The Horror of It All: One Moviegoer's Love Affair with Masked Maniacs, Frightened Virgins, and the Living Dead...

by Adam Rockoff

Overview

Pop culture history meets blood-soaked memoir as Adam Rockoff, “a passionate fan of the horror genre in all its forms,” (The New York Times) recalls a life spent watching blockbuster slasher films, cult classics, and everything in between.

Horror films have simultaneously captivated and terrified audiences for generations, racking up millions of dollars at the box office and infusing our nightmares with chainsaws, goblins, and blood-spattered machetes. Today’s hottest television shows feature classic horror elements, from marauding zombies and sexy vampires to myriad incarnations of the devil himself. Yet the horror genre and its controversial offshoots continue to occupy a nebulous space in our critical dialogue. The Horror of It All is a memoir from the front lines of the horror industry that dissects (and occasionally defends) the massively popular phenomenon of scary movies.

Author Adam Rockoff delivers “the sharpest pop culture criticism you’ll find in any medium today,” (Rue Morgue) as he traces the highs and lows of the genre through the lens of his own obsessive fandom, which began in the horror aisles of his childhood video store and continued with a steady diet of cable trash. From the convergence of horror and heavy metal, to Siskel and Ebert’s crusade against the slasher flick, to the legacy of the Scream franchise, and the behind-the-scenes work of horror directors and make-up artists, Rockoff mines the rich history of the genre, braiding critical analysis with his own firsthand experiences as a horror writer and producer. Filled with mordant wit and sharp insight, The Horror of It All “is an amiable and often amusing guide” (Kirkus Reviews) that explains why horror films not only endure, but continue to prosper. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781476761879
Publisher:	Scribner
Publication date:	05/20/2017
Pages:	280
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.30(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Adam Rockoff is the screenwriter of Wicked Lake, a film so depraved it caused Ron Jeremy to storm out of the theater in anger. However, his 2010 adaptation of the classic exploitation film, I Spit on Your Grave, received nearly unanimous praise from horror critics. His first book, Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film, 1978-1986, a critical examination of the slasher genre, was made into a documentary which premiered on STARZ. When he’s not getting his hands bloody, Rockoff runs the television production company, FlashRock Films.

Read an Excerpt

The Horror of It All

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times . . .

Those immortal words were almost certainly not written to anticipate the horror boom in the early years of the twenty-first century. And yet they most surely apply.

It was the best of times because interest in horror movies, and all the accompanying cultural detritus, is at an all-time high.

I just got back from Barnes & Noble, as good a barometer as any for measuring the zeitgeist. On this day, the magazine rack was stocked with no fewer than eleven titles devoted exclusively to horror and exploitation films. Eleven! And lest anyone think I’m exaggerating for effect, here they are: Fangoria, Rue Morgue, Scary Monsters Magazine, Diabolique, HorrorHound, Famous Monsters of Filmland, Shadowland Magazine, Filmfax, VideoScope, Video Watchdog, and The Walking Dead: The Official Magazine. There were exactly zero magazines dedicated to Westerns. None for comedies either. Zilch for family films, dramas, and musicals. While there were also a handful of general entertainment periodicals, those publications included horror, too, whenever it hit the mainstream.

The 2011 Best Picture Oscar winner, The Artist, grossed a total of $44 million. That same year, in just its opening weekend, the third installment of the Paranormal Activity series grossed $52 million. This is just one example, but it’s indicative of what a commercial juggernaut horror has become.

If the genre is as healthy as it’s ever been, how can it possibly also be the worst of times? Well, because as incredible as this might seem, the golden age of horror journalism—which I would argue we’re in—has a downside: it seems as if everything worth writing has already been written.

I love the Friday the 13th series as much as anyone, but after Peter M. Bracke’s exhaustive fully illustrated oral history, Crystal Lake Memories, as well as both Daniel Farrands’s accompanying documentary adaptation and his earlier film His Name Was Jason: 30 Years of Friday the 13th, there’s absolutely nothing to add to the legacy of everyone’s favorite hockey-masked maniac. We now have a handful of books I could legitimately describe as the definitive work on Dario Argento, and with Mario Bava: All the Colors of the Dark and Beyond Terror: The Films of Lucio Fulci, Tim Lucas and Stephen Thrower respectively have provided the final word on these Italian titans. I can’t imagine anyone writing about the grindhouse and trash cinema more lovingly than Bill Landis and Michelle Clifford. And if a Peter Biskind–esque look at horror cinema’s most famous feuds and faces is your thing, you probably can’t do better than Jason Zinoman’s Shock Value: How a Few Eccentric Outsiders Gave Us Nightmares, Conquered Hollywood, and Invented Modern Horror or David Konow’s Reel Terror: The Scary, Bloody, Gory, Hundred-Year History of Classic Horror Films. I could go on and on, and on and on.

