Week 2 - Task 3 Cabin In The Woods

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WEEK 2 – TASK 3 Using your notes from class on sub-genre and Horror conventions, write a 300-word summary of HOW the film makes interesting use of the conventions of Horror and Sub-genres you have studied.


Cabin in the Woods is a satirical horror movie making use of most of the sub genres of horror. The main sub-genre of the movie is slasher but it also features a prevalent theme of teen punishment, making the film a cautionary tale for teenagers. The main sub-genre of splatter is displayed through the iconography, theme of teen punishment, gender patriarchy and deaths of most of the characters. In splatter films the final girl usually adopts masculine traits in order to survive and defeat the villain. In Cabin in the Woods the final girl does try and defend herself with a gun but ends up choosing to want to die with her friend, the fool. This subverts the convention of the final girl always surviving adding to the satirical nature of the film. In the end though they both end up surviving. The movie does stick to conventions of horror movies by having the male characters initially take the lead. This is seen when the athlete tells the group to split up and when he saves his girlfriend from the monster. Iconography from the splatter genre include; masks, phallic weapons such as knifes and chainsaws in addition to excessive amounts of blood which is used to emphasis the films gory and graphic nature. This makes the film more uncomfortable to watch and but also satisfies their cathartic needs. As stated before, Cabin in the Woods is a cautionary tale for teenage sin, more specifically what you shouldn’t do as a teenager. For example; sex before marriage, drugs and alcohol. The film establishes the theme by having the cast play common stock characters that would be inn a teen punishment film such as; the slut the athlete, the fool, the scholar, the virgin and the final girl. It style with other teen punishment films before it, the slut is attacked and brutally murdered first, followed by her boyfriend. Their deaths are played during their sexual encounter in the forest. This is a common convention in horror films as sexual intercourse before marriage is considered a sin and therefore the punishable. By the couple being attacked and killed it tells the audience that they have been punished. As well as this, during the film, the athlete is seen drinking and being disorderly. Underage drinking is also seen as a sin and so he is punished by being killed. The killing these two characters in such an aggressive and extreme manner is used to warn and frighten teenager about the consequences of sinful behaviour. 

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