During her speech after winning Best Actress at the 2025 Critics Choice Awards last Friday, actress Demi Moore gave praise to her director and co-stars, and her fellow nominees, but also commented on what this film really is saying about the industry, that I truly hope will help in the change that is desperately needed.

She commented on something else that I hope is going to change. She said “I am so grateful, not just for my performance but that you have highlighted this film, this genre. Normally horror films are overlooked and not seen for the profundity that they can hold.”

Something that we serious horror fans have been saying for years, but we also know it usually falls on deaf ears when it comes to normal critics and society in general. The moral questions that even Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel, Frankenstein, asks can be so intense and though-provoking, but as far as most know, they don’t know the difference between the creature and the creator.

Horror films have always been a way for creators to get a message across, whether hidden within the subtext of the story, or right out in front, covered in blood and gore, but since the genre is usually ignored by most, they never get it. But we do. Not to mention the impact these films can have on some, whether young or old, just like any other genre, they have the power to affect the viewer at a deep level. At the Golden Globe Awards in 2018, after winning for The Shape of Water, director Guillermo de Toro said this in his speech:

“Since childhood, I’ve been faithful to monsters. I have been saved and absolved by them because monsters, I believe, are patron saints of our blissful imperfections and they allow and embody the possibility of failing and live.”

So, kudos to Moore for pointing that out in your speech. We horror fans applaud not only the hard work you’ve done in The Substance, but for making that point. Thank you!