tension – R&D Gothic Discoveries

When we think about The Jungle Book, we usually think about the animation movie that we all watched when we were younger. This first movie was released in 1967 and was based on a previous novel written by Rudyard Kipling. Last year, in 2018, a new version of this movie was released, called Mowgli.

Briefly, it is the story of a child, Kaa, that was raised in the jungle surrounded by wild animals. We follow him through his journey in adulthood and see him overcome different challenges that living in the jungle can imply. In the new version of the movie, there are different gothic motifs involved, but the most important one throughout the movie is darkness. Darkness is exploited through the use of dark backgrounds and lightings. The majority of the 2018 film is set in dark spaces of the jungle, where there is not much light, nor much life. The use of dark places obviously adds suspense and tension in the movie. Since the individuals who watch the movie do not know what surrounds Mowgli, they feel stressed and it certainly creates tension. The public is hence kept in ignorance and blindness, such that the anticipation of something bad happening builds up, which also is a gothic motif called tension.

There were certainly not that many gothic elements in the first version of the Jungle Book, but I guess we could argue that the new version represents the new generation of kids watching it as well as the older one that used to watch it as a kid in 1967. Did you ever watched the older version of the Jungle Book or you’ve only watched the new one?

Cheers,

Rosalie

In this post, I will provide you a little explanation of the evolution of the gothic genre through time with different examples of books that were really popular in this genre.

First of, I will describe how The Castle of Otranto set the standards for the future gothic pieces. This story was written by Horace Walpole in 1764. It was the first story that follow the gothic genre we know today. This story really set the standards for this genre and, even nowadays, some gothic pieces are inspired from it. At first, the gothic genre really focused on the aspect of setting. The setting of a story is really the base because it will decide whether or not the reader will be frightened by the piece or not. In The Castle of Otranto, the setting is, in my opinion, the most important elements of the story. Actually, the fact that it is set in strange places really far from anything else is what makes the reader afraid. On the contrary, if the story was set in the middle of the city in a beautiful house, the tension in the book would certainly be destroyed.

Following the same idea, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, written in 1897, also put emphasis on the setting of the story. In this book, the fact that Count Dracula’s castle is far from the city makes the readers believe even more in the “evilness” of the character. Even in the story, the protagonist, Jonathan Harker, is afraid to go to the Count’s castle because it is set in a far and strange place and no one is really sure of what’s happening there. Once again, the tension found in the book is essentially created by the setting of the story.

On the other hand, more recent gothic pieces put emphasis on completely different motifs to create tension. For instance, Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight, published in 2005, created tension based on the archetype of the damsel in distress and forbidden love. The forbidden love situation is mainly represented in Bella and Edward’s relationship. The fact that he is a vampire and she is a human, makes it technically impossible for them to fall in love, even though this is exactly what happens. Adding to this situation, Bella, one of the main characters, is essentially represented as a damsel in distress. Meyer puts Bella in different situations that sometimes put her in danger, but mainly creates vulnerability. It is in those cases that the archetype of the damsel in distress will create tension for the readers because they will fear what will happen to the girl.

With this glimpse of information, I hope you understand a little better the evolution of the gothic motifs through time and that it makes you realize how the authors create the tension you like so much about gothic novels.

Rosalie

Tag: tension

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