230250 Frozen Ground: The Arctic Gothic in US-American Film (S) (SoSe 2025)

Classic elements of Gothic fiction, such as an uncanny environment, an eerie setting, and the supernatural lend themselves very well for film because both are “born in darkness;” the Gothic is very visual. There is indeed an overwhelming visual quality to films that build on Gothic elements. They often center on the old haunted house as a metaphor for the moral and psychological corruption of its inhabitants, or on family and intercultural relationships confined to and haunted by their past, as well as on monstrous/grotesque characters unable to escape their tragic fate. In that sense, Gothic cinema addresses the primeval nature of our individual and collective fears, which speaks for Gothic being its own "revenant genre,” in and out of fashion throughout time, but always apt to inspire new works of literature and film. This course investigates Gothic as a cinematic mode that has shaped the U.S.-American canon over several decades, and which is still influential in contemporary media. It focuses on films and TV shows that take place in the periphery regions of North America, specifically in the Arctic areas, and argues towards an epistemology of the Arctic Gothic, which encompasses cultural representations often neglected in the field of Gothic Studies.