Clayton George Wickham - final thesis

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task of exploring and revealing their relationship to the events here depicted.” (1987;
116) Telotte’s statement demonstrates that not all critics agree as to whether or not
this voyeuristic camera positioning is negative. However, while Telotte chooses to
examine voyeurism as aesthetically created to challenge the viewer, Humphries takes
an opposing stance on voyeuristic design, which, he argues, results in casual
audience complicity. In a discussion of Halloween, Humphries says, “the spectators
can both enjoy the earlier sight of the girl undressing and later feel safe from any
danger insofar as we can identify with her, while knowing we are safe [...] Spying on
girls undressing is fine, provided the looker is not a psychotic.” (1991; 143)
[brackets mine] Humphries then discusses the absolution the eye/camera provides
the audience through enjoying the sadistic elements of the film: a viewer can enjoy
watching a vulnerable subject by proxy, while being able to condemn the actions of
the character that is looking (143-144).
Halloween is often centralized in discussions of the eye/camera and vice
versa. This is largely due to the distinctive and iconic opening sequence which is a
shot designed to appear as a single extended eye/camera shot, making it a significant
film particularly where this device is concerned. Because of its importance, that
sequence will be analysed in detail later in this chapter. However, the eye/camera’s,
and often the basic act of seeing’s, relationship to voyeurism regularly appears
within writing about film. James Marriott’s guide Horror Films, which is aimed at a
non-academic audience, discusses the film Deep Red (1975; dir. Argento). In this
overview, Marriott addresses the roots of the giallo film (to be discussed later),
writing about “the themes of voyeurism and eyewitness from Psycho, Rear Window
(1954), and Peeping Tom...” (168) as primary examples of influential foregrounding