Summary Of Stephen King Why We Crave Horror Movies

In Stephen King’s article “Why We Crave Horror Movies,” he expresses his views as to why he believes humans enjoy watching horror movies so much. In the beginning of the article King writes that he believes every human being is mentally ill, he then spends the rest of the article explaining his reasoning behind his opinion. Although King gave some logical explanations as to why humans crave horror movies, many individuals could disagree with many of his points. Some people may actually be what he considers mentally ill which could be what causes them to gravitate towards horror movies, but that may not be the case for every horror movie lover. There are plenty of different reasons why people like horror movies. For some people it may not be about just watching people be murdered, it could be more so about the fascination of how they made the scenes look so real. If the people who watch horror movies are said to be mentally ill, does it also mean that the people who create horror movies are too? Imagine what goes into a director's head when they are creating these movies. Creating horror movies to them may seem like art, it is a game of making something so fake look so real. It could be possible that the creators of horror movies only make horror movies to attract as King said “mentally ill” individuals (King 598).
King uses the article to explain that everyone is not the same person as who they are when they are by themselves. King related horror movies to roller coasters.
Just like roller coasters appeal to younger individuals, so does horror movies. King wrote that the older a person gets, the more they become less engaged in horror movies (King 599). This point King made was very logical, but it still does not apply to every older person. Some older people can watch horror movies and be more obsessed than those younger than them. Horrors movies do not just appeal to a certain age group, it more so appeals to certain individuals. These days what drags individuals to horror movies is more so the plot and not so much the amount of blood seen in the trailer for the
movie. In the article, King states that “the potential lyncher is in almost all of us” and that sometimes he needs to be let free and allowed to go crazy (King, 599). One could strongly disagree with this because not every person has ever had the thought of killing another human being. King may have felt this way before which could have led to him writing so many horror filled things, but he should not assume every person feels the same way. Thinking about what he said could cause one to wonder if King himself is actually mentally ill. King wrote that the job of horror movies is to reach out to the worst parts in us, although that may be the case it does not reach out to all of us (King 599). For some the job of a horror movie is to simply reach their expectations. Some may just want to watch horror movies to see if it really scares them. The quote “as long as you keep the gators fed,” was a metaphor used by King to explain humans and horror movies (King 600). What King meant by this metaphor was that when humans watch horror movies it helps to contain their inner demons. That could indeed be the case but it could also just be because humans just simply enjoy horror movies. If anything some people may think that watching horror movies would influence an individual's demons to come out even more. It would be like peer pressure because if someone is truly crazy in the head, and they go to watch a horror movie it could easily push that person over the edge. Horror movies could easily give people who are really battling with their inner demons, more ideas as to why they should free them. All through the article, it was as if King would used the way he felt to try and make it seem like every other human being felt the same way. He did have good points, but most seemed to be solely based off of Kings thoughts and experiences. Some horror movie lovers may agree with King, but many may not. Why people crave horror movies is based off of the person themselves.