Grand-Guignol Cinema and the Horror Genre

“To reckon with the horror film’s connections to the Grand Guignol theatre is to refigure our understanding of the horror genre. DeGiglio-Bellemare stages this reckoning with the sort of ambition, enthusiasm and a wide range of references that enrich horror studies. This is a stimulating and provocative book”— Adam Lowenstein, author of Horror Film and Otherness, Professor of English and Film/Media Studies, University of Pittsburgh, USA.

“This is a terrific book. While horror scholars frequently use the term ‘Grand-Guignol’ as a sort of shorthand – ‘Grand-Guignol effects,’ or ‘Guignol Treatment’ – we haven’t devoted the time and scholarship to fully unpack the Grand-Guignol’s lingering influence and affect in horror cinema. If that were all this book did, that would be enough to make it a necessary addition to the field. But DeGiglio-Bellemare also provides a rich and thick theoretical horror discussion – invoking Bataille, cultural studies, Marx and the rich scholarly history of the field. Well-written and immensely readable, this is a smart, sophisticated, well-conceived book – by a terrific scholar. Belongs on the bookshelf of every horror scholar and horror lover, and definitely belongs on the syllabus” — Joan Hawkins, author of Cutting-Edge: Art-Horror and the Horrific Avant-garde.

Mario DeGiglio-Bellemare teaches courses in genre cinema, grotesque traditions, cinematic embodiment, and monster ethics in the Humanities department at John Abbott College, Canada. He is also an independent filmmaker and the co-director of the Montreal Monstrum Society.