What does it mean to be influenced? In small terms, it means that something or someone has the ability to cause an effect. When you look at someone as an artistic influence, then that person’s work can inspire you and even cause you to change certain aspects of yourself and your work. I, personally, look up to Wes Craven and his work in the film industry. He had directed some of the most terrifying and twisted horror movies, earning him the title of “‘The Sultan of Slash’ and ‘The Guru of Gore’ by reviewers” ("Wes Craven (1939-)"). I have seen some of his more popular films such as A Nightmare on Elm Street and even some of his lesser unknown films like Red Eye. These movies have been my favorites since middle school and still are today.

Our story begins when Paul and Caroline Craven had their youngest son named Wesley Earl Craven on August 2, 1939, in Cleveland, Ohio ("Wes Craven (1939-)" 1). As shocking as it may seem, Craven “had an evangelical Christian upbringing” (Wooley 5). At that point in time, religion was a big part of American culture and so kids, just like Wes Craven, were pushed into their parent’s faith. However, it was his mother that was the religious parent since Craven’s father “participated in the church for about a year and then never went back” (Goldman MM16). Unfortunately, his father had an alcohol problem and died at the age of 40 (Goldman MM16). Therefore, his mom had to take care of Craven and his siblings as a single parent. Furthermore, “Craven’s church forbade its members-especially the younger ones- to go to any movie theater” (Wooley 9). This was due to the graphic content in certain Hollywood movies, so Craven grew up watching Disney movies but there were times where he was able to see other movies from different genres (Wooley 9). While he was dealing with “the repressive strictness of the church’s teachings and their reinforcement at home, … it’s not hard to see why the nightmares started for Craven at a very early age” (Wooley 17). Most of the time, nightmares would scar a kid but he has been able to use his nightmares as inspiration for his films later on. In middle school, Wes Craven “found that he could express some of what was going on inside himself through writing” (Wooley 19). Then when he got to high school, “he was working part-time in a public library, a gig that helped feed his voracious reading habit” (Wooley 19). As a senior, he applied and was accepted into Wheaton College with the highest score on the Ohio State Intelligence Test and a recommendation letter from his sister’s boyfriend (Wooley 20). Later on in 1963, Craven graduated with a degree in English and Psychology (Wooley 21). Though one year before that, Wes Craven became the editor for Wheaton’s college magazine but the president canceled the magazine because he “published two short stories” that were about topics that pertained to the civil rights movement (Wooley 22-23). After getting his Bachelor’s degrees, he went into the “master’s program at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore” (Wooley 28). Although Wes Craven is known for his films, at this time in his life he wrote his first novel, Noah’s Ark: The Diary of a Madman (Wooley 29). Sadly, “[a]fter graduating from Johns Hopkins, Craven tried unsuccessfully to get the book published” (Wooley 30). Since he was in a one year program, “[w]ith Noah’s Ark accepted as his master’s thesis, Craven graduated from Johns Hopkins in 1964, earning an MA in philosophy and writing” (Wooley 30). After this, “[h]e got his first college teaching job, as a humanities instructor at Westminster College in New Wilmington, Pennsylvania, and he married his college girlfriend, Bonnie Broecker (Wooley 32). Though after a year, he got a job at Clarkson College in Potsdam, New York and this is where he grew to love film (Wooley 32). He loved it so much that he told Wooley in the interview,

“I scraped my money together and bought a 16-millimeter camera, a Revere. It didn’t have sound or anything; I was really just teaching myself how to use a camera. Then some students saw that I had one, and they immediately came to me and said, “We want to start a film club. Will you be our adviser?” I said, “Sure.” I didn’t know anything about it, but we shot a film called The Searchers, which was a Mission: Impossible type of thing. A couple of other students did some little shorts— one of them was stop-motion animation. We shot all over the campus, and we had a lot of fun, and we cut everything together with scissors and Scotch tape. We knew nothing about how films were actually made. We didn’t even have a splicer. We didn’t know anything. And nobody at the school knew anything— or cared. But we showed our films all over the town and the college and actually made our money back five times over.” (Wooley 32-33).

In addition, Wes Craven chose to quit his job to explore the world of film (Wooley 34). He went to New York City in hopes that he could find a job in the film industry but had no such luck and in order to provide for his wife and two children, he had to take a job as an English teacher at Madrid-Waddington near Potsdam (Wooley 36). Nevertheless, Craven went back to New York and worked as a messenger boy but then he was fired and had to become a taxi driver (Wooley 37). Unfortunately, his wife had enough, so “[s]he filed for divorce and got custody of their two young children” (Wooley 38). Though while working as a messenger boy, his boss, Harry Chapin, was “the person who first shared the professional editing techniques that enabled Craven to finally find some work— beyond delivering messages— in the New York film world” (Wooley 40). Due to this, Craven finally landed a job as a film editor assistant for Roger Murphy who worked for Sean Cunningham but when Murphy left, Craven took over for him (Wooley 42-43). Craven and Cunningham also worked together on the film Together,in which “would mark Craven’s first picture as a director” (Wooley 44). Then they went on to make the horror movie, The Last House on the Left (Wooley 46). After almost five years since The Last House on the Left, Craven teamed up “with producer Peter Locke and wrote a horror screenplay entitled The Hills Have Eyes”, which later on hit the big screen (Muir 13). After making the movies Deadly Blessing, Swamp Thing, and The Hills Have Eyes Part 2, Wes Craven finally his most famous movie A Nightmare on Elm Street with a budget of $1.8 million (Muir 18). Eventually, Craven made a few more horror movies and was even involved in the first season of The Twilight Zone (Muir 18). His more recent movies were the Scream trilogy but since there was a fourth movie Craven said that it was “the beginning of a new trilogy” (Goldman MM16). Sadly, there will never be another Scream movie trilogy since Wes Craven’s untimely death. Although that hasn’t stopped Netflix from showing the TV show with the same name. So in a way, Wes Craven still lives on.

Wes Craven' movies are the reason I love the horror genre. Although I am a Psychology and Anthropology major, I am still interested in the Arts and had often thought about becoming more involved in them because of his films. Wes Craven earned the fame and recognition that he has today... Even in Death.