Clayton George Wickham - final thesis

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Nerve was not just a prototype slasher film: it used its kills to punctuate
the flow of the story at carefully-timed intervals, amazing the audience
with a flurry of shocking images, much as Friday the 13 th would do a
decade later. Is the violence contained in Friday the 13 th or Twitch of the
Death Nerve grounded in reality? No. The violence in these films is the
stuff of pure fantasy. But does it really matter as long as the audience
screams? (12)
This final sentiment is echoed by Bob Martin during his interview with Sean
Cunningham promoting the release of Friday the 13th:
Whatever influences and inspirations are detectable in Friday the 13 th , it
is apparent that Paramount Studios agrees with Cunningham about the
film’s commercial potential – Paramount’s decision-makers have decided
to release the film nationwide, in over 700 theaters, this May, a
distribution plan that requires a major investment in the production of
film prints. (1980; 64)
Martin’s contemporary anticipation for the release of Friday the 13 th
demonstrates, from its appearance in Fangoria, the position of a horror genre
fanatic’s expectation. Through the information garnered in an interview with the
director and a summary of the film, Martin creates an expectation based upon genre
tropes, the previous work of the talent involved, and the declared influence of the
filmmaker(s). If this article is to be taken as a representative example, it can be