College Writing II
Prof. Parker
Assignment: Paper 2
Due date: 10/15/09
Fear is contaminated
Fear can contaminate people by ways such as having a murder in the beginning of a
story, mystery in the plot, sound and color effects at the background, and a great description of
the setting. In the movie, The Ring, and in the book, The Hound of the Baskervilles, there are
similarities and differences between these ways that illustrate fear as a force contaminating
protagonists and readers.
The essential similarity between these two texts is that they both contain death as the
central theme. Death, does not matter of an innocent or a sin person, is a gothic element that
creates goose bumps as soon as you hear it. To witness an actual murder is even scarier. In both
movie and the book, the story begins with the death of a person and builds up to a possible death
of others. In The Ring, the girl in the beginning dies by an evil power. Her friend witnesses her
death and becomes mentally ill. As the story builds up, the main character Rachel, then her son
and her ex-husband feel the fear contaminating them by the way how this girl died with smashed
face after watching the tape that they had seen. In The Hound of Baskervilles, the death of Sir
Charles Baskerville’s starts out the story which grabs the interest of protagonists, Holmes and
Watson. Later in the story, Sir Henry is at the risk of a possible death, which is the fear
throughout the story that forces him to be contaminated. Thus in both texts, murder at the first
place produces a feeling of threat to characters and audience.
Besides having death as a central threat, mystery and the investigation carried to solve it
to prevent future deaths is another similarity between the movie and the books. Mystery is an
element that makes a story scarier. Unanswered sets of questions make the main character and
the audience anxious to solve the mystery and reach the end. It is a way to put the audience on
the edge and make them eager to know what is next. In the movie, Rachel is trapped up into the
situation that leads her to investigate every single detail of the murder. She watches the tape and
tries to find as many clues as she can to stop her and her son’s death. Similarly in the book,
Watson, during his investigation, hears the sound of the Hound personally and experiences that
fear. He also tries to link all the clues and seeks to find all unanswered area of the mystery by
himself besides giving unbiased reports to Holmes. Thus in both texts, the way that the mystery
was set up and the attempts that were made to solve it were contaminating to the protagonists
and the audience.
Another similarity between the movie and the book is the way in which the fear of dark,
gloomy, unhappy setting contaminates people. Places surrounded with woods are always scary
because of their darkness and loneliness. In the woods, there always lies a fear of a dangerous
animal coming and killing a person. In The Ring, the cabin under which Samara was pushed into
the well was a scary place because it was in the middle of nowhere and was isolated from other
cabins. When the cabin is viewed by Rachel for the first time, she suspects there might be
something wrong with the place. This feeling of uneasiness forces Rachel and the audience to be
contaminated. In The Hound of the Baskervilles, the description of moor creates a scary image in
the mind of the reader. The moor runs very long, dark, and is surrounded by tall crops. When
Watson comes with Sir Henry, Dr. Mortimer points out at the moor for the first time and they get
a nice view of it on their way. Moreover, Sir Henry also mentions, ‘It’s enough to scare any
man’. This shows how the settings of both texts play an important role to generate fear in its
characters.
Besides having a similarity in the settings there is also a specific contrast in the locations
of both places where the investigations takes place. The loneliness of the countryside is always
scarier than a busy city. However, it is interesting how both settings can be fearful depending on
the situation. For instance, for a criminal, a city would be a dangerous place to hide due to the
fear of getting caught. However, countryside is also a dangerous place due to the lack of
survival needs. In The Ring, the setting implies a busy city, where big apartments are located
conjunctively and neighborhood is rich of people. Although, it is a populous place, there is a
sense of fear in the house of all the protagonists at night. There is also a chaos when Rachel
investigates in her office about Morgan family. On the other hand, in The Hound of the
Baskervilles, all the residents are isolated and located miles apart from each other. The moor is
also a dark and a quiet place surrounded by the hills. This illustrates the idea of an old versus a
modern world where the old always seems scarier. The way in which these contradicting settings
are presented in the texts contaminates fear in their own way as it fits the story line.
The use of technology in different ways in both texts also generates fear. Here, the
technology can be used positively or negatively to create or support a story that emphasizes on
the difference between the old and modern lifestyle. In The Ring, the videotape is a main source
of fear that leads to the death of individuals who watch it. The tape itself being scary threatens
the main character Rachel when she watches it for first time. Also, by using modern technology
of VCR, Rachel has to make a copy of the tape to save her son’s and her life which increases the
chance of other’s death. Thus, technology is a medium of fear represented in the movie to
contaminate both the character and the audience. Whereas, in The Hound of the Baskervilles, use
of the old technology such as lamp in a positive way decreases the fear that sometimes builds up
at night. Holmes and Watson sometimes use lamps to read an excerpt from newspaper for their
investigation. The other technology used in the book is a telescope by Frankland. This is also
positively used to trace the map of a boy providing food to a stranger. There is a clear difference
between the use of technology that generates a fear in one and eliminates it in the other.
The major difference between the movie and the book would be the music, sound effects,
and the color effects to portray the story. It is obvious that watching a dangerous situation would
be scarier than reading about it. The movie can use those advantages to make the story more
effective. In The Ring use of creepy, slow background music in the contrast to a high pitched
scream and dark and dull colors add their effects to the scariness. For audience, it contaminates
fear throughout the movie and for protagonists it brings out the same emotion when they watch
the videotape. While in the reading of a book, even though the detailed description creates
heaviness to the matter, it does not scare to death. The reading about the moor was very detailed
and described with a good diction of weighty words; it did not scare me as a reader just because
it did not put me into the real place. Thus, the movie does better job creating the closeness
between the protagonist and audience. This way of creating a relationship between the viewer
and a character contaminates fear.
In conclusion, both texts are unique in their own way. There were significant similarities
between the two in the pattern of death, mystery, investigated associated with it and the setting
which was really scary. There were also significant differences such as the location, use of
technology and the sound effect. However, both were equally successful creating an interest and
contaminating a fear among the audience.