Freaks FREAKS freaks

Freaks : Tod Browning

   In regards to the statement of this being categorized as a horror film, I would say I agree and disagree, and let me tell you why.  I think this because of the time when this film came out  they couldn't have imagined the types of fucked up things that people now think about and make movies about.  Rape, brutal killings, really scary looking monsters/zombies, ect.  The things we are exposed to now isn't comparable to anything that the 30's produced cinema wise, or even had thoughts in their head about.  So i can understand how then it would be classified as such, on the contrary I think its a bit upsetting regardless of the time period to call this a horror.  What are you scared of the way people were born?  Thats real life, the way God made them, they are real people.  Not some make up artist creating someone into a scary monster.  Its sick people look at people that weren't born with as much fortune as they were with lower respect, it could have been any of us.  The film is logical when I think about it, of course the freaks have a code of freaks, after having to live like that their whole life being picked on.  How can they not stand up for themselves, and plus Hercules, and Cleopatra deserved what they got for the sick way they acted to people who are just the same as all of us.  That was made pretty clear from the beginning of the film, and as  Joan Hawkins said in her article, "freakish is only skin deep."  They have emotions and feelings too.  They never tried to kill anyone that was respecting them, they showed kindness and a good connection with people giving them respect even though they were different.  So I think that the only part that would make this a horror was the scene with the revenge of the freaks.  It is dark out and rainy out and sets up an inevitably scary setting, but we have already watched this whole movie and had a built up preconception of these freaks being just like us, so it makes its not as scary but almost rather justified.  Now a days we attribute horror movies to having suspense in them, however I don't think there was much of that in Freaks.