From The Wicker Man to Men: why cinema is obsessed with the dark side of rural Britain
Something about small, isolated communities unleashes a deep, primeval fear within us
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Something about small, isolated communities unleashes a deep, primeval fear within us
I love horror stories for children, perhaps because I wasn't really allowed to experience many of them as a child. For me, experiencing a horror story aimed at younger viewers creates a particular time warp sensation, a sense that my brain is leaning back into the old fears I carried with me decades earlier, to allow me to meet the story where it is and, in a way, get back something I didn't get a chance to have in childhood. It's a magical, very particular kind of horror storytelling, and when it works well I'm in awe of its practitioners.