FEAR OF THE UNKNOWN

Jamilla Philson

The 1980s remain to be a time like no other that we have witnessed before and we were rapidly advancing and growing as a society. In Reagan’s America, a new way of life began to emerge. With this advancement, technology became the norm and a part of our everyday lives, we began to discuss race and diversity and their role in society, diseases and illnesses ran rampant, and while at odds with Russia, the fear of nuclear blast occupied everyone’s minds. Within all of these elements involve the “unknown”, especially with where these events would have taken us and where society would go from there. Fear is one way to summarize this decade, but through this fear, especially represented through cinema, we begin to understand why the 80s was such a defining time.

The fear of the “other” was one of the biggest threats to society in the 1980s, which was especially perpetuated by the media. During this time, President Ronald Reagan had started a campaign that declared a “war on drugs” that led to an increase in incarcerations for nonviolent drug offenses. With the crack epidemic infiltrating inner cities and urban areas, many black and brown people were seen as target offenders and the reason for the popularity of drugs, despite that not entirely being the case. Paul Verhoeven’s Robocop (1987), while a comedic and ridiculous take on policing at the time, also demonstrates its flaws in presenting crime throughout the film. One reason why Robocop works so well for audiences, especially when it was released, was because the crimes were happening to white people, despite Detroit, where the film takes place, having an 80% black population. Osvaldo Oyola comments on this by stating, “​​Instead, crime is something that seems to happen to white people (the would-be rape victim, the gas station attendant, the old couple who run the grocery) in a social vacuum, unrelated to any other social problems like poverty, mass incarceration and selective enforcement of laws. This is a result of what can only be described as overcompensation on the part of a Hollywood system that tries hard (and fails) to seem progressive.” This progressiveness is lost because it continues to perpetuate the feeling of otherness. If these crimes were happening to people of color or under any of the circumstances previously mentioned by Oyola, this film might have not done so well when it was released. Robocop succeeds in showing that the protagonist’s brand is representative of Ronald Reagan’s conservative ideologies and his version of America at the time. He stops the bad guy by any means necessary. 

Personally, while it was one of the funniest films we watched this semester, the tone of it when shown to audiences in the 80s versus today would be completely different. Post the height of the Black Lives Matter movement, this film almost makes some viewers feel uneasy with the comedic yet violent portrayal of cops, but something that Paul Verhoeven does excellently is portray the problems within policing at the time, how corrupt this system actually is, and how it is run by corporations.  With the topic of “otherness” not being shown or mentioned and to have the film represented from the side of the system, especially when glossing over the Detroit fact, makes it complacent because of how it simply eradicates “otherness” entirely instead of addressing it. 

An American Werewolf in London (1981), directed by John Landis, also conveys its main themes of otherness. David Kessler, while trapped in a foreign land after being bitten by a werewolf and losing his best friend, Jack, experiences this otherness in two ways: his Jewishness and his werewolf transformation, essentially his internal and external struggles. Opposite to Robocop, Landis chose to portray otherness from the perspective of the “other”, and not from the system. This translates in a more personal sense and can reach audiences who also feel this way. Because of the loss of his friend Jack, David has no one, except for Nurse Alex Price, who only uses him for her own benefit and doesn’t really care about his problems. He is a stranger in a strange land. While his werewolf transformation is the most obvious example of his otherness in London, it is his Jewishness that causes his real fears and trauma to internalize. While the nurses comment on David being Jewish from external factors, they do not even comprehend what it means to be Jewish internally. The scene with his family being killed by Nazi monsters represents the trauma and anxieties that Jewish people experience that are often passed down to them through generations. He lives with the fear of being other, the fear of anti-semitism, which can often be an invisible threat most times, and it constantly haunts him and is magnified by his werewolf transformation. When he finally transforms, it is the combination of the loss of his close friend and those anxieties physically manifesting that make David’s perspective of being perceived as other valuable, especially for the time it was made in. Many people who are Jewish find a connection with this film because of its representation and because they can relate to David’s fears as their own. 

The fear of the unknown also manifested in the summer of 1981, when a strange and mysterious disease was infecting and killing gay men. This unidentified disease had symptoms that were normally associated with people with weakened immune systems. While the government stood by and did nothing to help, at least for the first five years, thousands of people had been infected and died. Although Carpenter never meant for it to be an allegory for AIDS, the film The Thing (1982) has a lot of similarities to the reaction of paranoia this disease put many people through and how it was dealt with. If you had contracted AIDS, you most likely would have been outed as a homosexual. Because of this disease, a rise in homophobia also grew within society. The alien in The Thing is invisible and undetectable, much like AIDS, and you don’t know who’s been affected or when, or even if you’re next. The men turn on each other, casting blame for what they don’t know and don’t understand yet. It’s also significant in this film that there isn’t one female character. This emphasizes the masculinity element and the reason why people believe it is allegorical. But much like our main protagonist in The Thing, thousands of people were living their lives in fear and paranoia of this invisible monster. AIDS stripped you of your identity and you became cast out from society, viewed as other, as infected. Like Gregg Mucci states, “To be infected was to be different, and in uncertain times, different is deadly.” 

