Uncanny Women and the Home in Contemporary Austrian Horror Film: Spitzendeckchen (2012), Ich seh, ich seh (2014) and HomeSick (2015)

Abstract:This article explores the representation of women inextricably linked to their domestic spaces in three twenty-first-century horror films by Austrian directors, Spitzendeckchen [Vienna Waits for You, 2012] by Dominik Hartl, Ich seh, ich seh [Goodnight Mommy, 2014] by Severin Fiala and Veronika Franz and HomeSick (2015) by Jakob Erwa. I argue that the uncanny in these films emerges, both narratively as well as cinematographically, out of the female protagonists' parasitic relationship to the home and the return of the repressed societal impetus of female domesticity in the very absence of male agency. The way this gender dynamic is represented is closely linked to the contemporary Austrian context.