So what’s the problem with this embarrassment of riches? Twenty years ago, when I was digging around the back of a moth-infested used-book store for a battered copy of John McCarty’s Splatter Movies: Breaking the Last Taboo of the Screen, I could never have dreamed that some Monday I would be able to order the biography of Peter Cushing, a history of horror fanzines, and a beautiful full-color coffee table book showcasing Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett’s unparalleled horror memorabilia collection, only to have all of them arrive at my front door on Tuesday morning.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that this was only a problem for me. It had been over a decade since my first book, Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film, came out, and I had been itching to write a follow-up. But about what?

Then it hit me. I was in the bathroom reading Fargo Rock City for the umpteenth time—both on the toilet and in general. I know I sound like some hack comedian, but every single good idea I’ve ever had has come to me either in the shower or while emptying my bowels. For those of you who don’t know, Fargo Rock City is Chuck Klosterman’s memoir about growing up as a heavy metal fan in rural North Dakota. On the surface, it’s both a history and critical analysis of hair metal, but filtered through Klosterman’s personal experiences it becomes something much more profound.

What if I could do the same thing with horror movies? To my knowledge, this had never been done. Kier-La Janisse’s masterful House of Psychotic Women comes close. But two things gave me reason to believe there might be room for another voice. One, and most obvious, Janisse is a woman. We may like to pretend that gender has no effect on how we process art and culture, but that’s a lie, and everyone knows it. Plus, her hardscrabble life was markedly different from my own uneventful suburban upbringing. Two, and this is equally apparent just from her book’s subtitle—An Autobiographical Topography of Female Neurosis in Horror and Exploitation Films—Janisse is a far better writer than I’ll ever be.

This isn’t false modesty. Unfortunately, I have plenty of examples to support this claim. The first testimonial (the very first one) on the back cover of Going to Pieces states: “Rockoff is no blood-in-his-eye moron.” Have you ever heard such effusive praise? I might not be the smartest guy in the room. Or the most eloquent. But hey, at least I’m no moron! I might as well be the thinnest guy at fat camp. Then there’s the fact that a signed copy of my book is selling on eBay for less money than a brand-new one. So I have the dubious distinction of being one of the lucky authors whose signature actually devalues the work. This reminds me of a hot dog stand near my hometown where a buttered roll actually cost less than a plain roll. As adventurous as my friends and I were, we never dared sample that “butter.”

So why waste your hard-earned money on this book? As a close friend of mine recently asked, “Who the hell wants to read about your experiences? Why is that interesting to anybody except for you?” I realized two things. One, I need some new friends. But two, my experiences, while unique to me, are really nothing more than a window to your own. A mirror to reflect back those memories that may have been forgotten, misplaced, or shelved away in the furthest recesses of your mind. Part of the subtitle of this book is One Moviegoer’s Love Affair. That’s both true and misleading.

I distinctly remember the first time I ever saw the 1978 film Class Reunion Massacre. On some level, I understood that hundreds of people were responsible for its conception, production, and release; thousands more had eventually seen it in theaters or on home video. But the film itself was so weird, and my experience of watching it so personal, that at the time I couldn’t imagine anyone else even being aware of its existence.

Once I started discussing horror films with like-minded fans, I soon learned that many people were indeed aware of Class Reunion Massacre. One or two had even seen it in some shitty theater under its original title, The Redeemer: Son of Satan!

Then it became crystal clear. Although I can only write about my own experiences, I can draw on the collective consciousness of horror fandom. And this is why you might like this book. Because my memories are yours.

I’m almost forty now, no longer the target demographic for horror movies. And yet I love them more than ever. Lots of my friends do too.

As someone who came of age during the slasher boom in the early eighties, I’ve seen the genre rise, and fall, and rise again. Since then, horror films have undergone more transformations than even Dr. Moreau could fathom. Scream ushered in an era of snarky, self-conscious, postmodern horror. The Blair Witch Project obliterated the studio model and proved that any bozo with a camcorder could make a scary movie, while superior documentary-style films such as The Last Exorcism, The Devil Inside, and the Paranormal Activity series proved to be not the exception but the rule. The term “torture porn” was coined to describe the uncompromising films of Eli Roth and Rob Zombie, giving media pundits a perfect sobriquet for the objects of their derision. Films released barely twenty years earlier were remade or “reimagined” in droves, including each of the holy trinity of slasherdom: Halloween, Friday the 13th, and A Nightmare on Elm Street. Vampires were sexy, then gritty, then sexy again. And, eventually, zombies were freakin’ everywhere.

The time is once again ripe to ask the question: why do horror films continue to not only endure but prosper? It’s a question that will be answered not by the cultural arbiters—forever frustrated by their inability to explain the allure of horror—but by someone on the front lines.

