Intertextuality - a shortcut for producers and a satisfying Easter egg for involved audiences!
Intertextuality is where one media product makes reference to another media product in order to construct, reinforce and anchor meaning
Films that Riptide makes reference to include Jaws, Last Night In Soho, Eden Lake, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Saw, Ouija, The Omen, Paranormal Activity, Would You Rather…
While there is no one film that Riptide makes reference to, it shares many superficial similarities with Dario Argento’s 1977 horror masterpiece Suspira. These similarities include the iconography of women fleeing in terror, the emphasis on red and blue lighting that constructs a binary opposition, and the 1970s fashion. This explicit intertextual reference to 1970s horror films is clearly making reference to the sexism and deep seated misogyny that existed in the 1970s, and perhaps reflects on the significant changes which have since happened
