‘Horror Noire: A History Of Black Horror’ Makes The Case For Empathy In A Scary World

Black people love scary movies too

Through film, we learn to relate to and care for people we may not interact with on a regular basis. Famed critic Roger Ebert once said, “Movies are the most powerful empathy machine in all the arts.” No genre of film does this better than horror does.

Think of the sheer number of times you’ve feared for someone’s life. Not the kids in the Friday the 13th flicks because most of them are awful human beings, but someone like Halloween’s Laurie Strode or Child’s Play’s Andy Barclay. We want all the best things for these people and hope against hope they survive until the credits role. Now stop for a second and think about the black people in these flicks. Or better yet, think about the lack of black people. We’re either not involved enough or not involved at all.

Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror, the new documentary from Xavier Burgin, examines how something seemingly as small as representation in a horror film has real world consequences far scarier than any ghoul, ghost, or goblin.

Creators Burgin, Robin Means Coleman, Ashlee Blackwell, Tananarive Due, and Danielle Burrows illustrate the ever increasing importance of a person seeing themselves on screen. In 2018, Crazy Rich Asians, and Black Panther were the cultural events of the year because large groups of people previously omitted from pop culture conversations finally got to see themselves in Hollywood. But the aforementioned creative team, along with prominent black voices in horror, make the case for the importance of how big screen African-American representation impacts self-perception from other African-Americans, but also how that representation impacts perception from other races. This is especially true when those other races see us in ways that don’t check a stereotypical box or fulfill a trope.

Miguel Nunez Jr. has the look of a man who knows Jason is going to kill him soon.

There are several stereotypes that can be commonly found in Hollywood. There’s the “magical negro” e.g., Scatman Crothers in The Shining and the “supportive best friend of the main character”…