![NosferatuShadow](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/ba/NosferatuShadow.jpg)
Horror is a
film genre
A film genre is a stylistic or thematic category for motion pictures based on similarities either in the narrative elements, aesthetic approach, or the emotional response to the film.
Drawing heavily from the theories of literary-genre cri ...
that seeks to elicit
fear
Fear is an intensely unpleasant emotion in response to perceiving or recognizing a danger or threat. Fear causes physiological changes that may produce behavioral reactions such as mounting an aggressive response or fleeing the threat. Fear ...
or
disgust
Disgust (Middle French: ''desgouster'', from Latin ''gustus'', "taste") is an emotional response of rejection or revulsion to something potentially contagious or something considered offensive, distasteful, or unpleasant. In ''The Expression o ...
in its audience for entertainment purposes.
Horror films often explore dark subject matter and may deal with
transgressive topics or themes. Broad elements include
monsters,
apocalyptic events, and
religious
Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatur ...
or
folk beliefs. Cinematic techniques used in horror films have been shown to provoke psychological reactions in an audience.
Horror films have existed for
more than a century. Early inspirations from before the development of film include
folklore
Folklore is shared by a particular group of people; it encompasses the traditions common to that culture, subculture or group. This includes oral traditions such as tales, legends, proverbs and jokes. They include material culture, rangin ...
, religious beliefs and
superstition
A superstition is any belief or practice considered by non-practitioners to be irrational or supernatural, attributed to fate or magic, perceived supernatural influence, or fear of that which is unknown. It is commonly applied to beliefs ...
s of different cultures, and the
Gothic
Gothic or Gothics may refer to:
People and languages
*Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes
**Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths
**Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...
and
horror literature
Horror is a genre of fiction which is intended to frighten, scare, or disgust. Horror is often divided into the sub-genres of psychological horror and supernatural horror, which is in the realm of speculative fiction. Literary historian J. A ...
of authors such as
Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe (; Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. He is wid ...
,
Bram Stoker
Abraham Stoker (8 November 1847 – 20 April 1912) was an Irish author who is celebrated for his 1897 Gothic horror novel '' Dracula''. During his lifetime, he was better known as the personal assistant of actor Sir Henry Irving and busi ...
, and
Mary Shelley
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (; ; 30 August 1797 – 1 February 1851) was an English novelist who wrote the Gothic novel '' Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' (1818), which is considered an early example of science fiction. She also ...
. From origins in
silent film
A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, w ...
s and
German Expressionism
German Expressionism () consisted of several related creative movements in Germany before the First World War that reached a peak in Berlin during the 1920s. These developments were part of a larger Expressionist movement in north and central ...
, horror only became a codified
genre
Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other f ...
after the release of
''Dracula'' (1931). Many sub-genres emerged in subsequent decades, including
body horror
Body horror or biological horror is a subgenre of horror that intentionally showcases grotesque or psychologically disturbing violations of the human body. These violations may manifest through aberrant sex, mutations, mutilation, zombification, ...
,
comedy horror
Comedy horror, also known as horror comedy, is a literary, television, and film genre that combines elements of comedy and horror fiction. Comedy horror has been described as able to be categorized under three types: "black comedy, parody and sp ...
,
slasher film
A slasher film is a genre of horror films involving a killer stalking and murdering a group of people, usually by use of bladed or sharp tools like knife, chainsaw, scalpel, etc. Although the term "slasher" may occasionally be used informally as ...
s,
supernatural horror
Horror is a genre of fiction which is intended to frighten, scare, or disgust. Horror is often divided into the sub-genres of psychological horror and supernatural horror, which is in the realm of speculative fiction. Literary historian J ...
and
psychological horror
Psychological horror is a subgenre of horror and psychological fiction with a particular focus on mental, emotional, and psychological states to frighten, disturb, or unsettle its audience. The subgenre frequently overlaps with the related subge ...
. The genre has been produced worldwide, varying in content and style between regions. Horror is particularly prominent in the cinema of
Japan
Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...
,
Korea
Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic ...
, Italy and
Thailand
Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
, among other countries.
Despite being the subject of social and legal controversy due to their subject matter, some horror films and franchises have seen major
commercial success, influenced society and spawned several
popular culture icons.
Characteristics
The horror film is defined by ''The Dictionary of Film Studies'' as representing "disturbing and dark subject matter, seeking to elicit responses of
fear
Fear is an intensely unpleasant emotion in response to perceiving or recognizing a danger or threat. Fear causes physiological changes that may produce behavioral reactions such as mounting an aggressive response or fleeing the threat. Fear ...
,
terror,
disgust
Disgust (Middle French: ''desgouster'', from Latin ''gustus'', "taste") is an emotional response of rejection or revulsion to something potentially contagious or something considered offensive, distasteful, or unpleasant. In ''The Expression o ...
, shock,
suspense
Suspense is a state of mental uncertainty, anxiety, being Decision-making, undecided, or being Doubt, doubtful. In a Drama, dramatic work, suspense is the anticipation of the wikt:outcome, outcome of a plot (narrative), plot or of the solution t ...
, and, of course, horror from their viewers."
In the chapter "The American Nightmare: Horror in the 70s" from ''Hollywood from Vietnam to Reagan'' (2002), film critic
Robin Wood declared that commonality between horror films are that "normality is threatened by the monster." This was further expanded upon by ''The Philosophy of Horror, or Parodoxes of the Heart'' by
Noël Carroll
Noël Carroll (born 1947) is an American philosopher considered to be one of the leading figures in contemporary philosophy of art. Although Carroll is best known for his work in the philosophy of film (he is a proponent of cognitive film theory ...
who added that "repulsion must be pleasurable, as evidenced by the genre's popularity."
Prior to the release of ''
Dracula
''Dracula'' is a novel by Bram Stoker, published in 1897. As an epistolary novel, the narrative is related through letters, diary entries, and newspaper articles. It has no single protagonist, but opens with solicitor Jonathan Harker taki ...
'' (1931), historian
Gary Don Rhodes explained that the idea and terminology of horror film did not exist yet as a codified
genre
Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other f ...
, although critics used the term "horror" to describe films in reviews prior to ''Dracula''s release. "Horror" was a term used to describe a variety of meanings. In 1913, ''Moving Picture World'' defined "horrors" as showcasing "striped convicts, murderous Indians, grinning 'black-handers', homicidal drunkards" Some titles that suggest horror such as ''The Hand of Horror'' (1914) was a melodrama about a thief who steals from his own sister. During the silent era, the term horror was used to describe everything from "battle scenes" in war films to tales of drug addiction. Historian Gary Don Rhodes stated that the term "horror film" or "horror movie" was not used in early cinema.