Because to really understand the modern horror film, you have to live it. You have to embrace the outré, dive headfirst into the rabbit hole with eyes wide open (or shut), and not be afraid to slay the sacred cows.

And for those of us who do, it’s a helluva ride.

Editorial Reviews

"Adam Rockoff writes from his heart with cleverness and wit as well as a hell of a lot of knowledge. The Horror Of It All is right up there with any classic tome of horror criticism and history."

Scream Magazine

"[Rockoff] knows horror movies like the Colonel knows chicken.... Rockoff’s genuine love for the genre shouts from every page."

Buzzymag.com

Some of the sharpest pop culture criticism you’ll find in any medium today, delivered with evocative writing that veers between thoughtful, heartfelt and hilarious….a compulsively readable package that’s likely to become the most popular non-fiction book horror aficionados will clamor for this year.

Rue Morgue

"Adam Rockoff's The Horror of It All may well have been titled Everything You Always Wanted to Know About the Horror Industry… But Were Too Afraid To Ask. It's a no bullshit look at the culture of horror and the films that define it, from a professional who hasn't lost his ability to be a fan. Written with the know-how of an academic and the crackerjack honesty of bathroom graffiti, The Horror of It All will satiate horror hounds and film buffs alike."

Rodrigo Gudiño

The author is a passionate fan of the horror genre in all its forms….The Horror of It All twitches with manic, foul-mouthed, bloggy energy.

The New York Times Book Review

Adam Rockoff is the ultimate authority on horror film andfandom, and no one captures the full dimensions of the genre with greater wit,humor, nostalgia and charm. The Horror of it All is bloodybrilliant!

Adrienne King

"Adam Rockoff's The Horror of It All may well have been titled Everything You Always Wanted to Know About the Horror Industry… But Were Too Afraid To Ask. It's a no bullshit look at the culture of horror and the films that define it, from a professional who hasn't lost his ability to be a fan. Written with the know-how of an academic and the crackerjack honesty of bathroom graffiti, The Horror of It All will satiate horror hounds and film buffs alike."

Rodrigo Gudiño

02/23/2015
Seasoned horror film critic and filmmaker Rockoff (Going to Pieces) attempts to analyze the genre’s high and low points in this series of personal essays that, taken as a whole, is not entirely effective. His book hops back and forth between the author’s autobiography and his perspective on horror films (along with heavy metal and other related art forms). These chapters often have little relation with one another, but they can nevertheless be entertaining, as seen in Rockoff’s point-by-point breakdown of the 1980s PMRC congressional hearings over “explicit content” in various media. Rockoff’s stated purpose is to provide criticism by way of the “collective unconscious,” as though his own experiences are representative of the vast majority of horror buffs. However, given that most of his opinions on various films are contrary to prevailing sentiment—as made abundantly clear in his objections to the “Horror Commandments”—it seems that Rockoff doesn’t represent most horror fans, and his knowledge is too deep and his references are too obscure to appeal to the average moviegoer. Without a satisfactory thesis, Rockoff’s prose, though amusing, feels directionless. (May)

Publishers Weekly

2015-01-28
One horror fan's mélange of memories, opinions and movie facts.Violent horror movies, especially of the slasher variety, tend to split viewers into two camps. Either you avoid them or, like horror aficionado and producer Rockoff (Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film, 1978-1986, 2002), you adore them. This ode to the genre combines personal reminiscences, movie trivia and rambling digressions into a book that is neither film criticism nor history but more like a monologue by a well-informed and highly opinionated fan. One aspect of the book describes how the adolescent author scared himself silly watching horror movies on rented VHS cassettes and late-night cable stations and eventually worked his way into the industry as a screenwriter and producer. Another aspect is devoted to Rockoff's commentary, which is particular and anecdotal in its approach. In one chapter, he names his top choice in a number of categories—e.g., "Greatest Kills," "Most Future Stars," "Most Sequel-Worthy Killer" and "Best Holiday Slasher." In another, he defends a series of positions heretical to the fan community (for instance, that Ridley Scott's Alien is boring). It's likely that no one but other self-proclaimed horror geeks will find these sections of interest, but Rockoff is an amiable and often amusing guide to all this macabre minutia. Elsewhere, the book suffers from inexplicable digressions on subjects ranging from pornography (a recurring interest) to Charlie Sheen, and the author's flippant attitude toward critics who take a more skeptical or theoretical view of the genre is off-putting. But at his best, Rockoff is a passionate defender of the creative rights of filmmakers, no matter how shocking or disturbing their creations might be, and a convincing advocate for scary movies as transgressive art—or just plain fun. A rich but meandering book that will mostly appeal to like-minded fans.

Kirkus Reviews