By Todd Garbarini
New York Times theater critic Jason Zinoman
recently held a discussion at the Times Center in mid-town Manhattan about
horror films. He was joined by author
Chuck Hogan and film director Guillermo del Toro who both discussed their
collaboration on “The Fall,†the second book in their best-selling trilogy about
vampires called “The Strain.†For those
of you who only may be familiar with Mr. Del Toro’s work through the cinema,
“The Strain†trilogy comes highly recommended.
During the discussion, Mr. Zinoman pondered as to
why vampires endure, certainly a legitimate question given the audience’s
seemingly insatiable appetite for all things fang-like: Showtime’s “True Bloodâ€
series is enjoying terrific success. Mr.
Del Toro responded that vampires are highly romanticized – for women, they have
chastity. In romantic novels, women are
attracted to the Bad Boy. There is also
the tapping into people’s fear of death and ageing, and wanting to remain
frozen in time; novelists and filmmakers have exploited these fears for
years.
When asked what scares him, Mr. Del Toro replied
that he saw The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
when he was very young, and became a vegetarian for four years following his
initial viewing of that film. As a
child, his grandmother told him about going to hell as a result of original
sin, and this caused him much distress, fueling much of the horrific visions of
his films.
In speaking of his film work, Mr. Del Toro truly
loves the monsters that he has created, and the ultimate compliment came from
ILM’s Dennis Murren – technically and conceptually, audiences have never seen
monsters like the ones that Mr. Del Toro has dreamed up.
A teaser trailer for Mr. Del Toro’s upcoming film Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark, a remake of
the 1973 TV-movie of the same name, was shown to the audience. It is very effective, eschewing the
conventional cookie-cutter style that plagues so many Hollywood trailers.
Jason Zinoman has
also written about films, television, books and sports for publications such
as Vanity Fair, The Guardian, The Economist and Slate. His new book is called "Shock Value: How
A Few Eccentric Outsiders Gave Us Nightmares, Conquered Hollywood and Invented
Modern Horror," and is scheduled to be released by Penguin Press in July
2011.