The
mystery film
A mystery film is a genre of film that revolves around the solution of a problem or a crime. It focuses on the efforts of the detective, private investigator or amateur sleuth to solve the mysterious circumstances of an issue by means of clues, i ...
genre was in vogue and early information on ''Dracula'' being promoted as mystery film was common, despite the
novel
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itself ...
,
play and film's story relying on the
supernatural
Supernatural refers to phenomena or entities that are beyond the laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin (above, beyond, or outside of) + (nature) Though the corollary term "nature", has had multiple meanings si ...
. Newman discussed the genre in
British Film Institute
The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves film-making and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery to encourage film production, ...
's ''Companion to Horror'' where he noted that Horror films in the 1930s were easy to identify, but following that decade "the more blurred distinctions become, and horror becomes less like a discrete genre than an effect which can be deployed within any number of narrative settings or narratives patterns".
Various writings on genre from Altman, Lawrence Alloway (''Violent America: The Movies 1946-1964'' (1971)) and Peter Hutchings (''Approaches to Popular Film'' (1995)) implied it easier to view films as
cycles opposed to genres, suggesting the
slasher film
A slasher film is a genre of horror films involving a killer stalking and murdering a group of people, usually by use of bladed or sharp tools like knife, chainsaw, scalpel, etc. Although the term "slasher" may occasionally be used informally as ...
viewed as a cycle would place it in terms of how the film industry was economically and production wise, the personnel involved in their respective eras, and how the films were marketed exhibited and distributed.
Mark Jancovich in an essay declared that "there is no simple 'collective belief' as to what constitutes the horror genre" between both
fans and
critics of the genre. Jancovich found that disagreements existed from audiences who wanted to distinguish themselves. This ranged from fans of different genres who may view a film like ''
Alien
Alien primarily refers to:
* Alien (law), a person in a country who is not a national of that country
** Enemy alien, the above in times of war
* Extraterrestrial life, life which does not originate from Earth
** Specifically, intelligent extrater ...
'' (1979) as belonging to
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel uni ...
, and horror fan bases dismissing it as being inauthentic to either genre. Further debates exist among fans of the genre with personal definitions of "true" horror films, such as fans who embrace
cult figures like
Freddy Kruger of the ''
A Nightmare on Elm Street
''A Nightmare on Elm Street'' is a 1984 American supernatural slasher film written and directed by Wes Craven and produced by Robert Shaye. It is the first installment in the ''A Nightmare on Elm Street'' franchise and stars Heather Langenka ...
'' series, while others disassociate themselves from characters and series and focusing on genre ''
auteur
An auteur (; , 'author') is an artist with a distinctive approach, usually a film director whose filmmaking control is so unbounded but personal that the director is likened to the "author" of the film, which thus manifests the director's unique ...
'' directors like
Dario Argento
Dario Argento (; born 7 September 1940) is an Italian film director, producer, screenwriter, actor and critic. His influential work in the horror genre during the 1970s and 1980s, particularly in the subgenre known as ''giallo'', has led him ...
, while others fans would deem Argento's films as too mainstream, having preferences more
underground films. Andrew Tudor wrote in ''Monsters and Mad Scientists: A Cultural History of the Horror Movie'' suggested that "Genre is what we collectively believe it to be"
Cinematic techniques
![Woman-wearing-red-t-shirt-2898511](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/43/Woman-wearing-red-t-shirt-2898511.jpg)
In a study by Jacob Shelton, the many ways that audience members are manipulated through horror films was investigated in detail.
Negative space is one such method that can play a part in inducing a reaction, causing one's eyes to remotely rest on anything in the frame – a wall, or the empty black void in the shadows.
The
jump scare is a horror film
trope
Trope or tropes may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Trope (cinema), a cinematic convention for conveying a concept
* Trope (literature), a figure of speech or common literary device
* Trope (music), any of a variety of different things ...
, where an abrupt change in image accompanied with a loud sound intends to surprise the viewer.
This can also be
subverted to create tension, where an audience may feel more unease and discomfort by anticipating a jump scare.
Mirror
A mirror or looking glass is an object that reflects an image. Light that bounces off a mirror will show an image of whatever is in front of it, when focused through the lens of the eye or a camera. Mirrors reverse the direction of the im ...
s are often used in horror films is to create visual depth and build tension. Shelton argues mirrors have been used so frequently in horror films that audiences have been
conditioned to fear them, and subverting audience expectations of a jump scare in a mirror can further build tension.
Tight framing and
close-up
A close-up or closeup in filmmaking, television production, photography, still photography, and the comic strip medium is a type of shot (filmmaking), shot that tightly film frame, frames a person or object. Close-ups are one of the standard s ...
s are also commonly used; these can build tension and induce
anxiety
Anxiety is an emotion which is characterized by an unpleasant state of inner turmoil and includes feelings of dread over anticipated events. Anxiety is different than fear in that the former is defined as the anticipation of a future threat wh ...
by not allowing the viewer to see beyond what is around the
protagonist
A protagonist () is the main character of a story. The protagonist makes key decisions that affect the plot, primarily influencing the story and propelling it forward, and is often the character who faces the most significant obstacles. If a st ...
.
Music
Music
Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspe ...
is considered a key component of horror films. In ''Music in the Horror Film'' (2010), Lerner writes "music in horror film frequently makes us feel threatened and uncomfortable" and intends to intensify the atmosphere created in imagery and themes.
Dissonance,
atonality
Atonality in its broadest sense is music that lacks a tonal center, or key. ''Atonality'', in this sense, usually describes compositions written from about the early 20th-century to the present day, where a hierarchy of harmonies focusing on a ...
and experiments with
timbre
In music, timbre ( ), also known as tone color or tone quality (from psychoacoustics), is the perceived sound quality of a musical note, sound or tone. Timbre distinguishes different types of sound production, such as choir voices and musica ...
are typical characteristics used by
composer
A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music.
Etymology and Def ...
s in horror film music.
Themes
In the book ''Dark Dreams'', author Charles Derry conceived horror films as focusing on three broad
themes
Theme or themes may refer to:
* Theme (arts), the unifying subject or idea of the type of visual work
* Theme (Byzantine district), an administrative district in the Byzantine Empire governed by a Strategos
* Theme (computing), a custom graphical ...
: the horror of
personality
Personality is the characteristic sets of behaviors, cognitions, and emotional patterns that are formed from biological and environmental factors, and which change over time. While there is no generally agreed-upon definition of personality, ...
