Horror Movie

The makeup team prepares to shoot the cigarette burning scene by applying fake wounds and scars on the narrator. The shoot is interrupted by the discovery that no one has brought prop cigarettes to set. The narrator cracks a joke about it, which angers Valentina because he is breaking character. The director of photography, Dan, sends their grip to buy cigarettes. He makes a foreboding comment about the missing cigarettes being their only on-set mishap. The narrator considers sharing that his mother used to make him buy cigarettes for her and try them, but decides it isn’t necessary while he’s in character as the Thin Kid.

Valentina resolves their scheduling issue by reversing the shooting order for the day. The makeup team adds burn scars to the narrator’s body. Valentina gathers Dan and Cleo to the makeup area and discusses her dissatisfaction with the film’s plot as it shows the teens enjoying attention and sympathy after the Thin Kid’s disappearance. She stresses that there shouldn’t be a clear motivation for their actions, which will unnerve the audience. To this end, she suggests that the teens shouldn’t receive attention and that nothing should change as a result of the Thin Kid’s disappearance. This will make the movie feel starker and stranger. 

The narrator seconds Valentina’s suggestion by indicating that it would make the world seem monstrous. The narrator realizes that Valentina is relying on his support to counterbalance Dan and Cleo. Dan nevertheless argues against the suggestion on the basis that the original scene is fun. Cleo remains neutral, so they set aside the discussion.

The grip returns with a full pack of cigarettes. They rehearse the stubbing scene, getting dangerously close to the narrator’s body with the lit cigarettes. Frustrated by initial results, Valentina suggests shooting close-ups of cigarette burns on pig skin. The narrator imagines that Valentina had tried this while she was off-set to get into character. As Valentina laments over her desire for a realistic shot, the narrator offers to let them stub a real cigarette on his body.

The crew refuse to let it happen at first, but the narrator insists, rationalizing that it has happened to the Thin Kid already. He reassures them that they can do it quickly enough to prevent severe injury. When Valentina begins to entertain the idea, the narrator realizes that she may have orchestrated the day’s problems to get him to volunteer his suggestion. He delegates Cleo with burning him because her character would do it quickest.

Cleo and the narrator perform the stunt with hesitation, the narrator leaning into the cigarette at the last second. He never forgets the pain and describes it as a turning point in the movie’s history. The scene is one of three that are eventually uploaded to YouTube, gaining millions of views. Mel, a makeup and effects assistant, offers the narrator a puff of her cigarette and then cruelly retracts it, causing the narrator to smile.

The narrator outlines how each of the original Horror Movie crew members died, beginning with Karson’s death in a car crash and ending with Dan’s death by coronary thrombosis. Cleo’s death is alluded to as a well-known incident, though its nature is not specified. The narrator is the only surviving member of the crew. This drives fan interest in the film, as well as the narrator’s reputation within the horror film community. The narrator hires a manager to help him control his public appearances. In 2019, she convinces him to appear at a horror fan convention.

After driving to Virginia to personally transport the signing photos and the mask, the narrator sets up in the celebrity room. He remains unsure of his motivations for coming, apart from the financial opportunity. He acquaints himself with a writer stationed across from him. The narrator resents the faux recognition he receives from the other celebrities. When the first fans arrive, the narrator similarly feels cynical about their enthusiasm for the film. He welcomes them anyway.

Entertaining more fans, the narrator receives art of Cleo and the Thin Kid that nearly makes him cry. He alludes to having visited Valentina after a court trial. He fields obnoxious interactions with his neighboring celebrities. Finally, he is visited by an antagonistic fan, who asks to look at the narrator’s hand.

In the screenplay, Cleo paces up and down her stairs, passively attempting to harm herself. Her mother catches her, so Cleo supplies the alibi that she was preparing to go to Valentina’s house. Karson sees Cleo as he enters his garage. Standing outside a large house, Valentina plays with a fortune-teller note that she had stolen from one of her classmates. The note indicates that a party is happening the following weekend. Valentina attempts to sneak through the shrubbery of the house and sees Karson and Cleo waiting for her near the back.

The teens return to the abandoned classroom and find that the Thin Kid has erased the chalkboard writing. They angrily call him out, revealing that his body has started to alter following his prolonged use of the mask and his cigarette scarring. The teens punish the Thin Kid by pulling his right arm across the teacher’s desk and cutting half of his pinky off with a pair of garden shears. The Thin Kid screams as he bleeds out of his finger. Valentina drops his blood on the symbol. She then inserts the severed pinky into the mouth of the Thin Kid’s mask, forcing him to swallow it. They leave his hand wrapped in a towel as the Thin Kid sits despondently. He looks at the viewer accusatorily.

The narrator collates details from the various interviews he’s given on how he lost his finger. The first thing he recalls is Cleo and two other crewmembers accompanying him to the hospital. Cleo tells the narrator the story of her failed attempt to save a dying baby squirrel when she was young. The anecdote consoles the narrator. 

Valentina offers to take financial responsibility for the narrator’s recovery. The narrator remains unsure how his finger ended up getting severed. Cleo argues that they should shut down production indefinitely. Valentina is intent on continuing. The narrator decides not to reattach his pinky so that he can return to set immediately. Because his memory had been blurred by recovery medication, the narrator is unsure if Valentina had manipulated him into thinking the shears were safe to use for the shoot. He suggests, however, that it would be a convenient excuse for the possibility that he had intentionally left his real finger inside the prop pinky, simply out of curiosity. The narrator calls back to Dan’s foreboding comment about the cigarette, which he says cursed the production.

In the screenplay, Cleo returns to the abandoned classroom and nearly tells the Thin Kid her theory that everything is happening the way it is because they are in Hell and they are trying to make demons. She tends to the Thin Kid’s wounded finger. Afterward, she applies green latex over his body wounds, blending in with his mask. The Thin Kid retreats into the supply room. Cleo considers sharing a line by American novelist Peter Straub, who wrote that “demons are made to love and be loved” (138), but leaves without saying it to the Thin Kid.

The three teens return to the abandoned school with a mannequin that Karson has taken from his dad’s store. The Thin Kid, now covered in scales, watches them arrive and waits atop Cleo’s symbol. Karson gives the Thin Kid a screwdriver, expecting him to stab the mannequin. When the Thin Kid fails to obey, Karson expresses doubt that their plans are working. Cleo plays an audio recording of herself screaming while Karson demonstrates the stabbing action. The Thin Kid meekly stabs the mannequin, dropping the screwdriver as he recoils from his finger wound. They urge him to try again with his other hand. The Thin Kid stabs then violently slams the mannequin against the chalkboard.