Horror Matters: The Day The Kid Spoke

It is my pleasure to introduce to you my co-host, The Sensational, Spooky, Seductive, Creature of Death, The Kamikaze Kid. The Kamikaze Kid will bring a fresh new element to this site, as well as share with you her thoughts on everything horror. So without further hype, let The Kamikaze Kid explain to you why Horror Matters to her!


Horror Matters: The Day The Kid Spoke

“I accentuated the aspect of horror a bit more. In horror films, we think the horrific element is a special thing that doesn't exist in real life and that's why we can enjoy it. But there are terrifying things in life too and they are all made by human beings. Everybody has those things inside themselves. So by filming human beings, it naturally becomes a horror movie.”

-Miike Takashi

In the words of one of the greats, or should I say “The Greatest”, all humans are capable of these ungodly acts which are portrayed in horror films. The horror film itself frightens us only because, when placed into some of the most horrific of situations, the human mind can be bent and stretched worlds outside of our own comfort zone.

It is this idea primarily that got me into horror. As a small child, one of the first horror films I was exposed to was ‘It’. While this reaches more into the paranormal side of the horror genre, as I haven’t seen any clowns coming out of my drain recently, Stephen King is probably one of the greatest staples in the American horror fiction foundation. His idea of the dark, dirty deeds which people are capable of (schizophrenia driving man mad enough to kill his wife or a crazed fan hobbling her favorite author because of her overwhelming obsession for his novels) began to expose me to more and more of this dark world the human mind seems to keep trapped away.

Much like the development of my own brain, my passion for the genre only grew more intricate. We had all seen ‘Hellraiser’ and found it hard to forget Cenobites may hiding under our beds at night. ‘Night of the Living Dead’, from 1968, was a personal gateway into the zombie apocalypse long before the craze began. But much like my personality, I craved for something different. I wanted something more and I needed it now! Luckily it hit me and it hit hard.

Miike Takashi is considered one of the world’s most controversial directors of our time and it was with the discovery of his films I was directed into the world of Asian Horror which I now consider my specialty. The first film I had been exposed to was ironically named ‘Ichi the Killer’.

‘Ichi the Killer’ is a gore based horror primarily circling around the twisted workings of extremely demented individuals. There is nothing paranormal or science fiction about this movie. I will admit, some of the fatal deaths seem to push the limits on “Would it really happen like that?” but the thrilling thing about this twisted masterpiece is that the mental instabilities these individuals suffer from are more common in the world we live in than you are I seem to want to admit. Brainwashing, homicidal tendencies, sadomasochism all wrapped up into an Ichi filled rice ball.

Basically, our “hero” Ichi is manipulated into thinking he remembers things that never happened causing an oddly placed rage to go out onto specifically chosen individuals. There are the prostitutes, the gang members and our sadomasochistic opposing character, Kakihara, who can’t seem to get enough of that pain and torture he lives and breaths for.I don’t want to ruin the ending or anything seeing as it is such a deep film but if there is any forewarning into the goodies that lay ahead, barf bags were passed out at the premier and a woman actually slapped Miike midway through the film as it was that disturbing. Ouch!

 From here there was only fuel to the fire. Director of ‘Old Boy’, Park Chan-Wook and his ‘Vengeance Trilogy’ and ‘Battle Royale’ based off of the ever controversial novel by Koshun Takami, are only a couple of the vast array of Asian horror which depict real people doing real horrifying things when placed only the most special of circumstances. Revenge, survival and mental illness.

This evolution and passion for horror has taken me to bounds I didn’t think I would go. Starting out with a film like ‘Ichi the Killer’ really left me a far more advanced fan than most when it comes to foreign horror and so I had thought I was prepared for anything. I then discovered the worlds of German and even Italian horror. I know what you must be thinking, “Give this journey across the world up.” But for those of you who have ever read the bible or studied world history, you can see that American’s, as a freshly birthed country, don’t have quite the dark and disturbing histories of these cultures.

And so it began, the exposure into the sick and twisted minds of those all across our world. While it made me hesitant to ever travel, making the tough streets of Detroit and Boston look like Baby Gap in comparison to the darkness of Eastern Europe or rural China, I realized many use food or art as a way to see the world and I a have simply exposed myself to the gut wrenching terrors of those we take so little time into understanding.

Miike was indeed right, all film about the human can inevitably be a direct gateway into the horrors we are capable of and this truth is what will continue to be my driving force into the minds of those dark individuals who bag our groceries, prescribe our medicines, handle our billing questions and even run our country.

My name is Angelica Guevara and I will be better known here as The Kamikaze Kid. I hope this have given you a little insight into the world of horror on a more personal level as I plan on exposing you to it a lot in my articles. But don’t be scared, it was bound to happen sooner or later.