, horror of
Armageddon
According to the Book of Revelation in the New Testament of the Christian Bible, Armageddon (, from grc, Ἁρμαγεδών ''Harmagedōn'', Late Latin: , from Hebrew: ''Har Məgīddō'') is the prophesied location of a gathering of armies ...
and the horror of the
demon
A demon is a malevolent supernatural entity. Historically, belief in demons, or stories about demons, occurs in religion, occultism, literature, fiction, mythology, and folklore; as well as in Media (communication), media such as comics, video ...
ic. The horror of personality derives from
monsters being at the centre of the plot, such
Frankenstein's monster
Frankenstein's monster or Frankenstein's creature, often referred to as simply "Frankenstein", is a fictional character who first appeared in Mary Shelley's 1818 novel '' Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus''. Shelley's title thus compar ...
whose psychology makes them perform unspeakable horrific acts ranging from
rape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration carried out against a person without their consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority, or ...
s,
mutilation
Mutilation or maiming (from the Latin: ''mutilus'') refers to Bodily harm, severe damage to the body that has a ruinous effect on an individual's quality of life. It can also refer to alterations that render something inferior, ugly, dysfunction ...
s and
sadistic killings. Other key works of this form are
Alfred Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock (13 August 1899 – 29 April 1980) was an English filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema. In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 featur ...
's ''
Psycho,'' which feature psychotic murderers without the make-up of a monster. The second 'Armageddon' group delves on the fear of
large-scale destruction, which ranges from
science fiction works but also of
natural events
Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are p ...
, such as Hitchcock's ''
The Birds'' (1963). The last group of the "Fear of the Demonic" features graphic accounts of
satanic rites,
witchcraft
Witchcraft traditionally means the use of magic or supernatural powers to harm others. A practitioner is a witch. In medieval and early modern Europe, where the term originated, accused witches were usually women who were believed to have ...
,
exorcism
Exorcism () is the religious or spiritual practice of evicting demons, jinns, or other malevolent spiritual entities from a person, or an area, that is believed to be possessed. Depending on the spiritual beliefs of the exorcist, this may be ...
s outside traditional forms of worship, as seen in films like ''
The Exorcist
''The Exorcist'' is a 1973 American supernatural horror film directed by William Friedkin and written for the screen by William Peter Blatty, based on his 1971 novel of the same name. It stars Ellen Burstyn, Max von Sydow, Lee J. Cobb, Kitty ...
'' (1973) or ''
The Omen
''The Omen'' is a 1976 supernatural horror film directed by Richard Donner and written by David Seltzer. An international co-production of the United Kingdom and the United States, it stars Gregory Peck, Lee Remick, David Warner, Harvey Spen ...
'' (1976).
Some critics have suggested horror films can be a vessel for exploring contemporary cultural, political and social trends. Jeanne Hall, a film theorist, agrees with the use of horror films in easing the process of understanding issues by making use of their optical elements.
The use of horror films can help audiences understand international prior historical events occurs, for example, to depict the horrors of the
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...
, the
Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...
, the worldwide
AIDS epidemic or
post-9/11
The post-9/11 period is the time after the September 11 attacks, characterized by heightened suspicion of non-Americans in the United States, increased government efforts to address terrorism, and a more aggressive American foreign policy.
Pol ...
pessimism. In many occurrences, the manipulation of horror presents cultural definitions that are not accurate, yet set an example to which a person relates to that specific cultural from then on in their life.
History
In his book ''Caligari's Children: The Film as Tale of Terror'' (1980), author Siegbert Solomon Prawer stated that those wanting to read into horror films in a linear historical path, citing historians and critics like
Carlos Clarens Carlos Clarens (1930–1987) was a film historian and writer on the cinema particularly noted for his sensitive, pioneering '' An Illustrated History of the Horror Film'' (1967, revised 1968). Having left Havana in his younger years, he made his mar ...
noting that as some film audiences at a time took films made by
Tod Browning
Tod Browning (born Charles Albert Browning Jr.; July 12, 1880 – October 6, 1962) was an American film director, film actor, screenwriter, vaudeville performer, and carnival sideshow and circus entertainer. He directed a number of films of vari ...
that starred
Bela Lugosi
Béla Ferenc Dezső Blaskó (; October 20, 1882 – August 16, 1956), known professionally as Bela Lugosi (; ), was a Hungarian and American actor best remembered for portraying Count Dracula in the 1931 horror classic ''Dracula'', Ygor in ''S ...
with utmost seriousness, other productions from other countries saw the material set for parody, as children's entertainment or nostalgic recollection. John Kenneth Muir in his books covering the history of horror films through the later decades of the 20th century echoed this statement, stating that horror films mirror the anxieties of "their age and their audience" concluding that "if horror isn't relevant to everyday life... it isn't horrifying".
Early influences and films
Beliefs in the
supernatural
Supernatural refers to phenomena or entities that are beyond the laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin (above, beyond, or outside of) + (nature) Though the corollary term "nature", has had multiple meanings si ...
,
devil
A devil is the personification of evil as it is conceived in various cultures and religious traditions. It is seen as the objectification of a hostile and destructive force. Jeffrey Burton Russell states that the different conceptions of ...
s and
ghosts have existed in
folklore
Folklore is shared by a particular group of people; it encompasses the traditions common to that culture, subculture or group. This includes oral traditions such as tales, legends, proverbs and jokes. They include material culture, rangin ...
and
religion
Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatural, ...
s of many cultures for centuries; these would go on to become integral parts of the horror genre.
Zombie
A zombie ( Haitian French: , ht, zonbi) is a mythological undead corporeal revenant created through the reanimation of a corpse. Zombies are most commonly found in horror and fantasy genre works. The term comes from Haitian folklore, in w ...
s, for example, originated from
Haitian folklore. Prior to the development of film in the late 1890s,
Gothic fiction
Gothic fiction, sometimes called Gothic horror in the 20th century, is a loose literary aesthetic of fear and haunting. The name is a reference to Gothic architecture of the European Middle Ages, which was characteristic of the settings of e ...
was developed. These included ''
Frankenstein
''Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' is an 1818 novel written by English author Mary Shelley. ''Frankenstein'' tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a sapient creature in an unorthodox scientific ...
'' (1818) and short stories by
Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe (; Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. He is wid ...
, which would later have several film adaptations. By the late 1800s and early 1900s, more key
horror texts would be developed than any other period preceding it. While they were not all straight horror stories, the horrific elements of them lingered in popular culture, with their set pieces becoming staples in horror cinema.
