Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Matt Simon wants to make Lawrence horrible.
Simon, Omaha, Neb. junior, is recruiting fans of the horror genre to form a new student group, calling the group “Bleeding Kansas,” a name taken from Lawrence’s own gruesome past. Simon said he hoped to attract students from all fields of study who appreciated all forms of horror.
A new group has formed to promote horror films on campus and is hoping to become an official University organization. The group is still looking for a faculty sponsor.
“I want it to be for people that are interested in any sort of horror activity,” Simon said. “I’d really like it to be intermedia — movies, music, books, video games.”
He’s only been working on the project for the past three weeks, putting up fliers on bulletin boards across campus and creating a Facebook group. In that time, the group has gained more than 30 members. Student interest aside, to gain recognition as a student group from the University the group needs one more thing — a faculty sponsor.
“I imagine there is a faculty member somewhere who is a total horror freak but I haven’t found them,” Simon said.
The University’s film department has some. The department’s main sound stage in Oldfather Studios is named after Herk Harvey, a former professor and director of cult horror classic, “Carnival of Souls,” which was partially filmed in Lawrence. Liberty Hall will screen the film during its monthly “Midnight Movie Madness” Sept. 19.
Simon said one of the reasons the group needed University recognition was to work with other student groups in an effort to explore the horror influence at the University and in Lawrence culture.
“I thought it would be cool to pair up with other student groups, like a gay student group and have a gay horror night,” Simon said. “Or from other countries. We have someone that joined from South Korea. We could talk about Korean horror.”
Another reason Simon wants recognition is to have events on campus.
“A lot of film club people meet at their houses,” Simon said. “But I want big screens.”
Some think the group could help the reputation horror has recently taken on. John Tibbetts, professor of flim who has taught horror classes, said he feared the trends in horror that had developed lately.
“I love horror,” Tibbetts said. “I love the whole subject. But recently it’s all teenage vampires. Before that it was goths. When horror becomes a fashion statement, I have a problem with it, because real horror cuts so much deeper.”
Claire Howard, Pittsburg freshman, said she thought contemporary horror could use the help.
“I like being scared, but not disgusted,” Howard said. “I’m not interested in seeing someone saw their own hand off.”
Clinton Bell, Pittsburg freshman, agreed and said there could be an overload of gore in newer films.
“I think horror movies that come out now are too into gore and really stupid plot lines,” Bell said. “If you write horror it’s just ‘How can we make this person’s death interesting?’”
Simon said he hoped to have the group ready to plan events as Halloween approached.
“My goal is to do something really cool for Halloween time,” Simon said. “I thought, for sure, we had to have something in October or we would be a total failure.”
No plans for any event have been made yet, pending the pursuit of official student group status.
— — Edited by Abby Olcese
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Comments
Horror movies inspire student group
So, that's NOT whoever it was originally captioned as? I can't recall if you had it as Simon or Tibbetts.
Do you happen to know who it IS?
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