Survival Mode: An Analysis of Black Women’s Survival in Contemporary Horror
From the trenches of real life, it’s straight-up laughable to see the Black woman in a horror movie reduced to just “Girl, are you okay?” after our counterparts are stabbed in the leg by some anonymous deranged killer. Mind you, we’re also bleeding. The gathering of the collective eye-roll, and sucking our teeth in unison at the demise of Alfre Woodard in Annabelle is just one example of what sets change in motion for our preferred genre of art.
Sacrificing ourselves so a white family can live in harmony isn’t worth a standing ovation; survival is. We’re starting to see a shift in the way our characters and their stories are written with today’s Black final girls becoming more honest to our culture. If you couldn’t tell already, we’re living through a Black horror renaissance, and the future does look promising.
Black Women Have Always Done The Work
American Black women historically have been left to liberate and protect themselves. When the girls gathered for change at the Seneca Falls Convention in support of women’s rights in 1848, that didn’t include us. The examples are abundant, but the bottom line is that the systemic failure to acknowledge and protect brown skin has molded a culture of women who are as strong as they are soft. That’s how we survive. Mirroring this on screen is staying true to the traits and values born out of a mixture of love and strife. Don’t get it twisted.
Stop making yourself upset by looking backward. Move past your frustrations with how The Craft reduced Rachel True’s character to just “racism”. Instead appreciate the current horror media that emulates an escapist portrait of how Black women have and will continue to survive.
Nuanced Resilience in A Quiet Place: Day One
There’s a quality of resilience among Black women. It’s a trait that gives us an unspoken understanding of what we deserve. Even if survival isn’t the end goal, our commitment to peace is just as important. Lupita Nyong’o is Samira in A Quiet Place: Day One, a cancer patient in hospice as aliens bring on the apocalypse. Through the chaos, she meets Eric (Joseph Quinn), a conventionally polished white man who would typically be the film’s hero, helping the poor dying woman. But that’s not the case here. Sam has already come to terms with leaving Earth and made her plans for a departure that would make her feel most comfortable. What she’s decided for herself is exactly what she’s going to get, preferably without any outside help.
The beautiful thing about this prequel is making Sam, who is marginalized in many ways, the teacher, the student, and the hero by highlighting the complexity of the Black woman. She’s able to save Eric by crossing a personal boundary, and (bear with me) allowing him to help her. In return, she’s granted unwavering support in the fate she’s chosen for herself. That still counts as resilience.
Strength isn’t always doing it alone. Strength is also understanding when and who to receive help from, as long as the vision is respected. If Sam had not allowed Eric to help, he might not have internalized what survival truly means, and wouldn’t have gained the drive to survive himself.
Letting Black Women Make Real Mistakes In Horror
Black women’s strength can be a thin tightrope to walk; tread too far and you’ll end up in the forbidden lands of stereotype, like the “Strong Black woman” trope. But real women make mistakes. It’s the steps taken after those mistakes that are important to take into account. Take Tess for example, from Zach Cregger’s Barbarian. Tess, played by Georgina Campbell, is a sweet and mild character who makes the questionable decision of agreeing to share a double-booked apartment with a stranger. Then, on top of that, she decides to peek into the basement.
When held hostage by an entity that doesn’t play by any common rulebook, Tess shows how solution-oriented she is by observing the threat and acting accordingly. Marginalized people live in a world where giving in to instinct can easily come back to bite. Screaming for help might make the situation worse depending on your front-facing identity. It’s easy for me to believe that this shared experience grants Tess her life and freedom, while the men who give priority to instinct over critical thinking lose their lives.
Believe Women, Especially Black Women
There’d be fewer casualties in Barbarian if the police had believed her cries for help. J.D. Dillard’s Sweetheart shows us a similar situation, but this time on a desert island. The horror film follows Kiersey Clemons as Jenn, surviving on a remote island with few resources while dodging an aquatic monster. After several days alone, her boyfriend Lucas (Emory Cohen) and friend Mia (Hanna Mangan Lawrence), wash up on the beach. But their arrival isn’t exactly a good thing, as their reliance on Jenn’s resourcefulness adds additional conflict to an already-dired situation. A mix of white privilege and class disparity influences how comfortable they are dismissing Jenn’s warnings of danger on the island. Nothing like some good ol’ gaslighting to make your Black female protagonist feel crazy.
We know in real life that this behavior isn’t “normal”, but it is accepted. American society is too comfortable stealing from the cultural and community efforts of Black women while labeling us as untrustworthy or difficult. I see the hashtags on Instagram #BelieveWomen. Let that include all women, regardless of race, class, or history of trauma. It’s one thing to survive an ordeal, but another to be believed by the public to ensure we don’t become a monolith.
Dillard gives us a societal warning throughout Sweetheart by showing the (exaggerated) consequences of choosing not to believe the words and actions of Black women. It’s not enough to just appreciate our efforts—you’ve got to believe us, too.
Categorized:Editorials