Critic and author
Kim Newman
Kim James Newman (born 31 July 1959) is an English journalist, film critic and fiction writer. Recurring interests visible in his work include film history and horror fiction—both of which he attributes to seeing Tod Browning's ''Dracula'' at ...
described
Georges Méliès ''
Le Manoir du diable'' as the first horror film, featuring elements that would become staples in the genre: images of demons, ghosts, and haunted castles.
The early 20th century cinema had production of film so hectic, several adaptions of stories were made within months of each other. This included Poe adaptations made in France and the United States, to ''Frankenstein'' adaptations being made in the United States and Italy. The most adapted of these stories was ''
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
''Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde'' is a 1886 Gothic novella by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. It follows Gabriel John Utterson, a London-based legal practitioner who investigates a series of strange occurrences between his old ...
'' (1886), which had three version made in 1920 alone.
Early German cinema involved Poe-like stories, such as ''
The Student of Prague'' (1913) which featured director and actor
Paul Wegener
Paul Wegener (11 December 1874 – 13 September 1948) was a German actor, writer, and film director known for his pioneering role in German expressionist cinema.
Acting career
At the age of 20, Wegener decided to end his law studies and conce ...
. Wegner would go on to work in similar features such as ''
The Golem and the Dancing Girl
''The Golem and the Dancing Girl'' (original German title: ) is a 1917 German silent comedy horror film. It is part of a trilogy, preceded by '' The Golem'' (1915) and followed by '' The Golem: How He Came into the World'' (1920). Paul Wegene ...
'' and its related ''Golem'' films. Other actors of the era who featured in similar films included
Werner Krauss
Werner Johannes Krauss (''Krauß'' in German; 23 June 1884 – 20 October 1959) was a German stage and film actor. Krauss dominated the German stage of the early 20th century. However, his participation in the antisemitic propaganda film ''Jud S ...
and
Conrad Veidt
Hans Walter Conrad Veidt (; 22 January 1893 – 3 April 1943) was a German film actor who attracted early attention for his roles in the films ''Different from the Others'' (1919), '' The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari'' (1920), and '' The Man Who Laug ...
who starred in ''
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari'', leading to similar roles in other German productions.
F. W. Murnau
Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau (born Friedrich Wilhelm Plumpe; December 28, 1888March 11, 1931) was a German film director, producer and screenwriter.
He was greatly influenced by Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Shakespeare and Ibsen plays he had seen at th ...
would also direct an adaptation of ''
Nosferatu
''Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror'' (German: ''Nosferatu – Eine Symphonie des Grauens'') is a 1922 silent German Expressionist horror film directed by F. W. Murnau and starring Max Schreck as Count Orlok, a vampire who preys on the wife ...
'' (1922), a film Newman described as standing "as the only screen adaptation of ''Dracula'' to be primarily interested in horror, from the character's rat-like features and thin body, the film was, even more so than ''Caligari'', "a template for the horror film."
1930s
![Bela Lugosi as Dracula](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/08/Bela_Lugosi_as_Dracula.jpg)
Following the 1927 success of
Broadway
Broadway may refer to:
Theatre
* Broadway Theatre (disambiguation)
* Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S.
** Broadway (Manhattan), the street
**Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...
play of ''
Dracula'',
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures (legally Universal City Studios LLC, also known as Universal Studios, or simply Universal; common metonym: Uni, and formerly named Universal Film Manufacturing Company and Universal-International Pictures Inc.) is an Americ ...
officially purchased the rights to both the play and the
novel
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itself ...
. After the ''Dracula''s premiere on February 12, 1931, the film received what authors of the book ''Universal Horrors'' proclaimed as "uniformly positive, some even laudatory" reviews. The commercial reception surprised Universal who forged ahead to make similar production of ''
Frankenstein
''Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' is an 1818 novel written by English author Mary Shelley. ''Frankenstein'' tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a sapient creature in an unorthodox scientific ...
'' (1931). ''Frankenstein'' also proved to be a hit for Universal which led to both ''Dracula'' and ''Frankenstein'' making film stars of their leads:
Bela Lugosi
Béla Ferenc Dezső Blaskó (; October 20, 1882 – August 16, 1956), known professionally as Bela Lugosi (; ), was a Hungarian and American actor best remembered for portraying Count Dracula in the 1931 horror classic ''Dracula'', Ygor in ''S ...
and
Boris Karloff
William Henry Pratt (23 November 1887 – 2 February 1969), better known by his stage name Boris Karloff (), was an English actor. His portrayal of Frankenstein's monster in the horror film '' Frankenstein'' (1931) (his 82nd film) established ...
respectively. Karloff starred in Universal's follow-up ''
The Mummy
A mummy is an unusually well preserved corpse.
Mummy or The Mummy may also refer to:
Places
*Mummy Range, a mountain range in the Rocky Mountains of northern Colorado in the United States
*Mummy Cave, a rock shelter and archeological site in Par ...
'' (1932), which Newman described as the studio knowing "what they were getting" patterning the film close to the plot of ''Dracula''. Lugosi and Karloff would star together in several Poe-adaptations in the 1930s.
Following the release of ''Dracula'', ''
The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'' declared the film's box office success led to a cycle of similar films while ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' stated in a 1936 overview that ''Dracula'' and the arrival of
sound film
A sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades passed before ...
began the "real triumph of these spectral thrillers". Other studios began developing their own horror projects with
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded on April 17, 1924 ...
,
Paramount Pictures, and
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Warner Bros. or abbreviated as WB) is an American film and entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California, and a subsidiary of Warner Bros. D ...
Universal would also follow-up with several horror films until the mid-1930s.
In 1935, the President of the BBFC
Edward Shortt
Edward Shortt, KC (10 March 1862 – 10 November 1935) was a British lawyer and Liberal Party politician. He served as a member of David Lloyd George's cabinet, most significantly as Home Secretary from 1919 to 1922.
Background and educatio ...
, wrote "although a separate category has been established for these
orrificfilms, I am sorry to learn they are on the increase...I hope that the producers and renters will accept this word of warning, and discourage this type of subject as far as possible." As the United Kingdom was a significant market for Hollywood, American producers listened to Shortt's warning, and the number of Hollywood produced horror films decreased in 1936. A trade paper ''
Variety
Variety may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats
* Variety (radio)
* Variety show, in theater and television
Films
* ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont
* ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
'' reported that
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures (legally Universal City Studios LLC, also known as Universal Studios, or simply Universal; common metonym: Uni, and formerly named Universal Film Manufacturing Company and Universal-International Pictures Inc.) is an Americ ...
abandonment of horror films after the release of ''
Dracula's Daughter
''Dracula's Daughter'' is a 1936 American vampire film, vampire horror film produced by Universal Pictures as a sequel to the 1931 film ''Dracula (1931 English-language film), Dracula''. Directed by Lambert Hillyer from a screenplay by Garrett F ...
