The Oscar of horror (version for non-Spanish speakers)
Narrative
Dear Santa, this letter is from one of my doppelgangers, one of my malevolent doubles, my other self. I was born under the sign of Gemini, and my nature has been divided since the beginning of time. Indeed, today I write to you from the darkest regions of my soul.
And I appeal to your refined artistic taste, your delicate sense of dark humor, your highly developed cinematic nose, to beg you, on my knees if necessary, to grant me the honor of bringing to the big screen a film never before conceived. A feature film entitled: The Horror Oscars.
But why a horror film and not a romance or comedy? Because horror is the all-seeing eye; it is the Bermuda Triangle that drags everything toward its hurricane-force navel, feeding on all that dares to cross the imposing sea. It is palpable proof that the human heart has abyssal depths, within whose entrails dwell countless monsters with scorpion-like arms and tails, hungry, malnourished, waiting for a scrap of meat, fresh or rotten, it doesn't matter! They need, at any price, to feast on a delicious banquet of carrion. The horror reveals both sides of the coin, its luster, its tarnish, which Caesar or which Caligula it represents or honors. Furthermore, it makes clear that these coins, regardless of their value, have passed through billions of hands. They have been licked by dirty, infected, virulent fingertips that smell like what Satan's underpants would smell like, if such a thing existed.
The film I want you to produce is set in the year 2089, in a dystopian society that rewards crime and murder. A society in which all film genres and subgenres have been absorbed by horror. Indeed, in the vast gallery of cinema, so-called snuff films proliferate—those in which real violence is recorded. In this corrupt society of the future, film directors and screenwriters can commit all kinds of atrocities and cruel acts as long as their evil serves the Seventh Art, contributes to enriching its repertoire, and is guided (governed) by the search for the perfect, flawless horror film, capable of portraying the true essence of humanity, just as the protagonist of the classic slasher film (The Photographer of Fear)
kills people with the intention of capturing the spark of panic in the fullness of its intensity and with the purpose of compiling all those frames into a single, apotheotic film. In this context, there exists the Academic Fraternity of World Cinema, which, through the Horror Oscars, honors the authenticity with which filmmakers unleash humanity's most perverse passions from their dark and foul-smelling closets.
There are four categories, influenced by four cult horror films:
The Human Centipode is the first category and pays homage to the worst billionaire serial killer whose modus operandi is the torture of his victims through surgical operations. But, above all, what the jury values most is the grotesque creature that emerges from said medical procedure.
Then we have the award for best horror documentary, which requires that it showcase the worst aspects of navigating the internet of the future, and, indeed, the laurel will go to the feature film that reveals, in the most perfect, morbid, and perverse way, the dangers of arranging online dates with strangers. This award focuses on the monstrous nature of the killer behind the user's mask.
Society in the year 2089 will be under the absolute tyranny of pornography. The commercialization of sex, the sexual exploitation of bodies, their commodification by large industries, the transformation of fetishes into deities as important as the Greek or Egyptian deities were in their time, will reach such an extreme that the world, completely blind, will walk hand in hand with pornography wherever it leads. And it leads to the dead ends of brutality, violence, banality, hatred, murder, gore, and much more.
Therefore, the award for best pornographic horror film is essential, one that not only illustrates the madness to which bodies are dragged in their insatiable pursuit of pleasure, but also stretches it to the point of bordering on (or surpassing) the limits of catastrophe. The ideal actor, in this case, will be the one who best embodies the obsessive-compulsive sex addict, the one who can't stop thinking about sex and is capable of committing any crime to get it; the one whose behavior, ultimately, resembles that of a bull that has just been injected with large amounts of Viagra.
At this point, what the judges are trying to find is a film in which even the camera itself is a symptom of the spiritual decay afflicting the characters and the context in which they move.
Finally, the Walrus category… there is a difference between this film and the first (the human centipede), namely: the main protagonist, the hunter of twisted stories, ends up becoming the hunted animal, falling into the clutches of a fifty-something millionaire whose traumatic experience engendered a particular affection for walruses… a fetid affection, of course, which takes shape in the no less corrupt idea of turning a human being into an animal. In this category, film scholars pursue the perfect character, a little man who moves through the mire of the dark web and sensationalism for the simple reason that he needs a mass audience to consume his yellow journalism. Indeed, this character doesn't care about going all the way to Patagonia, much less what kind of human demon he might encounter, as long as he finds what he seeks: atrocious acts, not to summon justice, but to wallow in it.
But my film still needs a plot development, acts, scenes, and twists that increase and sustain the tension; it lacks the psychological depth that comes from a meticulous biography of the characters. Because without that biography, the motivations, desires, and feelings won't be palpable on camera. So the horizon of my ideal film is strewn with questions… which you, dear Santa Claus, can answer.
And, of course, you too, dear cinephile soul. So let me end with a question: what ingredient is missing from this film? How would you tell it?
Comments 1