What is a horror film?

A horror film has three main aspects

Firstly, the movie should be personal to the audience. They use fears that are very common for example a girl being raped. This means that the film is personal to you, you may feel something like this could happen to you as in the movie they too are very normal. I think a scary film would include a young girl like me going about her daily routine when something alarming happen like a murder or rape. As long as the audience could identify with the actors and plot it will alarm them.

Next the film needs an ideological meaning. They are either obvious or hidden but never the less present. For example, in basic horrors an essential idea is that the virgin always survives and the drug taking friend will die. Although, some movies like Scream challenge this with a pre plot type of thing and kill a well known star die within the first few minutes. Towards the end of the movie we also see the community bettering themselves, priest find their faith again and parents become more consoling and understanding. I find that after watching a real life based story it makes me more cautious of my surroundings and perhaps they wish to have this effect on people.

Thirdly, the idea that the film will be able to franchise and make series is crucial to film makers. Horror franchises beyond other genres in term of sequences because of the profit involved. For example, saw one, two, three, four, five and six. It seems that blood and gore never grows tiring for the audience like romantic comedies and documentaries do. Some would say this is because they are just like going on a rollercoaster; you feel a rush and uncontrollably excited at first. But at other times your in suspense or you come to a halt, you feel somehow attached and involved to the movie, responsible in a way to tell them to duck down or run faster. When we get off a rollercoaster we feel energised and super aware like when leaving the cinema or living room from seeing a horror movie.

On wikipedia Horror Films are described as:
Horror films are movies that strive to elicit the emotions of fear, horror and terror from viewers. Their plots frequently involve themes of death, the supernatural or mental illness. Many horror movies also include a central villain.