Monster in the House Paper

Alison Mautner

8 November 2015

Film Appreciation-Gambino Period F

Response 2

The “Monster in the House” genre can be taken literally or figuratively-there can be a

terrifying, cursed creature in a literal house, or the genre can be figurative, when the monster

takes over an entire town or, in the case of Jaws directed by Steven Spielberg, an ocean. Snyder

argues that the conflict, or monsters, in these movies is typically ushered in by the “sins” of the

characters. His assertion proves to be correct through two of the movies watched in class.

In Jaws, the “house” is not literal, but the monster certainly is. In “Monster in the House”

movies, the characters caught in conflict cannot escape the monster because the creature inflicts

upon the characters’ everyday routines and lives. In many horror or thriller films the characters

find ways to escape the terror. They can either escape the town, escape the premises, or even

eliminate the monster altogether in some supernatural cases by exorcism or another form of

murder. In Jaws, however, there is no escape. The protagonist Chief Brody is in charge of the

town of Amity, and therefore when the monster arrives he must stay. The only way to control the

monster is to destroy the monster, the Great White Shark that is terrorizing the town and turning

Amity Island into a pit of hysteria. The “sin” in this movie is committed by the mayor, who much

to Chief Brody’s dismay decides to keep the beaches open after numerous shark attacks occur.

He is more concerned with making money on July 4th weekend than the safety of his town, and

this is the sin committed to prove Snyder’s point. By keeping the beaches open, the mayor allows

for more attacks to occur and more people to die until eventually the chief has to kill the shark

himself. Had the mayor listened to Chief Brody and closed the beaches earlier instead of

worrying about the financial state of the island, the monster would have been powerless....