Crochet is Sick! by Alison Peirse
A video essay by Alison Peirse that examines crochet in horror films, what it depicts or represents culturally or historically, and how production and costume designers play a role in storytelling in these films.
via [in]Transition:
“Everything that appears in shot on screen is there because a conscious decision was made, and agreed upon, by multiple craftspeople to include it in the image. These props and costumes then, are carefully thought-out graphic representations of how a filmmaker wishes that character to be represented, the object or garment embodying a specific social and cultural shorthand for who that character is, and who they will come to be. In the filmography at the end of this essay, I follow my usual feminist citational practices by citing the women who have worked on the film (see Peirse 2024b), but this time I prioritize the woman production designer, art director or costume designer first. I do this because I wish to acknowledge their material contribution to the world of the film, a contribution that is important, but is frequently overlooked. Where there is no credited woman on production design, art direction or costume design, I then default to the most senior woman crew member.
In working on this project, I have come to realize that crochet appears in horror films in limited ways. As a prop (say, a blanket, a cushion, a bedspread), it has come to connote illness for a character, draped over the knees or the sofa of someone in mental or physical pain (or someone who will, imminently, be in such agonies). In An American Werewolf in London (1981) it precipitates the infamous transformation scene, in the case of The Love Witch (2016), it becomes associated with death itself. It also connotes vulnerability: when Needy crumples on the sofa in Jennifer’s Body (2009), when homeless Katie attempts to sleep on the backseat of her car in Dementer (2019), when the female protagonists of It Follows (2014), Lost Gully Road (2017), Martyrs Lane (2021) and Soulmate (2013) wrap crochet blankets around them as a preliminary act of self-soothing (an act which will, imminently, fail). To cross-reference with costume: crochet shawls are associated with the psychic (woman), while crochet cardigans with the mentally unwell or dangerous (woman). Horror has come to imbue crochet with a virulent sickness, a sickness that infiltrates prop and garment alike.”