'' (1936) was that "European countries, especially England are prejudiced against this type product ." At the end of the decade, a profitable re-release of ''Dracula'' and ''Frankenstein'' would encourage Universal to produce ''
Son of Frankenstein
''Son of Frankenstein'' is a 1939 American horror film that was directed by Rowland V. Lee and stars Basil Rathbone, Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. The film is the third in Universal Pictures' ''Frankenstein'' series and is the follow-up to the ...
'' (1939) featuring both Lugosi and Karloff, starting off a resurgence of the horror film that would continue into the mid-1940s.
1940s
![Cat People (1942 poster)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/Cat_People_%281942_poster%29.jpg)
After the success of ''Son of Frankenstein'' (1939), Universal's horror films received what author Rick Worland of ''The Horror Film'' called "a second wind" and horror films continued to be produced at a feverish pace into the mid-1940s. Universal looked into their 1930s horror properties to develop new follow-ups such in their ''
The Invisible Man
''The Invisible Man'' is a science fiction novel by H. G. Wells. Originally serialized in '' Pearson's Weekly'' in 1897, it was published as a novel the same year. The Invisible Man to whom the title refers is Griffin, a scientist who has devo ...
'' and ''
The Mummy
A mummy is an unusually well preserved corpse.
Mummy or The Mummy may also refer to:
Places
*Mummy Range, a mountain range in the Rocky Mountains of northern Colorado in the United States
*Mummy Cave, a rock shelter and archeological site in Par ...
'' series. Universal saw potential in making actor
Lon Chaney, Jr.
Creighton Tull Chaney (February10, 1906 – July12, 1973), known by his stage name Lon Chaney Jr., was an American actor known for playing Larry Talbot in the film '' The Wolf Man'' (1941) and its various crossovers, Count Alucard (Dra ...
a new star to replace Karloff as Chaney had not distinguished himself in either A or B pictures. Chaney, Jr. would become a horror star for the decade showing in the films in ''
The Wolf Man'' series, portraying several of Universal's monster characters. B-Picture studios also developed films that imitated the style of Universal's horror output. Karloff worked with
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the mu ...
acting in various films as a "
Mad doctor
The mad scientist (also mad doctor or mad professor) is a stock character of a scientist who is perceived as " mad, bad and dangerous to know" or "insane" owing to a combination of unusual or unsettling personality traits and the unabashedly amb ...
"-type characters starting with ''
The Man They Could Not Hang
''The Man They Could Not Hang'' is a 1939 American horror film directed by Nick Grinde from a screenplay by Karl Brown. It stars Boris Karloff as Dr. Henryk Savaard,Stephen Jacobs, ''Boris Karloff: More Than a Monster'', Tomahawk Press 2011 pp. ...
'' (1939) while Lugosi worked between Universal and
poverty row
Poverty Row is a slang term used to refer to Hollywood films produced from the 1920s to the 1950s by small (and mostly short-lived) B movie studios. Although many of them were based on (or near) today's Gower Street in Hollywood, the term did ...
studios such as
Producers Releasing Corporation
Producers Releasing Corporation was the smallest and least prestigious of the Hollywood film studios of the 1940s. It was considered a prime example of what was called "Poverty Row": a low-rent stretch of Gower Street in Hollywood where shoest ...
(PRC) for ''
The Devil Bat
''The Devil Bat'' is a 1940 black-and-white American horror/howcatchem film produced by Producers Releasing Corporation (PRC) and directed by Jean Yarborough. The film stars Bela Lugosi along with Suzanne Kaaren, Guy Usher, Yolande Mallott and ...
'' (1941) and Monogram for nine features films.
In March 1942, producer
Val Lewton
Val Lewton (May 7, 1904 – March 14, 1951) was a Russian-American novelist, film producer and screenwriter best known for a string of low-budget horror films he produced for RKO Pictures in the 1940s. His son, also named Val Lewton, was a pain ...
ended his working relationship with independent producer
David O. Selznick to work for
RKO Radio Pictures
RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, was an American film production and distribution company, one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orph ...
'
Charles Koerner
Charles Koerner (September 10, 1896 – February 2, 1946) was an American film executive, best known for being executive vice president over production at RKO Pictures from 1942 to 1946.
Koerner is best remembered for firing Orson Welles fr ...
, becoming the head of a new unit created to develop
B-movie horror feature films. According to screenwriter
DeWitt Bodeen and director
Jacques Tourneur
Jacques Tourneur (; November 12, 1904 – December 19, 1977) was a French film director known for the classic film noir ''Out of the Past'' and a series of low-budget horror films he made for RKO Studios, including ''Cat People (1942 film), Cat ...
, Lewton's first horror production ''
Cat People'' (1942), Lewton wanted to make some different from the Universal horror with Tourneu describing it as making "something intelligent and in good taste". Lewton developed a series of horror films for RKO, described by Newman as "polished, doom-haunted, poetic" while film critic
Roger Ebert the films Lewton produced in the 1940s were "landmark
in American movie history". Several horror films of the 1940s borrowed from ''Cat People'', specifically feature a female character who fears that she has inherited the tendency to turn into a monster or attempt to replicate the shadowy visual style of the film. Between 1947 and 1951, Hollywood made almost no new horror films. This was due to sharply declining sales, leading to both major and
poverty row
Poverty Row is a slang term used to refer to Hollywood films produced from the 1920s to the 1950s by small (and mostly short-lived) B movie studios. Although many of them were based on (or near) today's Gower Street in Hollywood, the term did ...
studios to re-release their older horror films during this period rather than make new ones.
1950s
The early 1950s featured only a few gothic horror films developed, prior to the release of
Hammer Film Productions
Hammer Film Productions Ltd. is a British film production company based in London. Founded in 1934, the company is best known for a series of Gothic horror and fantasy films made from the mid-1950s until the 1970s. Many of these involve class ...
's gothic films, Hammer originally began developing American-styled science fiction films in the early 1950s but later branched into horror with their colour films ''
The Curse of Frankenstein
''The Curse of Frankenstein'' is a 1957 British horror film by Hammer Film Productions, loosely based on the 1818 novel '' Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus '' by Mary Shelley. It was Hammer's first colour horror film, and the first of t ...
'' and ''
Dracula'' (1958). These films would birth two horror film stars:
Christopher Lee and
Peter Cushing
Peter Wilton Cushing (26 May 1913 – 11 August 1994) was an English actor. His acting career spanned over six decades and included appearances in more than 100 films, as well as many television, stage, and radio roles. He achieved recognition ...
and led to further horror film production from Hammer in the decade.
