Subversive laughter: Incongruity, relief, and cultural critique in Longlegs (2024) and The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

Abstract

This chapter examines the enduring cultural impact of Thomas Harris’ The Silence of the Lambs and Jonathan Demme’s film adaptation, alongside Osgood Perkins’ Longlegs, through the rarely examined angle of dark humour studies. While such films are not comedies broadly speaking, this chapter maintains that Demme and Perkins’ tactical exploitation of the incongruity, superiority and relief theories offer a mixed model framework for comprehending the sustained popularity of their darkly iconic characters, while simultaneously engendering a complex, disturbing emotional experience in which viewers oscillate between laughter, terror, and sorrow. The analysis considers how fictional serial killers reflect and satirise contemporary anxieties around the patriarchy, gender discrimination, child trafficking and exploitation and the rise of far-right politics and fascism, by drawing troubling parallels with bygone and current world leaders such as Reagan, Trump, Musk, Putin, Kim Jong Un, and Farage. Through a comparative case study of Hannibal Lecter, Jame Gumb and Long Legs, this article demonstrates how postmodern cinematic monsters operate as sites of cultural contradiction and incongruity, fusing charisma and horror to sustain their disturbing appeal and relevance in contemporary media.