Monstrous Mother, Incestuous Father, and Terrorized Teen: Reading Precious as a Horror Film

Abstract

WHEN A mother HER THROWS A TELEVISION down a stairwell in pursuit of her daughter holding her newly born son; a father rapes his daughter while mother voyeuristically gazes from afar; and a grandmother refers to her own granddaughter, who has Down syndrome, as an animal, we are introduced to Precious, a 2009 film based on 1996 novel Push by Sapphire and directed by Lee Daniels that provides some of most provocative representations of black family life witnessed on screen. These scenes, among others, are so scandalous and disturbing that they invite reading film as an extension of horror genre. Because film takes on taboo subjects such as failed black motherhood, incest, pedophilia, and homosexuality, turning to horror as one way by which to read these racialized representations seems called for. My intent in this article is not to avoid critical engagement with sociopolitical issues addressed on screen or to disregard a class analysis of obstacles faced by protagonist, but rather to suggest that based on way story unfolds, filmmakers (writer, director, cinematographer, etc.) either consciously or unconsciously drew on horror genre in order to portray protagonist's struggle as synonymous with a living nightmare.Exploring film as an extension of horror is certainly rendered plausible given that a number of reviewers and critics have associated film with horrific, inhuman, gothic, and animalistic.1 film's indisputable association with horror is all more convincing when we examine its depiction of perverse social relations [that] breed monstrosity (Lindsey 280); its challenge to traditional notions of family where the eruption of violence and sexuality [enter] into domestic sphere (Lindsey 279); and its representation of a matriarch who wreaks havoc on her daughter because of her own sexual repression-all of which are consistent with horror.This investigation is structured around examining following subject areas: mothers, phallic mothers, collusive mothers, failed mothers/motherhood, and monstrous mothers; parallels to horror films-Psycho (1960) and Carrie (1976); incestuous fathers, sexual taboo, and rape; horror and horrific; body as grotesque; and dreams, fantasies, and voyeurism. To introduce each section, since film pays tribute to literary figure Zora Neale Hurston, this article extracts subtitles from Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937) to connect novel and film and to demonstrate how Hurston's text provides an urtext to protagonist Precious's (played by Gabourey Sidibe) search for subjectivity, a subjectivity that she shares with Hurston's protagonist (Janie Crawford).Bad Mothers, Phallic Mothers, Collusive Mothers, Failed Mothers/Motherhood, and Monstrous MothersIt was like seeing your sister turn into a 'gator... You keep seeing your sister in 'gator and 'gator in your sister, and you'd rather not.-Zora Neale Hurston (48)Bad MothersIn order to examine phallic, collusive, failed, and monstrous mothers as well as black motherhood, it is necessary to address phenomenon of bad mothers. Characterization of black mother as bad has to be contextualized within larger discussion of what constitutes a mother and historical and political discourse surrounding bad mother. In past few decades, 'bad' mothers have moved noticeably toward center stage in American culture, declares Molly Ladd-Taylor and Lauri Umansky (2). The are familiar: welfare mother, teen mother ... But mother-blaming goes far beyond these stereotypes (Ladd-Taylor and Umansky 2). Any mothers who do not fit kind of mother associated with 'traditional' nuclear family, according to Ladd-Taylor and Umansky, constitute bad mothers and are under assault (3). This examination, however, is an attempt not to defend bad mother or to further demonize mother but to suggest that filmmaker either consciously or unconsciously deployed strategies to create mother image, an image that circulates in contemporary discourse. …