Among the most influential horror films of the 1950s was ''
The Thing From Another World
''The Thing from Another World'', sometimes referred to as just ''The Thing'', is a 1951 American black-and-white science fiction-horror film, directed by Christian Nyby, produced by Edward Lasker for Howard Hawks' Winchester Pictures Corporati ...
'' (1951), with Newman stating that countless science fiction horror films of the 1950s would follow in its style. For five years following the release of ''The Thing From Another World'', nearly every film involving aliens, dinosaurs or radioactive mutants would be dealt with matter-of-fact characters as seen in the film. Films featuring vampires, werewolves, and Frankenstein's monster also took to having science fiction elements of the era such as have characters have similar plot elements from ''Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde''. Horror films also expanded further into international productions in the later half of the 1950s, with films in the genre being made in Mexico, Italy, Germany and France.
1960s
The horror film changed dramatically in 1960, specifically, with
Alfred Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock (13 August 1899 – 29 April 1980) was an English filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema. In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 featur ...
's film ''
Psycho'' (1960) based on the novel by
Robert Bloch. Newman declared that the film elevated the idea of a multiple-personality serial killer that set the tone future film that was only touched upon in earlier melodramas and ''
film noirs''. The release of ''Psycho'' led to similar pictures about the psychosis of characters and a brief reappearance of what Newman described as "stately, tasteful" horror films such as
Jack Clayton
Jack Isaac Clayton (1 March 1921 – 26 February 1995) was a British film director and producer who specialised in bringing literary works to the screen.
Overview
Starting out as a teenage studio "tea boy" in 1935, Clayton worked his way up ...
's ''
The Innocents'' (1961) and
Robert Wise
Robert Earl Wise (September 10, 1914 – September 14, 2005) was an American film director, producer, and editor. He won the Academy Awards for Best Director and Best Picture for his musical films ''West Side Story'' (1961) and ''The Sound of ...
's ''
The Haunting'' (1963). Newman described
Roman Polanski
Raymond Roman Thierry Polański , group=lower-alpha, name=note_a ( né Liebling; 18 August 1933) is a French-Polish film director, producer, screenwriter, and actor. He is the recipient of numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, tw ...
's ''
Rosemary's Baby'' (1968) the other "event" horror film of the 1960s after ''Psycho''.
Roger Corman
Roger William Corman (born April 5, 1926) is an American film director, producer, and actor. He has been called "The Pope of Pop Cinema" and is known as a trailblazer in the world of independent film. Many of Corman's films are based on works t ...
working with AIP to make ''
House of Usher'' (1960), which led several future Poe-adaptations other 1960s Poe-adaptations by Corman, and provided roles for aging horror stars such as Karloff and Chaney, Jr. These films were made to compete with the British colour horror films from Hammer in the United Kingdom featuring their horror stars Cushing and Fisher, whose ''
Frankenstein
''Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' is an 1818 novel written by English author Mary Shelley. ''Frankenstein'' tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a sapient creature in an unorthodox scientific ...
'' series continued from 1958 to 1973 Competition for Hammer appeared in the mid-1960s in the United Kingdom with
Amicus Productions
Amicus Productions was a British film production company, based at Shepperton Studios, England, active between 1962 and 1977. It was founded by American producers and screenwriters Milton Subotsky and Max Rosenberg.
Films
Prior to establish ...
who also made feature film featuring Cushing and Lee. Like ''Psycho'', Amicus drew from contemporary sources such as Bloch (''
The Skull
''The Skull'' is a 1965 British horror film directed by Freddie Francis for Amicus Productions, and starring the frequently paired horror actors Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee, alongside Patrick Wymark, Jill Bennett, Nigel Green, P ...
'' (1965) and ''
Torture Garden'' (1967)) led to Hammer adapting works by more authors from the era.
Mario Bava
Mario Bava (31 July 1914 – 27 April 1980) was an Italian filmmaker who worked variously as a director, cinematographer, special effects artist and screenwriter, frequently referred to as the "Master of Italian Horror" and the "Master of the M ...
's ''
Black Sunday'' (1960) marked an increase in onscreen violence in film. Earlier British horror films had their gorier scenes cut on initial release or suggested through narration while ''Psycho'' suggested its violence through fast editing. ''Black Sunday'', by contrast, depicted violence without suggestion. This level of violence would later be seen in other works of Bava and other Italian films such the ''
giallo
In Italian cinema, ''Giallo'' (; plural ''gialli'', from ''giallo'', Italian for yellow) is a genre of mystery fiction and thrillers that often contains slasher, crime fiction, psychological thriller, psychological horror, sexploitation, and, ...
'' of
Dario Argento
Dario Argento (; born 7 September 1940) is an Italian film director, producer, screenwriter, actor and critic. His influential work in the horror genre during the 1970s and 1980s, particularly in the subgenre known as ''giallo'', has led him ...
and
Lucio Fulci
Lucio Fulci (; 17 June 1927 – 13 March 1996) was an Italian film director, screenwriter, and actor. Although he worked in a wide array of genres through a career spanning nearly five decades, including comedies and Spaghetti Westerns, he ga ...
. Other independent American productions of the 1960s expanded on the gore shown in the films in a genre later described as the
splatter film
A splatter film is a subgenre of horror films that deliberately focuses on graphic portrayals of wikt:gore, gore and graphic violence. These films, usually through the use of special effects, display a fascination with the vulnerability of the h ...
, with films by
Herschell Gordon Lewis
Herschell Gordon Lewis (June 15, 1926 – September 26, 2016) was an American filmmaker, best known for creating the " splatter" subgenre of horror films. He is often called the "Godfather of Gore" (a title also given to Lucio Fulci), though hi ...
such as ''
Blood Feast
''Blood Feast'' is a 1963 American splatter film. It was composed, shot, and directed by Herschell Gordon Lewis, written by Allison Louise Downe from an idea by Lewis and David F. Freidman, and stars Mal Arnold, William Kerwin, Connie Mason, ...
'', while Newman found that the true breakthrough of these independent films was
George A. Romero
George Andrew Romero (; February 4, 1940 – July 16, 2017) was an American-Canadian filmmaker, writer, editor and actor. His ''Night of the Living Dead'' series of films about an imagined zombie apocalypse began with the 1968 film of the ...
's ''
Night of the Living Dead
''Night of the Living Dead'' is a 1968 American independent horror film directed, photographed, and edited by George A. Romero, with a screenplay by John Russo and Romero, and starring Duane Jones and Judith O'Dea. The story follows seven pe ...
