ABSTRACT
This chapter describes some questions about what is at stake when women directors make horror films. It addresses the remake of Carrie, directed by Kimberly Peirce, which was defined by the filmmaker as a feminist revision of the horror genre. The chapter analyses female-directed horror films' marketing materials and reviews, as well as filmmakers' profiles, to unravel some of the tensions that have permeated the popular construction of these directors' star personas and authorship, and the reception of their films. It examines some of the pitfalls involved in conceptualising female/feminist authorship, in particular in reference to the conventions of the horror genre. The challenge is posed by the auteurist concept of film-making itself, in particular traditional masculine paradigms that restrict women filmmakers to being considered as auteurs only in particular ways. Drawing on the title of Linda Williams' essay, we need to ask what happens not only when the woman looks, but also when the woman directs.
