Review of The Art of Gothic- Britains Midnight how liberty diversity depravity

Review of The Art of Gothic- Britains Midnight how liberty diversity depravity

BBC (2014) Liberty diversity depravity, the art of gothic: Britain’s midnight hour - BBC Four. Available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04mgxxx (Accessed: 22 April 2016).

Inline Citations:

• (BBC, 2014)
 

This documentary is looking into Gothic, how it was being portrayed as reviving something that was dead, fearing the unknown and bringing up hidden anxieties people feared during the industrial revolution, the sense of the dark, gloomy, condensed city, the rush of the city beneath their feet, machines that had never been seen before, it was all so new to them that it bought up fear and anxiety in people.

He went onto saying Gothic is everywhere even in the modern day, how it has developed, from a monster or a vampire 'Dracula' to machines replacing duties that man was carried out to do, making the monster like figure into reality robot now in the modern day. How Gothic has gone onto develop in weird and wonderful ways.

The main feature of the first episode is mainly to do with Dracula, how he evolved from this foreign vampire who arrives to London to infect the city, this 'held a mirror' to society at the time, how people with becoming sick from diagnosed diseases and pollution caused by factories which carries on even in a modern day.
Has Dracula developed into a bigger problem, I believe it reflected what was going on and growing within the city, masking the real life problems in the city, the 'Hussle and Bussle' of London was 'Sucking the blood (life) out of people' making them feel weak and tired with working a job in the factories day in day out.

People were beginning to believe they were being stalked by something by reading Dracula, he turned into a daunting myth, but I feel it was a chase of many problems people faced on a daily basis and Dracula was the reflection of this.

The documentary explains a lot about the truths of Gothic horror and reflecting in society. From objects being sold, which looked scary, with large eyes, odd looking, kind of gargoyle appearance which looked like voodoo, to draw people in to buy to collect or place inside their homes.

There were no beautiful furniture or objects, there was a mass of these which I feel placed apart in peoples imagination and making people think are they being stalked or followed by these monsters.

I really enjoyed how he talks further about John Ruskin developing the nature of Gothic and how intrigued he was with the development with robots from Dracula and other monsters portrayed in novels. The replacement of monsters/ vampires etc into working robots, similar to Frankstein monsters in a modern way to fit into today's society.
Gothic lives on in paintings, buildings, films, machines, mirrors  and cinema, it made me think how it has created and shaped today in many bizarre ways, even with peoples fears and pressure within daily work.
I enjoyed this episode it was informal and factual and made me think about it in more depth, which all made sense to me and also was freighting to think that deep into the subject matter.

I mostly enjoyed how many writers were influenced by gothic horror and how we are influenced by them now, by dressings up and adapting characters, in comics, in fashion, make-up, events etc. watching shows and film adaptations. I learnt a lot of insight and it was easy to follow.