Les techniques anxiogènes dans le cinéma d’horreur et dans la littérature d’épouvante : échanges, parallélismes, passages : (sur l’exemple de la prose de Jean-Pierre Andrevon)

Abstract

According to common opinions, horror films are the art of monstration par excellence, whereas horror fiction is based on ambiguity and the unsaid. The purpose of this article is to show that this statement is false. In order to evoke the feeling of fear in the reader/viewer, horror films and fiction remain in a fruitful and permanent dialogue: this is reflected in many exchanges used in anxiety‐provoking techniques that are analysed in this article. The structure elements of scary texts and films are recurrent. My study aims to demonstrate that, on the one hand, both literary and cinematic gore are based on hyperrealism of massacre scenes/descriptions/close‐ups, preferably exteriorized parts, figurative narrative structures and visual hyperbolization. On the other hand, however, both horror films and fiction play with ambiguity and off‐screen scenes, building up the anxiety‐provoking structure. This ongoing interdisciplinary dialogue enriches the literature and the cinema – protean and ever‐changing.