Editorials
Why the Camera is King in Home Invasion Horror
We explore why the cinematography and camerawork is the most crucial factor when it comes to home invasion films
Home invasion horror films have become a growing trend in the genre, with the recent success of Fede Alvarez’s excellent Don’t Breathe being just the latest example. What Alvarez’s stripped down, claustrophobic film expertly illustrates is that if you want to make a good home invasion film, you really have to make the most out of your camera. This is a genre that is all about people being trapped somewhere, so to give the camera unlimited agency and make it the only entity that’s truly allowed to escape and move as it pleases is a crucial aspect of these pictures. Taking advantage of this seems to so often lead to the home invasion films that have come to be considered “classics,” while neglecting this principle sees forgettable, unsuccessful movies being made. While putting particular focus on Alvarez’s Don’t Breathe, the camerawork of many films from this genre will be examined in order to prove why cinematography is the most important aspect of home invasion horror.
Don’t Breathe has been the most recent endeavor in home invasion horror, with the film offering up plenty of fresh ideas and innovations to the closed-in storytelling. The main conceit in the film is that the owner of the home that is being invaded is blind, with several tactics in the film making the most of that handicap.
Shifting to night vision and scenes that are blurred are stylistic touches that work to great effect. While Rocky (Jane Levy) and the rest of her team struggle to figure out the layout of their new surroundings, the camera spins around at an unrestrained pace, zooming in and out on certain artifacts that are littered throughout the house. Every single detail that the camera focuses in on, whether it’s a hammer from a toolset, an errant shard of glass on the floor, or a simple skylight, they all become integral pieces to the puzzle of this film. The camera is slyly winking at you with every pan around the corner, spoiling-yet-not big set pieces from the film. The camera is as tuned into this building as its blind owner is. The film even starts with an extreme overhead, bird’s eyes view shot of everything that’s crucial to this film. We may not know it at the time, but once again, the camera does.
Mike Flanagan’s film, Hush, almost operates as the inverse to Don’t Breathe. Where the latter’s homeowner is blind, Maddie (Kate Siegel) in Hush is deaf. Just like how Alvarez’s picture uses the cinematography and the film’s aesthetic to help convey the ailment at hand, Flanagan’s film tries to make you experience Maddie’s deafness in a number of creative ways. When she finds herself the victim of a murderous invader, it is once again a situation where the camera is the one with ultimate control. Flanagan makes a point of showing off the geography of Maddie’s two-storey home in some very fluid, continuous shots. Flanagan also realizes that in a film with such a small playground, every camera movement magnifies and becomes ultra-important. As the film’s camera effectively builds tension and hides just like its intruder does, it also highlights ordinary objects like windows, insecticide, or a corkscrew, that all become major relics by the end of the film. Crucial tools that are dependent on Maddie’s inability to hear, such as her smoke alarm and her alarm clock get focused on in both regular contexts, before then later getting turned on their head in inventive ways. All of this being meditated by the camera. At moments of Maddie’s deepest desperation, the film depicts this carnage from outside of her home from a distance. The camera has the ability to leave while Maddie must fight to the bitter end.
Another film that accentuates this idea painfully well is David Fincher’s decisive film, Panic Room. This film has fallen into the reputation of being seen as “lesser Fincher” for a number of people, but it’s actually got the clearest execution of any of his pictures. Panic Room is a film that’s all about the agency of the camera. The principle of the home’s residents and antagonists being trapped in their surroundings while the camera has freedom is super prominent here. Fincher goes one step further with all of this by making his camera go through wires, fiber optics, and the “skeleton” of the house itself. While people are literally confined to a single room in this movie, the camera has so much power it can circulate through the house’s power supply. There are no obstacles for it at all. Fincher is arguably more interested in camera tricks and new sorts of digital zooms that continue to play with this idea, while other aspects of the film fall to the wayside. In this sense it’s easy to see where people lose interest in this film, but in terms of making a statement about home invasions and the lack of freedom we have, it’s an absolute goldmine.
