,
Fusiform Gyrus Dysregulation, and Leo Gabriadzes Unfriended.
Larrie Dudenhoeffer is a Professor of English at Kennesaw State University, USA, in the metro Atlanta area specializing in film and television studies, critical theory, and American studies. He is the author of Embodiment and Horror Cinema (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), Anatomy of the Superhero Film (Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), and Walls without Cinema: State Security and Subjective Embodiment in Twenty-First Century U.S. Filmmaking (2019).
