Gemini Rising films.

I really wanted to get across that feeling of watching horror films at sleepovers, so films were pretty important to me while I was writing Gemini Rising.  We all know that films are way scarier when watched on someone else’s floor, in a sleeping bag, with the lights out and your best friend shrieking next to you.

Also, there were films in my teens that I became almost as obsessed with as I was bands and books.  Number one: The Craft.  I went to see it at the cinema with my friends Rachael, Nadia and Vicki when I was 15.  When I was 18, I still loved it so much that I dressed up as Nancy for Hallowe’en.  Since then, not much has changed.  I still think it’s a brilliant movie.

The only film to rival it in the obsession stakes was The Crow – for similar reasons of aesthetic over plot.  And, slightly more tenuously, its sequel The Crow 2: City of Angels.  Seriously.  Closely followed by Heathers, which is still a classic – I love the teen movie as much as I do the horror movie, and this combined elements of the two with tongue firmly in cheek.  (See also: John Waters, with whom I remain obsessed, after watching Serial Mom for the first time during this era.)

Sorana’s education in classic horror films is lifted from my own life.  When I was growing up, I would rent a horror film from Blockbuster pretty much every Saturday night.  I progressed from Hitchcock to Elm Street, via Michael Myers.  I diligently worked my way through, from black and white classics right up to the self-referential genius of the Scream movies.

It’s weird: I’ve become more fearful as I’ve got older.  I have nightmares more.  But I still love watching the classics; I am delighted every time a new horror movie comes out that I think equals or even tops them, rare as it is (hello, Paranormal Activity).  Lately I have been investigating some obscure Hammer Horror gems.  I still love a Saturday night horror film like nothing else.