WiHM, Box Office Retrospective: 2006

When I started tallying up numbers, one of the first things I noticed is that horror cinema with female protagonists from the past ten years has been completely dominated by four franchises: Resident Evil, Underworld, Twilight*, and Paranormal Activity. They all started at slightly different times, and they're all catering to a slightly different audience demographic, so I find it interesting that they've all been as wildly successful as they have for as long as they have. And they're all still going. That's a substantial amount of sustained marketability, all starring women.

*I know, save your garment rending. I have a reason for including it on this list, and I'll get to it later. First, the top money-makers with female protagonists for 2006:

Underworld: Evolution - $62.3 million
The Omen - $54.6 million
(Final Destination 3 - $54.1 million)
When a Stranger Calls - $47.9 million
Silent Hill - $47 million
(The Hills Have Eyes - $41.8 million)
(The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning - $39.5 million)
The Grudge 2 - $39 million
Pan's Labyrinth - $37.6 million

Again, lots of remakes and sequels, and a fair few I haven't seen. In fact, there are only two original stories in this year's lineup, and I'm almost not sure they qualify--Silent Hill because it's technically an adaptation, and Pan's Labyrinth because I'm not sure it counts as "horror." But we're going to talk about them anyway, because it's my retrospective and I Do What I Want.

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The reason I decided to include Pan's Labyrinth in the end (apart from the fact that I asked Twitter for input), is because I tend to be a bit more generous than some when drawing the line between "horror" and "fantasy" and "sci-fi." For me, it doesn't matter that much because I watch all three genres for the same reasons: I want to be taken out of my comfort zone. I want to question my perception of reality. I want to see ordinary people transform into heroes when faced with impossible circumstances. I want to see worlds and creatures I've never seen or imagined before. Mostly, I want to be entertained. If I happen to get scared out of my wits in the process, as long as those other criteria are met, I'm okay with that. But I'm also okay if a movie calling itself "horror" doesn't actually manage to scare me.

So here's my question for this post: Where do you draw the line between "horror" and other genres? Do you come away disappointed if a horror movie doesn't scare you, or do you watch it for other reasons--and if so, what are those reasons?

Tell me your thoughts in the comments, and I'll be back next time with 2007!