Autorentext
John A. Dowell is an independent scholar. He is also the Technology Specialist for Michigan State University's Neighborhood Student Success Collaborative. Cynthia J. Miller is senior faculty at the Emerson College Institute for the Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies.Moritz Fink is an independent scholar and librarian, who holds a doctoral degree in American Studies from the University of Munich. He has published on The Simpsons, contemporary media culture, and popular satire. Fink is the coeditor of Culture Jamming: Activism and the Art of Cultural Resistance.Cynthia J. Miller is senior faculty at the Emerson College Institute for the Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies.John A. Dowell is an independent scholar. He is also the Technology Specialist for Michigan State University's Neighborhood Student Success Collaborative.

Klappentext
When evil clowns menace the screen, do we scream or laugh? When zombies converge to tear a victim limb from limb, do we cringe and hide our eyes, or shriek "What??! Play that again!!"? What about those instances when these seemingly opposite reactions happen at once? This is the phenomenon known as sLaughter. Horrific Humor and the Moment of Droll Grimness in Cinema: Sidesplitting sLaughter presents the first focused look at the moment in audience reception where screams and laughter collide. John A. Dowell and Cynthia J. Miller bring together twelve essays from an international collection of authors across the disciplines. The volume begins with an examination of the aesthetics and mechanics of the sLaughter moment, then moves closer to look at the impact of its awkward frission of humor and horror on the individual viewer, and finally, broadens its lens to explore sLaughter’s implications for the human condition more generally. The chapters discuss such box office hits such as A Clockwork Orange (1971), Fargo (1996), The Dark Knight (2008), and The Cabin in the Woods (2012), as well as cult classics such as The Toxic Avenger (1984) and Dead Snow (2009). Engaging and thought provoking, Horrific Humor and the Moment of Droll Grimness in Cinema will be of great interest to scholars of both humor and horror, as well as to those working in reception studies and fans of cult cinema.

Zusammenfassung
Horrific Humor and the Moment of Droll Grimness in Cinema explores the moment in audience reception where screams and laughter collide. Essays examinine the aesthetics and mechanics of the sLaughter moment, the impact of its frission of humor and horror on the viewer, and sLaughter's implications for the human condition more generally.

Inhalt

Foreword: From "Stairway to Heaven" to "I Hate Mondays": Is Understanding sLaughter Essential?
Molly Merryman
Introduction: The Hilarity of Terror: Toward an Understanding of sLaughter
John A. Dowell, with Cynthia J. Miller
Part I: The Aesthetics and Mechanics of sLaughter, or Welcome to the Funhouse of Carnography-Please Watch Your Head

1. Troma-tized by Punk
   Iain J.W. Ellis
2. "Must I Remind You of a Little Movie Called Deliverance?": sLaughter and the Postmodern Pastiche
   Don Tresca
3. Phallic Noses, Blood-Filled Balloons, Exploding Popcorn, and Laughing-Gas-Squirting Flowers: Reading Images of the Evil Clown
   Moritz Fink
4. The Mechanical sLaughterhouse: Horror, Humor, and Repetition in American Psycho and Fight Club
   Colin Yeo
   Part II: Bodies in the sLaughterhouse, or You Might Feel a Little Pinch
5. "Michael Eat Your Meat": Trauma, Satire, and Nostalgia in Bob Balaban's Parents
   William Quiterio
6. Ha!/Aaah!: The Painful Relationship between Humor and Horror
   David Misch
7. Igniting the Fuse of Destructive History: Nation and Ablation in the sLaughterhouse
   Thomas Britt
8. sLaughter as Existential Epiphany
   Ben Urish
   Part III: Beyond Mere War, or So Long and Thanks for All the Jokes!
9. Surfing Fascists and the Masses: (Non-)Evolving Images of the Cinenazi
   Ben Betka
10. In the UnDead of Winter: Humor and the Horrific in Dead Snow
    Cynthia J. Miller
11. Too Soon?: Laughing at Disaster on the Cinematic Titanic
    Ann Larabee
    About the Editors
    Notes on the Contributors