The Return of The Repressed

The return of the repressed is a term based on a psychological theory by Sigmund Freud. His psychoanalytic theory states that there are three different levels of consciousness within the human mind; the conscious, the subconscious and the unconscious. These levels of consciousness are controlled by the 'ego' which acts as a referee between the 'superego' and the 'id'.
The superego is the section of the brain which is filled with neurotic, almost angelic thoughts. If this is too prevalent in the conscious mind some abnormalities can develop such as Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. The 'id' on the other hand is the complete opposite; all the evil, unethical thoughts are possessed in this section of the brain. Obviously if the 'id' is too strong there can be very dangerous consequences (murderers, rapists, terrorists). The ego represses these thoughts to a suitable level, balancing out the good and bad thoughts so that a person is not evil, but is not overly neurotic either.

Freud states that some thoughts and cognition's from the unconscious mind can make their way into the subconscious mind, eventually passing into the conscious mind. This is why some people can suddenly do something against their character, violent and possibly purely evil. In relation to media this is clearly a subject that some horror films are based on. One supposedly innocent person having random bursts of outrage which are violent and sometimes disgustingly gory.

The 'monster' within seems to be unleashed posing the question; are we all internally evil?

Questions like this are played upon by directors and script-writers who directly ask the audience that, even if they are not consciously aware of the question proposed to them. 'The Hills Have Eyes' by Wes Craven is a film that compares good and evil throughout the film, displaying an unparallelled similarity between both a middle-classed western family and canniballistic mutants stalking and methodoligically destroying them one-by-one. The difference between the two groups are that the family repress everything, and the mutants repress nothing. The dysfunctionality of the mutants is because of lack of repression; they have no restraints in their mind in which they have to stop doing what they want to do. 'Ruby' (the donor in the film) is also a mutant though she is not overly possessed by her 'id' and therefore willingly helps out the westerners who are clearly in troubly. I believe this is because she has a strong 'ego' and it is that that prevents her from violently attacking everyone who 'trespasses' on the mutant's land. My subjective judgement is that although the mutants are completely human, the psychological effects of the mutations caused by a nuclear bomb led to them all (except Ruby) having an underdeveloped ego. This led to their 'Id' controlling their mind, letting loose all evil thoughts without repression
The family on the other hand have grown up and lived in a clearly stable society in which social norms are printed into their minds; clearly defining what is 'right and wrong' and ultimately helping them develop a strong ego. This ego seems to weaken towards the end of the film especially in the male 'hero' character. This society where he has lost half of his family seems to have no social boundaries, therefore weakening his sense of right and wrong heightening his evolutionary quest for survival. Violence is persistent towards the end of this movie as the boundaries of right and wrong become blurred and the once repressed thoughts are let out in violent and lethal attacks on the mutants, some without the ability to defend themselves.

This is just one example of a film which unravels the theory of repression to show that no matter how civilised we are, when a moment arises we will unleash the monster within when we need to. Although not a horror film villain, Ted Bundy is a prime example of the return of the repressed theory. He was not an over the top villainous person upon first glance, yet he murdered between 26-100+ people due to the fact he simply wanted to kill. This usually repressed tendancy to kill was brought straight into the conscious of Bundy although he seemed to pave a particularly normal life. A similar villain to him would be 'Ghostface' from Scream. Although he was scary due to his brutality and pure violence one of the factors making him more fearful than most horror villains is the fact that that person could be your next door neighbour. He could be your best friend. He could be a relative who appears to have a normal life but yet could put on that mask, and unleash his repressed tendancies to kill. Harold Shipman is also one person that you could pin the 'return of the repressed' label on.