‘A Hint of Joy Before it All Goes to Hell’

Abstract

This chapter discusses how David Robert Mitchell repeatedly listed John Carpenter as one of his main influences. It describes the opening scenes of Mitchell's It Follows on a tree-lined suburban street outside Detroit at dusk, which is considered a sister city of Haddonfield from the film Halloween (1978). It also explains the horror prologue as an essential component to the genre that serves as a mini trailer and provides a justification of the monster or as a way of keeping the audience tense or aware that they are watching a horror film and not a drama. The chapter assesses the striking opening vignette of It Follows, which is more than a typical horror film opening that features the killer attacking. It mentions Mitchell's first movie The Myth of the American Sleepover in 2011, which played a role in creating the world of It Follows.