This is a collection of highly engaging and provocative essays by top scholars in the increasingly interrelated fields of Philosophy, Film Studies, and Communication Arts that deal with the epistemology, aesthetics, ethics, metaphysics, and genre dynamics of horror cinema past and present, reveals that our fascination with horror cinema, and the pleasure we take in it, is in the end simply a natural extension of a philosopher's inclination to wonder. Contributors include Curtis Bowman, Noël Carroll, Elizabeth Cowie, Angela Curran, Cynthia Freeland, Michael Grant, Matt Hills, Deborah Knight, George McKnight, Ken Mogg, Aaron Smuts, Robert C. Solomon, and J.P. Telotte.

Chapter 1 Acknowledgments Chapter 2 Introduction Part 3 Horror, Tragedy, and Pleasure Chapter 4 The General Theory of Horrific Appeal Chapter 5 The Mastery of Hannibal Lecter Chapter 6 The Livid Nightmare: Trauma, Anxiety, and the Ethical Aesthetics of Horror Chapter 7 Aristotelian Reflections on Horror and Tragedy in An American Werewolf in London and The Sixth Sense Part 8 Horror's Philosopher-Auteurs Chapter 9 Heidegger, the Uncanny, and Jacques Tourneur's Horror Films Chapter 10 Hitchcock Made Only One Horror Film: Matters of Time, Space, Causality, and the Schopenhauerian Will Chapter 11 What You Can't See Can Hurt You: Of Invisible and Hollow Men Part 12 Philosophical (Horror) Investigations Chapter 13 On the Question of the Horror Film Chapter 14 An Event-Based Definition of Art-Horror Chapter 15 Haunting the House From Within: Disbelief Mitigation and Spatial Experience Chapter 16 Murder as Art/ The Art of Murder: Aestheticizing Violence in Modern Cinematic Horror Part 17 Horror and Reality Chapter 18 The Slasher's Blood Lust Chapter 19 American Psycho: Horror, Satire, Aesthetics, and Identification Chapter 20 Real Horror Part 21 Bibliography Chapter 22 Index Chapter 23 About the Contributors