'' (1968) which set a new attitudes for the horror film, one that was suspicious of authority figures, broke taboos of society and was satirical between its more suspenseful set pieces.
1970s
![Zombies NightoftheLivingDead](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/56/Zombies_NightoftheLivingDead.jpg)
Historian John Kenneth Muir described the 1970s as a "truly eclectic time" for horror cinema, noting a mixture of fresh and more personal efforts on film while other were a resurrection of older characters that have appeared since the 1930s and 1940s. ''Night of the Living Dead'' had what Newman described as a "slow burning influence" on horror films of the era and what he described as "the first of the genre auteurs" who worked outside studio settings. These included American directors such as
John Carpenter
John Howard Carpenter (born January 16, 1948) is an American filmmaker, actor, and composer. Although he worked in various film genres, he is most commonly associated with horror, action, and science fiction films of the 1970s and 1980s. He ...
,
Tobe Hooper
Willard Tobe Hooper (; January 25, 1943 – August 26, 2017) was an American director, screenwriter, and producer best known for his work in the horror genre. The British Film Institute cited Hooper as one of the most influential horror fi ...
,
Wes Craven
Wesley Earl Craven (August 2, 1939 – August 30, 2015) was an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and editor. Craven has commonly been recognized as one of the greatest masters of the horror genre due to the cultural imp ...
and
Brian De Palma
Brian Russell De Palma (born September 11, 1940) is an American film director and screenwriter. With a career spanning over 50 years, he is best known for his work in the suspense, crime and psychological thriller genres. De Palma was a leading ...
as well as directors working outside America such as
Bob Clark,
David Cronenberg and
Dario Argento
Dario Argento (; born 7 September 1940) is an Italian film director, producer, screenwriter, actor and critic. His influential work in the horror genre during the 1970s and 1980s, particularly in the subgenre known as ''giallo'', has led him ...
. Prior to ''Night of the Living Dead'', the monsters of horror films could easily be banished or defeated by the end of the film, while Romero's film and the films of other filmmakers would often suggest other horror still lingered after the credits.
Both Amicus and Hammer ceased feature film production in the 1970s. Remakes of proved to be popular choices for horror films in the 1970s, with films like ''
Invasion of the Bodysnatchers'' (1978) and tales based on ''Dracula'' which continued into the late 1970s with
John Badham
John MacDonald Badham (born August 25, 1939) is an English television and film director, best known for his films ''Saturday Night Fever'' (1977), ''Dracula'' (1979), ''Blue Thunder'' (1983), ''WarGames'' (1983), ''Short Circuit'' (1986), and ...
's ''
Dracula'' (1979) and
Werner Herzog
Werner Herzog (; born 5 September 1942) is a German film director, screenwriter, author, actor, and opera director, regarded as a pioneer of New German Cinema. His films often feature ambitious protagonists with impossible dreams, people with u ...
's ''
Nosferatu the Vampyre
''Nosferatu the Vampyre'' (german: Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht, lit=Nosferatu: Phantom of the Night) is a 1979 horror film written and directed by Werner Herzog. It is set primarily in 19th-century Wismar, Germany and Transylvania, and was conce ...
'' (1979). Although not an official remake, the last high-grossing horror film of decade, ''
Alien
Alien primarily refers to:
* Alien (law), a person in a country who is not a national of that country
** Enemy alien, the above in times of war
* Extraterrestrial life, life which does not originate from Earth
** Specifically, intelligent extrater ...
'' (1979) took b-movie elements from films like ''
It! The Terror from Beyond Space
''It! The Terror from Beyond Space'' is an independently made 1958 American science fiction horror film, produced by Robert Kent, directed by Edward L. Cahn, that stars Marshall Thompson, Shawn Smith (Shirley Patterson), and Kim Spalding. The ...
'' (1958). Newman has suggested high grossing films like ''Alien'', ''
Jaws
Jaws or Jaw may refer to:
Anatomy
* Jaw, an opposable articulated structure at the entrance of the mouth
** Mandible, the lower jaw
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Jaws (James Bond), a character in ''The Spy Who Loved Me'' and ''Moonraker''
* ...
'' (1975) and ''
Halloween'' (1978) became hits by being "relentless suspense machines with high visual sophistication." He continued that ''Jaws'' memorable
music theme and its monster not being product of society like
Norman Bates
Norman Bates is a fictional character created by American author Robert Bloch as the main antagonist in his 1959 thriller novel '' Psycho''. He has an alter, Mother, who takes from the form of his abusive mother, and later victim, Norma, wh ...
in ''Psycho'' had carried over into ''Halloween''s
Michael Myers and its films theme music.
1980s
With the appearance of home video in the 1980s, horror films were subject to
censorship
Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or "inconvenient". Censorship can be conducted by governments ...
in the United Kingdom in a phenomenon popularly known as "
video nasties
Video nasty is a colloquial term popularised by the National Viewers' and Listeners' Association (NVALA) in the United Kingdom to refer to a number of films, typically low-budget horror or exploitation films, distributed on video cassette that ...
", leading to video collections being seized by police and some people being jailed for selling or owning some horror films. Newman described the response to the video nasty issue led to horror films becoming "dumber than the previous decade" and although films were not less gory, they were "more lightweight
..becoming more disposable, less personal works." Newman noted that these directors who created original material in the 1970s such as Carpenter,
David Cronenberg, and
Tobe Hooper
Willard Tobe Hooper (; January 25, 1943 – August 26, 2017) was an American director, screenwriter, and producer best known for his work in the horror genre. The British Film Institute cited Hooper as one of the most influential horror fi ...
would all at least briefly "play it safe" with
Stephen King adaptations or remakes of the 1950s horror material.
Replacing Frankenstein's monster and Dracula were new popular characters with more general names like
Jason Voorhees
Jason Voorhees () is a character from the ''Friday the 13th'' series. He first appeared in '' Friday the 13th'' (1980) as the young son of camp-cook-turned-killer Mrs. Voorhees, in which he was portrayed by Ari Lehman. Created by Victor Mi ...
(''
Friday the 13th''),
Michael Myers (''
Halloween''), and
Freddy Kruger (''
A Nightmare on Elm Street
''A Nightmare on Elm Street'' is a 1984 American supernatural slasher film written and directed by Wes Craven and produced by Robert Shaye. It is the first installment in the ''A Nightmare on Elm Street'' franchise and stars Heather Langenka ...