Just like how Hush might be the alpha to Don’t Breathe’s omega, Korean master Park Chan-wook’s short film, Cut, from Three…Extremes very much feels like an intentional tribute to Fincher’s home invasion epic. Park’s camerawork follows many of the same patterns as Fincher does, with his camera doing impossible things as it moves through wires and cameras. Park’s Cut sees a famous director being attacked by a disgruntled extra who’s been in all of his films. A big point that’s being made here is the obfuscation between fiction and reality. The restless, sprawling cinematography helps highlight that on top of everything else. While other home invasion films see their victims being restricted to a tiny space, the director’s wife in this case is literally held in place by dozens of wires like some nightmarionette, while the director is tethered to a cord. Here the protagonists can barely move at all while the camera is doing somersaults around them and exiting this carnage whenever it sees fit.
Cut might push a lot of the fundamentals that are brought up here to the extreme, but increasingly impressive horror voices, Adam Wingard and Simon Barrett, hit a homerun with the reflexive home invasion flick, You’re Next. Erin (Sharni Vinston), the heroine of the film is with her boyfriend for his family’s reunion at their summer vacation home. Soon the lot of them start getting hunted down by relentless killers in animal masks. Just like how Scream sees characters that are self-aware to slashers, Erin is almost just as savvy towards home invasion etiquette. Whenever an attack goes down she reacts in the perfect way, with this unexpected approach taking the film far. While characterization takes You’re Next to new levels, it’s still the camera that ultimately pushes this ahead further.
Not only are major kills and devastating conclusions foreshadowed by innocent close-ups on certain architecture of the house, the camera also plays cruel games with you. While this family is under attack and suspicious of everything, the camera bombards the viewer with images from the home that could be dangerous. Then when they come back up later on, there is already a fear instilled in you whether anything happens or not. The camera continues to play games with the audience and characters’ hope. While the family seeks refuge next door, the camera already knows that the family is dead. It’s been there already. The same shots that prelude the massacre at the first house see echoing at this family’s; only they have no idea of the significance. The camera however is already marking them as corpses.
It’s interesting to note that when You’re Next came out, a lot of people cited it as ripping off Bryan Bertino’s The Strangers in a lot of ways. While The Strangers still certainly deserves to be mentioned in the same pantheon as the other home invasion horror films here, You’re Next progresses a lot of the ideas that it brings up. Both films happen to feature their antagonists wearing “cutely creepy” masks, but the other big similarity is that Bertino knows how to use the camera and makes it another presence in the house during this mayhem. The Strangers has a number of faults and kind of collapses towards the end, but it sprints to that conclusion with a knowing camera that never stops showing off the home. Shadows, curtains, and the corners of rooms become black holes of terror courtesy of the aggressive camera here. Even when things progress to the lawn and outside of the home, the camera keeps a high position watching over all. It’s steady and confident while the victims below are shaky and a mess.
The ultra-bloody French horror film, L’Interieur (Inside) and the Austrian home invasion tormenter, Funny Games, also both make sure to put their camera in the spotlight, realizing the power that it has. Both films expertly have their cameras take you on virtual tours of their homes in natural ways where it doesn’t even feel like you’re being taken through every inch of them. L’Interieur’s camera lingers on things like a pair of scissors or the bathroom, almost as if it’s psychically willing its character to consult these things. Funny Games’ camera meanwhile doesn’t want the people to have any agency at all. At one moment following extreme trauma, the camera remains still for several minutes to the point where you have to wonder if your copy has frozen or something’s gone wrong. It’s like the camera is holding these characters hostage. Later on, when a break is finally found, the camera is instrumental in hinting at a remote control, which ends up causing the film to rewind and tear hope from its victim’s hands. These people might be forced to see an unhappy ending, even if the camera is allowed to turn back time and do as it pleases. The villains in the film even break the fourth wall and wink at the audience, with the camera being what allows them to do so. You’re complicit in all of this.
