The Stepfather

In the film, The Stepfather, directed by Joseph Ruben there are many connections that can be made between the film and Tony Williams’ article, “Trying to Survive on the Darker Side: 1980s Family Horror”. Throughout the film, horror is depicted through “a master-slave power relationship, one stemming from within the patriarchal family”. This meaning that the male patriarch uses his power and authority to mold his family into what he believes is the perfect family.

Williams’ article says that “the bourgeois family attempting to mold its subjects into acceptable gender positions”. This is exactly what Jerry tries to do throughout the film. He preyed upon broken families to live out his idea of the perfect family. Jerry used Susan and Stephanie’s recent lose of their patriarch to con his way into their family. Masking his sadistic family values behind a charismatic father figure façade. Overtime, he begins to try and mold his new family into his idea of the perfect family. His façade fools Susan but he is unable to convince and mold her daughter Stephanie with his charismatic charm.

Stephanie is unable to be molded by Jerry’s charismatic charm. This is what ultimately leads to his demise. He is unable to cope with the fact that Stephanie doesn’t follow the “acceptable gender positions”. She goes against his family values by getting into fights and eventually getting expelled from school. He uses his charismatic charm to convince her principle to allowed her to attend school again. This causes Stephanie for the first time to actually trust Jerry. The trust between the two is shortly lived. His façade begins to unravel when Jim, Jerry’s former brother in law, starts intervening with his new life. Which causes Jerry to act out violently because he realizes that he is slowly losing control of his perfect family. Stephanie witnesses one of his violent episodes eventually becoming aware and understanding “where the danger lies”. The stress of balancing his lives and his desire to have a perfect family becomes too much for Jerry to handle. Causing him to slip up about his past in front of Susan. This slip up caused Jerry to have a psychotic break causing Susan and Stephanie to fight for their lives. This goes to show even perfect families have dark secrets.

Reading Summary:

“Trying to Survive on the Darker Side: 1980s Family Horror” by Tony Williams, talks about how the emergence of horror films containing “gory bloodbaths of promiscuous teenagers” during the 1970s led to horror films being more “complex and contradictory” during the 1980s. Williams mentions Carol Clover, using her notes to say how this new genre creates “a visible adjustment in the terms of gender representation”. Clover believes these adjustments “reveal an uncertain sense of sexual identity”. Leading to Clover arguing how contemporary horror films have an obsession with feminism, displaying masculinized female power. Clover believes that masochism is the dominant feature in horror films not sadism.