Horror has a lot of different flavours

Excerpt from the interview published on BleendingCool, here.

"[...] When we were just launching into the strip and the idea was still in its formative stages, I think both of us were slightly worried that we might have come up with a concept that simply didn’t have enough implicit ideas or fresh material to go the distance. By the time that we were starting the second eight page instalment, however, we’d both had the realisation that in story terms we’d inadvertently stumbled upon a diamond mine. Just making a small shift in the way that we were approaching the medium of film (via the medium of comics) seemed to open up an entirely new way of looking at things, with a resultant dazzling array of new narrative possibilities. By episodes three and four – “The Flame of Remorse Returns” and “A King at Twilight” if you’re interested, fear-fans – we were both becoming quietly convinced that these were about the best stand-alone pieces that we had ever done in our respective careers. Considering how fleeting and ephemeral some of our source material is, I think we’ve both been a bit startled by some of the profoundly human statements that have emerged, as if from nowhere. Also, given that our brief and our intentions are to create horror stories, we’ve both been pleased to discover a new breadth in that remit. Each issue we’re able to work with a genre that we may never have worked in before, and we find that we’re playing all of the notes on the horror piano rather than bashing out the same dark, heavy chords down at one end of the keyboard. In the grimmest of pieces there is always at least an incongruous humour, while it’s in the most ostensibly light-hearted pieces – like our romantic comedy, “The Time of Our Lives” – that the most dreadful and gut-wrenching impacts are concealed. We’re finding that horror has a lot of different flavours, and in Cinema Purgatorio we’re hoping to extend and educate both our own and the readers’ palates. And you never know, the reader might discover that they’re looking at forgettable old films completely differently and becoming aware of some of the uncomfortable shadows in the background. That has certainly been our own experience thus far, and there are an awful lot of movies or movie devices that I personally am never going to see in the same light again. [...]" [Alan Moore]

The complete interview is available on BleendingCool, here.