Carol J Clover wrote an article which comprehensively explains the final girl theory. She begins to mention that audiences prefer the final girl or girl being murdered to be a beautiful woman, rather than a husky man or ugly girl as "Women in Peril" work better in the suspense and horror genre. Relating this back to male gaze, audiences have been so used to seeing glamorous women at the forefront of gruesome murders opposed to the less attractive and initially underdeveloped characters. This could be because audiences who view in the male gaze frame of mind may find entertainment in the the potentially phallic murder of the "beautiful" woman.
The killer according the Clover is often unseen and portrayed as male,fat, ugly, deformed or dressed as a woman.This particular portrayal of the killer character is important as it provides a stark contrast and binary opposition with the beautiful victim.
Clover also mentions camera angles in her extract and highlights how in terms of the final girl, camera angles wane from being close to the killer and wax closer to the final girl. This is a shift underwritten by story-line as well as camera position, by the end we are watching through the eyes of the final girl and we are closest to her. Clover goes on to mention Freudian theories and phallic killing strategies "thrusts knife or drill into trembling bodies of young women". I have explained this point further in my quote analysis below.
The scan below shows 2 quotes analysed from the Clover's Final Girl text.
