Key Takeaways (At a Glance):
- The Cinematic Threat of Female Power: Historically, film—heavily influenced by the Hays Code and ancient cultural myths—has equated female sexuality and power with wickedness, often depicting strong women as grotesque monsters or deadly femmes fatales.
- The Theory of Abjection: Rooted in the psychoanalytic theories of Julia Kristeva and Barbara Creed, the “abject” represents everything society rejects to maintain order. In horror, this abjection is disproportionately linked to maternal authority and the female body.
- Weaponizing the Grotesque: Through a process known as “mimetic abjection,” intentionally assuming the role of the monster becomes a subversive tool for reclaiming female agency and dismantling patriarchal tropes.
- Deconstructing Neris: Noah Weisel’s Lovecraftian short film Neris brilliantly reconstructs the myth of the siren. By positioning the “monstrous” female as the victorious protagonist and narrator, the film forces audiences to confront the irresistible allure of the Other.
In the vast discourse of film history, granting a female character overt sexual and narrative power has frequently marked her as dangerous, wicked, or inherently tragic. Canonized during the restrictive era of the Hollywood Hays Code, this practice has roots in deeply established cultural and religious narratives that draw strict boundary lines between the sacred and the desecrated—lines that suspiciously mirror the division between male and female.
This profound “terror” surrounding female sexuality manifests most clearly in the horror genre. When a woman is allowed to be something other than a helpless victim, she is often transformed into a grotesque entity. She becomes a monster—sometimes literally equipped with a vagina dentata—whose ultimate threat is intrinsically tied to her reproductive capabilities and bodily autonomy. Even today, residual Victorian influences dictate that while audiences enjoy the spectacle of sexuality on screen, the narrative must unerringly punish its participants, especially the women.
However, a unique cinematic opportunity exists: What if we repurpose this grotesque? What if filmmakers celebrate feminine otherness, sexuality, and deviance without punishing it? By embracing the tropes of the Monstrous-Feminine, modern cinema can upend traditional stereotypes and force a confrontation with the “Allure of the Other.”
The Powers of Horror: Understanding “The Abject”
To understand why the female monster is so prevalent, we must look to the concept of Abjection. In her seminal book Powers of Horror, psychoanalyst Julia Kristeva argues that society’s definitions of the unclean, the taboo, and the horrific are essentially disguised “confrontations with the feminine.”
Film theorist Barbara Creed expands on this in her analysis of horror cinema, stating: “Virtually all horror texts represent the monstrous-feminine in relation to Kristeva’s notion of maternal authority and the mapping of the self’s clean and proper body.”
The Abject is that which we reject. It is the boundary we draw to separate the ‘dirty’ from the ‘clean,’ the subject from the object. Yet, this boundary is fragile and manufactured. As Kristeva notes, while the Abject repulses us, it simultaneously lures us in. We are enticed to cross the boundary, drawn to its primordial power. By consistently coding the mother figure or the female body as “abject,” society inadvertently admits just how terrifyingly powerful women truly are.
Mimetic Abjection: Embracing the Monster
If women in contemporary culture hope to alter a subject position that is constantly forced into alignment with the Abject, simply asking for “positive” representation is not always enough. As scholar Karen Shimakawa suggests, the deliberate assumption of the abject role might be the only recourse when the alternative is total invisibility.
This is Mimetic Abjection. For a critical piece of art to succeed, the performer or character must be fully aware of the abject role they are assuming. This knowing assumption creates a critical distance, allowing the creator to hold a mirror up to the audience’s prejudices. Avoiding the monstrous entirely misses the opportunity to analyze the wounds these tropes have caused. Instead, foregrounding the monster highlights its mythic, excessive qualities.
Case Study: The Lovecraftian Allure of Neris
This theoretical framework serves as the bedrock for the short film Neris, a ‘Weird Horror’ piece of Lovecraftian descent. The film features a female-presenting, sexually powerful, highly amoral protagonist. Her name, “Neris,” is simply “siren” spelled backward—a direct invocation of the alluring, deadly creatures of Homeric legend.
Neris is a story about a character whom the world would undoubtedly classify as a monster, both physically and morally. Yet, far from being the antagonist to be vanquished by a male hero, this abject monster is the protagonist, the narrator, and ultimately, the victor. She is a femme fatale who unapologetically gets away with her transgressions.
Reconstructing the Myth
The character of Neris straddles several of Barbara Creed’s established Monstrous-Feminine tropes:
- The Archaic Mother: She narrates her tale to her progeny, acting as a primordial abyss.
- Woman as Vampire: She draws blood and tastes it with intense pleasure, linking sex, violence, and death.
- Woman as Witch/Medusa: Using supernatural abilities, she traps weak-willed men. The reveal of her tentacled, cephalopodic lower half vividly evokes the serpentine hair of Medusa and the ultimate terror of the vagina dentata.
With all these terrifying representations on display—tropes historically used to frame the feminine as “radical evil”—how does Neris function as a socially constructive film?
The answer lies in mythic reconstruction. As Roland Barthes argued, myths present societal constructs as “natural,” but their political origins can always be restored and altered. By blending elements of modern romance with cosmic horror, and by granting the “monster” the absolute power to narrate her own fable and claim her own victory, the film shifts the mythic context.
Neris proves that the Monstrous-Feminine does not have to be a symbol of patriarchal fear. When placed in the right narrative hands, the abject diva becomes a mesmerizing icon of inescapable, triumphant power.