Ideas How 'body horror' helps us confront the fears within us
Dec 18, 2025
Xavier Aldana Reyes, an English literature and film scholar, and Rose Kapp, a registered nurse and dementia care specialist, dive deep into the world of body horror. They explore how films like 'The Fly' reflect our fears of bodily decay and identity. Xavier shares personal connections to body horror themes after a stroke, while Rose discusses the portrayal of aging and dementia in horror cinema. They reveal how body horror can evoke empathy and challenge societal views on mortality, aging, and what it means to be human.
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Horror Comes From Within
- Body horror makes the monster internal by focalizing transformation through the suffering character.
- That creates a difficult mix of pity and revulsion because the viewer is with the one becoming monstrous.
Cultural And Industrial Roots
- Body horror's rise in the 1980s came from new prosthetics effects and changing cultural views of the body.
- Cosmetic surgery, body modification, and industry effects created a
Bodies Became Political
- The body became political in the Reagan era as AIDS and culture wars made bodily autonomy contentious.
- That tension amplified filmic anxieties about infection, decay, and identity.