Of course, with the popularity that this genre has seen, and due to how little a budget horror of this nature requires, these types of films have exploded lately. A lot of direct-to-video shlock and forgettable cinema comes and goes here because it focuses on the violence and anger of this concept rather than focusing on the relationship between the camera and the victims. Even productions of a bigger fare like Knock, Knock or Vacancy fail to connect in the end because the camera isn’t given enough of a role. As future home invasion films come—and even the idea of a Don’t Breathe 2 isn’t impossible—pay attention to how much (or how little) the camera is saying about its prison.
College kids, strippers and vampires—those were Donald P. Borchers’ only requirements when he approached Richard Wenk about writing and directing a movie for New World Pictures. As requested, Wenk cooked up Vamp (1986), a tailor-made blend of the decade’s teen movie craze as well as its horror boom.
Grim and earnest stories were still very much a part of the ’80s horror landscape, yet Vamp is something of a comedy. One difference between it and, say, Saturday the 14th, though, is the former avoids using schtick. Wenk’s movie proves that horror comedies also don’t have to subtract thrills from their recipes. Of course, it takes a minute before reaching that point; college antics and culture shocks preface this one macabre misadventure.
Vamp‘s initial setup is apt for a typical college-set, sex-driven comedy; to bribe their way into a fraternity house, two pledges (Chris Makepeace, Robert Rusler) go looking for some adult entertainment. Without wasting time on any further exposition, the characters embark on an all-in-one-night trip that quickly detours into terror.
To procure their elusive MacGuffin—a stripper willing to gyrate for some frat boys—Keith (Makepeace) and AJ (Rusler), plus a third wheel named Duncan (Gedee Watanabe), trade the safety of their remote college campus for the seediness of some unnamed city. The setting is recognizably L.A. by day, but as soon as night falls, downtown, along with the characters, slips into a kind of surreal universe. Director of photography Elliot Davis gave this early entry on his prolific résumé an unusual yet distinctive look; that Mario Bava-esque, magenta-green lighting is omnipresent, so much so that it’s almost its own character.
Chris Makepeace and Robert Rusler in Vamp
The faint comparisons to Martin Scorsese’s After Hours are merited, although not just because of Vamp’s distinguishing nighttime aesthetic. Save for the primary characters, the supporting roles in Wenk’s movie are also quite colorful and transactional in their behavior. The difference here, though, is the additional urge to ruin Keith and his friends at every turn. Some of that harm is humorous and tolerable enough, whereas the moment Vamp dishes out its first fatality, it’s abundantly clear how this movie qualifies as horror.
Vamp falls into that category of horror movie that reveals its genre with a scream rather than a series of whispers. The opening scene can function as a hint of what lies ahead—things are not at all what they appear to be—but otherwise, Wenk is more than happy to hold off on the horror. When that time does come, though, it catches the viewer off guard. In addition to the pure shock value is that sudden decision to upend the movie’s foremost feature. Or so it would seem.
If afraid of major spoilage, those new to Vamp would be wise to stop reading here. There’s just no skirting around the fact that the central fellowship in this buddy movie hits a serious snag when AJ is killed. That development causes the story to become more of a “long, bad night” journey for Keith and his romantic interest. So while Wenk scores points for subverting expectations, there is also a touch of sadness in his decision. Because if Vamp does anything well, it’s making the characters likable.
Something that comes easily to Vamp—and other teen horror movies from this same era—is its ability to invent young characters worth caring about, or at the very least, are interesting and not so immediately off-putting. More impressive is how Wenk did all this without actually fleshing out those characters. Still and all, Keith and his kind are a grade above cookie-cutter, and in some cases, aren’t completely devoid of growth.
Grace Jones in Vamp
Vamp appeals with an assorted cast of characters. No two are the same, nor are they operating on the same wavelength. The cinematically extroverted AJ, whose actor conveyed charm and vulnerability in near equal amounts, comes alive when he’s at his most undead. Makepeace then makes the chronically cautious Keith a sympathetic fellow, even as he’s more and more affected by the night’s bizarre events. Meanwhile, Duncan is indeed the designated loser of the whole bunch, but Watanabe still manages to humanize him. As a bonus, the role didn’t require him to pull a Long Duk Dong.
