The Experience of Fear in Horror Films

The multimodal study on the experience of suspense and fear in horror films is part of a collaborative project funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), involving Film Studies (University of Mainz) and Computer Science (University of Hanover). The project aims to expand the digital research infrastructure through the development of a software platform that enables researchers to extract data from audiovisual material both automatically and manually. In this initial case study, a corpus of 20 slasher films—a subgenre of horror—was analyzed. The system was equipped with tools for manual annotation and basic algorithmic procedures to capture shot lengths, shot sizes, brightness and volume levels, and face recognition. Assuming that triggering fear is a functional core of suspense in horror films, the study uses exploratory statistical methods to identify patterns in the structure of relevant content. Ultimately, the research shows that slasher films simulate features of dangerous situations through their cinematic staging—situations to which human perception is evolutionarily attuned.