How comfortable are you with ambiguity?

[JamesGBoswell]

One thing I've noticed is that there's a spectrum when it comes to comfort levels with ambiguity as a plot device in horror. Some people prefer the very ambiguous, creeping, growing dread of existential horror like in Bird Box, while others prefer the explicit, in-your-face, "I'm going to kill you right now with this knife I'm holding in my hand"-sort of unambiguous terror like in slashers and gore-fests.

I fall almost completely on the side of the former; I don't want to see what the monster looks like or even know if there's really a monster there at all, I just want to be afraid that there could be a monster and believe it's probably horrible, if so. What about you?

 

[dask]

I like a little bit of both. I don't particularly need my nose rubbed in it but I like to know what's going on and that there really is a ghost haunting the house, not just someone imagining it.

 

[Alex The G and T]

I prefer the creeping dread.
"Boo! Made you Jump!" I regard as a cheap and annoying trick.

I demand something more clever than that.

 

[Finch]

I don't read much horror , but ambiguity is an important ingredient to any work of fiction . If done well it can create a strange atmosphere of uncertainty. Gene Wolfe is a master of ambiguity . The Fifth Head of Cerberus is a good example.

 

[CupofJoe]

first of all I'm not a great Horror fan. I love the slow build up rather than jump cut scare.
I like the film Alien.
In the first half, it give you a couple of really good jump scares [Facehugger and Chestburster] but for much of the rest of the film the monster is left up to your imagination. You see bit of it and people reactions. It is only later one we get to see it. Slowly carefully, we get a few moment to react to it before the action kicks in. the sound of Ripley's laboured breathing as she gets in to the space suit can get me in to a cold sweat all on its own. And I know how the scene ends...
In books I like HP Lovecraft when he just says something defy explanation and lets you draw your own images...

 

[Elckerlyc]

I am not a great fan of horror either. In general I don't watch horror, besides a few exceptions. It quite annoys me that so many SF-movies basically turn out to be horror-movies. I want true SF!
Alien is the exception. I really liked that one (and still do.) The whole setup was credible and the SF-part realistic. More so than anything I had seen before.
As with so many things, hinting but not actually showing is far more scarier. It lets your imagination work. Once 'The Thing' is out in the open you compare it to what you were fearing and think "Is that all It's wayyyy to slow or lumbering to be a threat!" Once you start analyzing it, it starts taking away the scare. It makes a difference once you know what you are up against.

Ambiquity in itself is a good instrument for strong storytelling. Nothing is black or white, strong or weak, good or evil. Life is more complex and so should good stories or movies show internal struggle as to what is what. So, in horror, it would be fun to let people 'think' they know what the monster is and act upon that assumption, while in fact it is something far more sinister....

 

[Randy M.]

I am not a great fan of horror either. In general I don't watch horror, besides a few exceptions. It quite annoys me that so many SF-movies basically turn out to be horror-movies. I want true SF!

Yeah! Like The Island of Dr. Moreau or "Who Goes There?" or "It's a Good Life!" or I am Legend or "Passengers" or ...

Randy M.
(Yes, I'm being a wiseguy. I'll stop now.)

 

[Randy M.]

What you're terming ambiguity could also be called subtlety. The thing meant to scare or disturb or unsettle arrived at obliquely, the anticipation creating (in theory) a stronger, longer-lasting effect than the in-your-face approach. For instance, I enjoy Richard Matheson's Hell House, really strong haunted house novel, but it's not a patch on The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson, which comes at its disturbing material through a specific character's emotional imbalance.

Randy M.

 

[olive]

The ambiguity of Lost Highway scared the hell out of me when I have seen it on the big screen 22 years ago. I was really affected. I haven't seen it again. May be I should to check, lol.

But Bird Box kind of ambiguity is action/adventure to me. I'm just curious.

 

[Phyrebrat]

Ambiguity and inexplicable are both fine with me. In fact I prefer them because I'm a huge weird fiction fan and in most cases in WF the weirdness is never explained - if not most, then the best.

This (I think) is because I enjoy the process of thinking about inexplicable films and stories long after I've finished them, wondering what might have caused this or that.

A common thing in my own writing is 'so was the MC responsible, or is there really a monster/ghost/etc?' which I know is not everyone's cup of tea (and if I'm pressed I'll always say that there's a supernatural element as opposed to the prosaic possibility of psychotic breaks). What works really well is the mix of the hint of psychotic behaviours or fugues with the very-real presence of supernatural.

David Lynch is Yoda when it comes to this kind of ambiguity or lack of explanation, encouraging the viewer to make their own conclusion, and I love that.

Funnily enough, I've just finished my first draft of my novel and found part of the struggle (of ten years!!) has been making sure the ends tie up as there is no real ambiguity in it.

Having said all that, I'm fine reading completely explicable events and ideas in fiction, too.

pH

 

[Fried Egg]

I love ambiguity in horror (and elsewhere ). As well as slow, gradual build ups of tension and unease. Ramsey Campbell does this very well.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Sense of place, slow build then scare me, please.