Television, and the fear of it, plagued the minds of people, specifically parents throughout the 80s. Television had become ubiquitous, everyone had one in their household, connecting us all in a new digital way. Boredom then became a crime because you always had television to bring you something new and exciting, something you’ve never seen before. With 24-hour news networks like CNN being introduced, parents had more to fear about the world their children were growing up in. In Poltergeist (1982), the Freelings feel as if they cannot protect their children from anything anymore, especially with the content being shown on television. This is a time where we were beginning to be exposed to more violence, sex, and news. More of the world is being shown to us than we’d actually like, but because of that, it is addicting and we can’t seem to get enough of it. In Poltergeist, Carol Anne sits in front of the tv watching static until her mother changes it to a gory war film, something that a young child should probably not be viewing. This simple flick of the channel, especially when not being aware of what is playing or what they were showing their children, is normalized, especially in a household when the television is always on. Carol Anne also finds comfort in it and her “TV people,” something that this film predicted about parasocial relationships today. Whatever Carol Anne sees on the television her parents cannot protect her from, exposing her to the horrible reality of the world we live in. 

This message is also blatantly expressed throughout David Cronenberg’s 1983 cult classic Videodrome. While on the surface Videodrome is an obsessive horror about Max Renn, the president of a TV station, who becomes addicted to a torture tape, Videodrome is really about society’s growing intimacy with technology and our desensitization to violence. While both films are commenting on society’s fear of technology, Videodrome’s commentary seems to be the most notable, terrifying, and candid because of how in your face it is. Cronenberg’s eerie predictions of what technology would do to our society today are spot on. The gun fused within Max’s hand and arm alludes that he is becoming a part of the technology itself, much like our current situation today where we rely on it for even our most simple tasks. We have become curated versions of what technology wants us to be and it is slowly starting to take over us. It’s also quite interesting to note how Cronenberg comments on how technology can be used to weaponize people and in turn how harmful it truly is to society. Even today we see how social networks like Twitter have been used to weaponize groups of people like on the January 6th riots at the Capitol. It feels unsettling but necessary to watch Videodrome even though this is the ugly truth about our society. In the film, Professor Brian O’Blivion states “whatever appears on the television screen emerges as raw experience for those who watch it. Therefore, television is reality, and reality is less than television.” Because of our obsessive relationship with television, and more general technology today, we view our lives as less than or not good enough. What we view through the screen is what we believe to be reality. Much like the Freelings, Cronenberg is expressing his fear of what is to come and how he witnessed it brewing in the 80s. Through television, people began to see violence and sex as mere entertainment, and the more they were fed, the more they couldn’t get enough of it. Television was just the start of this in the 1980s, and what was to come only made Cronenberg’s worst nightmares come true.

Dan O’Bannon’s 1985 Return of the Living Dead showed us another fear ruminating on people’s minds during the 80s: a nuclear bomb. While a campy and somewhat goofy film, not a continuation of Night of the Living Dead (1968), this film’s ending is straightforward and shocking. As tensions rose with Russia and the looming effects of the Cold War impacted a generation later, during the 80s this was a rational fear that was on a lot of people’s minds. Not only does this film use a nuclear blast to resolve the film, but comments on the military’s involvement in it. The film shows how the military was just quick to resolve the problem at hand by dropping a bomb on the town, not even being concerned about the safety of civilians and others not being affected by what is occurring at the graveyard. As reported to Colonel Glover in the final scenes, the person on the other end of the phone call states “Spectacular results, sir, very close to optimal placement, only 20 square blocks destroyed, and less than 4,000 dead.” It's ironic to mention that he stated very close to optimal placement, not even directly, and how casual they are about the deaths and destruction when the military is supposed to protect its citizens. Even though they thought this would fix things, it doesn’t, as the smoke and fumes from the nuclear bomb is brought back down into the rain, only making things much much worse. This is a commentary on our military and how quick they are to use bombs and destruction to solve issues when in turn it would really make things even worse in most cases.

Miracle Mile (1988) deals with this fear on a more expansive level than Return of the Living Dead. Harry Washello, after finally finding his one true love in a museum, gets an ominous phone call from a frantic soldier who warns him of a nuclear blast about to hit Los Angeles in one hour. This film played on the 1980’s biggest fears and how someone, especially like Harry, would handle it if something like this happened. The paranoia and anxiety are palpable. In an attempt to warn other people, Harry spreads the word to the people in the diner and various other people he meets along the way to save his girlfriend, Julie, but what ensues is a series of obstacles that block him from being able to finally escape. This film starts off completely opposite of the stark and existential reality it then becomes, a sweet romantic comedy with two young people in a candy-colored world. The switch is then flipped as it becomes all about seeking safety and survival. It perfectly captures the abruptness of the end of it all, something that people of the 80s greatly feared, especially with the false alarm missile incident with the Soviet Union in 1983 and Reagan’s “joking” announcement in 1984. Another interesting aspect of the film that took inspiration from its time’s dread and nightmares was the scene at the diner when Harry told all of the characters what was to come. Fred, the cook, was one of the few that seemed to believe him almost immediately. Not only was he quick to believe him, but it felt like he was prepared for the event, gathering a plethora of cans and non-perishable foods and knowing exactly where to go to escape the bomb. This is representative of the sense of preparedness that society felt in case a nuclear bomb was ever dropped on the United States.

It should be noted that in horror and science fiction, the monster or evil antagonist is never just that, it is a way for filmmakers and storytellers to explore ideas in society as metaphors, especially during the golden age of horror in the 1980s. Through the lens of cinema, we are able to have a glance at a whole other time period. The 1980s were not only characterized by fun pop and neon lights but fear and paranoia, mainly caused by unanswered questions. The unknown found its way deep into the fears of many people during a time where human society was beginning to peak. Not only what couldn’t have been answered, but what people didn’t understand, or could anticipate happening in the future, like a nuclear bomb, the future and influences of technology, AIDS, and otherness. These films' longevity not only serves as a form of entertainment for us right now but a complete and critical outlook on where society was in the 1980s and how it transformed from then on out.