As for Dedee Pfeiffer, she is plain adorable as the mysterious After Dark server nicknamed “Amaretto”. She spends all night fixing her dress strap while at the same time trying to get Keith to remember how he knows her. As their offbeat romance grows, it becomes another highlight of this movie. Whether or not Pfeiffer’s character is really a vampire also creates some welcome tension in the story.
Like a lot of its contemporaries, Vamp went on to become a bit of a cult classic. That current status is determined by several factors, but without a doubt, the casting of Grace Jones is the most considerable. The image of her writhing on that unique-looking chair, a Keith Haring original, springs to mind whenever this movie is brought up.
Chris Makepeace, Billy Drago and Paunita Nichols in Vamp
Prior to that first display of unequivocal horror, local vampire queen Katrina (Jones) took to the stage and delivered a strip show like no other. One would expect nothing less from that renowned model and performance artist. By now reports of Jones’ tardiness on set are no secret, yet it’s also hard to deny her commitment to the part of Katrina. It was, in fact, Jones who took charge of her character’s appearance—on top of Haring painting her body and that now-iconic chair, she had Andy Warhol handle her costuming. And not too many actors could seize a room’s attention without saying a single line of dialogue.
In 2022, Vamp received a retrospective novelization from Encyclopocalypse. This literary union of preexisting source material—Wenk’s original screenplay—and new ideas from author Christian Francis amounts to a more comprehensive visit to the After Dark Club. The basic story there is no different than what’s shown on screen; however, Francis gets creative with the characters’ origins and designs, and he enhances a number of key scenes.
The novelization expands on the urban and social decay of the main setting, and supplies a background for the After Dark Club. Sandy Baron’s character, Katrina’s emcee and familiar, is given ample motivation for sticking around; up until the fiery end, he is loyal to his friend and former business partner “Squeak”, who looks like he was “fed through a combine harvester, and left as nothing more than a heap of mangled remains”. Then there is Billy Drago’s character Snow, the leader of a street gang called The Dragons. His reason for menacing Keith and AJ is more altruistic than in the movie; he and his peers act tough to scare off any potential food for the vampires.
Lisa Lyon in Vamp
If not for all the backstories, Francis’ Vamp would be a hell of a lot shorter. Instead, this tie-in read dives into how AJ met Keith—the orphaned Anthony Joseph hailed from a broken home back in Brooklyn—and how their friendship flourished over the years. Keith’s archership is no longer just an assumed part of his entire being; it’s a confidence-building extracurricular for a boy who got picked on before coming into the protection of the new kid in town. These supplemental, in-depth looks at the protagonists, plus their close connection, are maybe unnecessary. The movie already did a fair and concise job of addressing their platonic intimacy without the need for flashbacks and insights, specifically in that scene where AJ lays it all out as he sacrifices himself.
Where the novelization gets off course is its approach to the minor characters. Intermittently backstorying the likes of Katrina’s indentured servants, Seko (Leila Hee Olsen) and Vlad (Brad Logan), ends up disturbing the flow of the writing. Was it absolutely essential that readers know Vlad was the Grand Duke of the House of Romanov, or how Snow’s accomplice Maven (Paunita Nichols) became so dentally challenged? No, not really. However, one’s mileage with these random biographies may vary.
The novelization is a more substantial experience, but for a movie like Vamp, less is more. And as plentiful as they are, it never simply coasts on its campy charms, either. The character work sits comfortably in that realm between cursory and meticulous, the script is sharper than first realized, and Greg Cannom’s vampire makeup is straightforward yet effective. Most of all, the movie didn’t squander its out-of-the-box concept. Richard Wenk made his vision of a “comic nightmare in which just about anything that can go wrong does” come true, and it is very enjoyable.
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