A horrible monster is haunting a woman named Rebecca and her little brother Martin.
“There is a dead woman in this house!”
The trailer for the 2016 horror filmed called “Lights Out” will send shivers down your spine.
”Everyone is afraid of the dark. And that’s what she feeds on.”
And while the mythical monster named Sophie is busy feeding on the main character’s fears, the movie’s creators are keen to explore the audience’s phobias, particularly the one called nyctophobia. In severe cases, nyctophobic patients may experience serious traumatic symptoms during the night, including rapid shallow breathing, chest pains and nausea. Their imagination draws horrible pictures of them being attacked by ghosts, monsters and bogeymen.
Cashing in on audiences’ fears is nothing new to Hollywood. The plot of the “Nightmare on Elm Street” franchise evolves around the idea of teenagers being attacked in their sleep by the ghost of Freddie Krueger. Freddy is a serial killer who was burnt alive and chases people in their dreams, killing them with a glove with sharp knife-like razors attached. Once they die in their sleep, the characters never wake up.
The whole “Elm Street” franchise is built around somniphobia – the fear of falling asleep. Somniphobic patients feel fatigue during the day and tend to experience mood swings and irritability.
The first part of the “Nightmare on Elm Street” series became a huge success, grossing more than $25 million in the US.
Even though Robert Englund, who played the main antagonist in the series, starred in more than 80 movies, it is “The nightmare on Elm Street”, and the role of Freddy – the most iconic monster in cinema’s history, that made him truly famous.
However, in his interview to RCN TV, Englund said that nowadays, Freddie Krueger doesn’t scare people anymore.
“The bar has been raised since we originally did the film, by other horror films. Things are getting scarier now, whether it’s “Sinister” or it’s “Cabin in the woods” or whether it’s a “Saw” film – you know, the bar has been raised with violence or horrific imagery. So, “Nightmare on Elm Street” movies have become a kind of a dark Grimm’s fairy tale.”
Robert Englund may be right about the original 1980’s Freddie Krueger movies, but he didn’t mention that Hollywood producers recently “freshened up” the franchise by releasing a “Nightmare on Elm Street” remake. The 2010 version featured new shocking visuals suitable for the millennial audience.
So, even though new gadgets and the stress of urban life bring forward new fears, the old ones, like the fears of the darkness, sleep and dying, are still there. And as long as people continue to experience such conditions, phobias will continue to bring money to game designers and TV and movie producers.