King said his preference is for the slow build but he’s not afraid to gross you out if that’s what it takes too

 

[Toby Frost]

I think ambiguity can be really powerful, and the mind can usually imagine something worse than the explanation provided. Lovecraft is interesting in this respect: sometimes his ambiguity is really effective (the phonograph recording in “The Whisperer in Darkness”, say), but other times he just sounds like a parody of himself. Likewise David Lynch is usually pretty good but I just found Inland Empire to be nonsense (although the "Rabbits" short film is quite unsettling).

Actually, “Rabbits” is an interesting example of this. It basically makes no sense and has no explanation, but it’s disturbing for a number of reasons. The dialogue is ambiguous and meaningless, but threatening (“I will find out one day”). Elements that should be comforting are used out of place, making them confusing: the characters are dressed as children's characters, and there’s a laugh track suitable for a sitcom. The music sounds like something from a film noir: I don’t know much about this, but I suspect that it uses minor chords to put the listener on edge. And every so often, red lights come on and a character speaks in a distorted voice, as if possessed. The problem with “Rabbits” is that it has no real meaning, and appears to have been created purely to unsettle. The ambiguity makes you want to know the truth, but there is no truth. So I wonder if ambiguity is most effective when it is genuinely hiding something.

I think a lot of ambiguity derives strength from the idea that you are seeing a key to accessing a terrible truth, or a form of that truth that is bearable, where it would be too awful if properly revealed. Basil Valentine’s alchemical drawings have this effect on me. The instructions to summoning a demon are often more sinister than the demon itself.

That said, there can be something unsettling about a complete lack of ambiguity. The Terminator – more specifically, the robot skeleton – is frightening because it’s so blatant and relentless. There it is: a great bit metal Grim Reaper, and it won’t stop. Likewise the villain from Marathon Man, who is obviously a vicious Nazi from the word go and never shows any hint of humanity. But this is rarer than ambiguity and perhaps harder to pull off.

 

[HareBrain]

Actually, “Rabbits” is an interesting example of this. It basically makes no sense and has no explanation, but it’s disturbing for a number of reasons.

Mostly, for me, that anyone would devote a significant amount of time and effort to making it. The attempt to unsettle is so blatant it becomes first laughable, then quickly boring (IMO). It worked much better in Twin Peaks.

So I wonder if ambiguity is most effective when it is genuinely hiding something.

Ambiguity is the inability to pick between several possibilities, but for it to work, you need to have (I think) at least a vague idea what those possibilities might be. Our brains are designed to look for meaning and answers, but they need a starting point. What unsettles is the inability to get much further.

 

[Danny McG]

Ambiguity eh?
I can take it or leave it

 

[Toby Frost]

Yes, I don’t think “Rabbits” works overall, and watching the whole thing is tedious, but I think it works as an example. Ultimately, though, it’s nothing but ambiguity, and that falls flat for me.

 

[Randy M.]

Ambiguity eh?
I can take it or leave it

I need clarification, Danny.

If, as Toby and Harebrain point out, ambiguity for ambiguity's sake is tiresome, do you have substantive ambiguity ambivalence or only hollow ambiguity ambivalence?

Randy M.

 

[Phyrebrat]

I’m not sure if this is classed as ambiguity but I do love when I am expecting a thread to go a certain way but it takes a completely different direction; one that you (well, I) never realised was there until the switch happens and you get that ‘ohhhh’ moment. Perhaps it’s just termed a simple red herring but I think you need implicit ambiguity.

But my other take is often that ambiguity is chiefly informed by our own formative experience; when reading situations we have experienced (or not) will colour our idea of the author’s intention.

I like the trope of ‘did he kill everyone or was it a monster, or is he the/a monster’. I admit I use it a lot in my horror fiction. But: if someone asked me ‘so is there a Tall Man in London killing people for their kidney stones or is it really the MC doing it?’ I would always favour the monster explanation.

Im sure there will be some roll eyes when I say this, but Here goes... I often wonder how my dance teaching has informed my take on literature - I’m always telling the kids there is no rightness in their answer when it comes to dance appreciation; the performance is a reflection of how one sees oneself and project our experiences and cultural capital on a piece of dance theatre.

It’s the same in films. I’m a huge fan of an outstanding feminist, academic horror podcast called The Faculty of Horror. They really underline how much of this kind of stuff is down to our own predilections.

I apologise for going a bit off-piste with this reply, but I wanted to say that 1) I love ambiguity and 2) it’s sometimes there, perhaps, without the author’s intent.

pH

 

[HareBrain]

I would always favour the monster explanation.

Me too. I used to hate Scooby Doo.

 

[Danny McG]

I need clarification, Danny.

If, as Toby and Harebrain point out, ambiguity for ambiguity's sake is tiresome, do you have substantive ambiguity ambivalence or only hollow ambiguity ambivalence?

Randy M.

Either/or I suppose