''). Unlike the characters of the past who were vampires or created by mad scientists, these characters were seemingly people with common sounding names who developed the
slasher film
A slasher film is a genre of horror films involving a killer stalking and murdering a group of people, usually by use of bladed or sharp tools like knife, chainsaw, scalpel, etc. Although the term "slasher" may occasionally be used informally as ...
genre of the era. The genre was derided by several contemporary film critics of the era such as
Roger Ebert, and often were highly profitable in the box office. The 1980s highlighted several films about body transformation, through special effects and make-up artists like
Rob Bottin
Robin R. Bottin (born April 1, 1959) is an American special make-up effects creator. Known for his collaborations with directors John Carpenter, Paul Verhoeven and David Fincher, Bottin worked with Carpenter on both '' The Fog'' and '' The Th ...
and
Rick Baker
Richard A. Baker (born December 8, 1950), known professionally as Rick Baker, is an American retired special make-up effects creator and actor. He is mostly known for his creature designs and effects. Baker won the Academy Award for Best Make ...
who allowed for more detailed and graphic transformation scenes or the human body in various forms of horrific transformation.
Other more traditional styles continued into the 1980s, such as supernatural themed films involving haunted houses, ghosts, and demonic possession. Among the most popular films of the style included
Stanley Kubrick's ''
The Shining'' (1980), Hooper's high-grossing ''
Poltergeist'' (1982). After the release of films based on
Stephen King's books like ''The Shining'' and ''Carrie'' led to further film adaptations of his novels throughout the 1980s.
1990s
![2019-10-18 Q&A The Blair Witch Project](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cb/2019-10-18_Q%26A_The_Blair_Witch_Project.jpg)
Horror films of the 1990s also failed to develop as many major new directors of the genre as it had in the 1960s or 1970s. Young independent filmmakers such as
Kevin Smith
Kevin Patrick Smith (born August 2, 1970) is an American filmmaker, actor, comedian, comic book writer, author, YouTuber, and podcaster. He came to prominence with the low-budget comedy buddy film '' Clerks'' (1994), which he wrote, directed, ...
,
Richard Linklater,
Michael Moore and
Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Jerome Tarantino (; born March 27, 1963) is an American film director, writer, producer, and actor. His films are characterized by stylized violence, extended dialogue, profanity, dark humor, non-linear storylines, cameos, ensembl ...
broke into cinema outside the genre at non-genre festivals like the
Sundance Film Festival. Newman noted that the early 1990s was "not a good time for horror", noting excessive release of sequels. Muir commented that in the 1990s after the end of the
Cold War, the United States did not really have a "serious enemy" internationally, leading to horror films adapting to fictional enemies predominantly within America, with the American government, large businesses, organized religion and the upper class as well as supernatural and occult items such as vampires or Satanists filling in the horror villains of the 1990s. The rapid growth of technology in the 1990s with the internet and the fears of the
Year 2000 problem
The year 2000 problem, also known as the Y2K problem, Y2K scare, millennium bug, Y2K bug, Y2K glitch, Y2K error, or simply Y2K refers to potential computer errors related to the formatting and storage of calendar data for dates in and after ...
causing the end of the world were reflected in plots of films.
Other genre-based trends of the 1990s, included the
post-modern
Postmodernism is an intellectual stance or mode of discourseNuyen, A.T., 1992. The Role of Rhetorical Devices in Postmodernist Discourse. Philosophy & Rhetoric, pp.183–194. characterized by skepticism toward the " grand narratives" of moderni ...
horror films such as ''
Scream
Scream may refer to:
*Screaming, a loud vocalization
Amusement rides
* Scream (Heide Park), a gyro drop tower in Soltau, Germany
* Scream! (ride), a tower ride at Six Flags Fiesta Texas and Six Flags New England
* Scream! (roller coaster), at ...
'' (1996) were made in this era. Post-modern horror films continued into the 2000s, eventually just being released as humorous parody films. By the end of the 1990s, three films were released that Newman described as "cultural phenomenons." These included
Hideo Nakata
is a Japanese filmmaker.
Life and career
Nakata was born in Okayama, Japan. He is most familiar to Western audiences for his work on Japanese horror films such as '' Ring'' (1998), ''Ring 2'' (1999) and '' Dark Water'' (2002). Several of these ...
's ''
Ring
Ring may refer to:
* Ring (jewellery), a round band, usually made of metal, worn as ornamental jewelry
* To make a sound with a bell, and the sound made by a bell
:(hence) to initiate a telephone connection
Arts, entertainment and media Film and ...
'' (1998), which was the major hit across Asia, ''
The Sixth Sense
''The Sixth Sense'' is a 1999 American psychological thriller film written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan. It stars Bruce Willis as a child psychologist whose patient ( Haley Joel Osment) claims he can see and talk to the dead.
Released ...
'', another ghost story which Newman described as making "an instant cliche" of
twist endings, and the low-budget independent film ''
The Blair Witch Project
''The Blair Witch Project'' is a 1999 American supernatural horror film written, directed and edited by Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez. It is a fictional story of three student filmmakers—Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams, and Josh ...
'' (1999). Newman described the first trend of horror films in the 2000s followed the success of ''The Blair Witch Project'', but predominantly parodies or similar low-budget imitations.
2000s
Teen oriented series began in the era with ''
Final Destination
''Final Destination'' is an American horror franchise that includes five films, two comic books, and nine novels. It is based on an unproduced spec script by Jeffrey Reddick, originally written for ''The X-Files'' television series, and was ...
'' while the success of
the 1999 remake of William Castle's ''House on Haunted Hill'' led to a series of remakes in the decade. The popularity of the remake of ''
Dawn of the Dead'' (2004) led to a revival in American
zombie film
A zombie film is a film genre. Zombies are fictional creatures usually portrayed as reanimated corpses or virally infected human beings. They are commonly portrayed as cannibalistic in nature. While zombie films generally fall into the horror ...
s in the late 2000s. Beyond remakes, other long-dormant horror franchises such as ''
The Exorcist
''The Exorcist'' is a 1973 American supernatural horror film directed by William Friedkin and written for the screen by William Peter Blatty, based on his 1971 novel of the same name. It stars Ellen Burstyn, Max von Sydow, Lee J. Cobb, Kitty ...
'' and ''
Friday the 13th'' received new feature films. After the success of ''Ring'' (1998), several films came from Hong Kong,
South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...
,
Thailand
Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
, and
Japan
Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...
with similar detective plotlines investigating
ghosts. This trend was echoed in the West with films with similar plots and Hollywood remakes of Asian films like ''
The Ring'' (2002). In the United Kingdom, there was what Newman described as a "modest revival" of British horror films, first with war-related horror films and several independent films of various styles, with Newman describing the "breakouts of the new British horror" including ''
28 Days Later
''28 Days Later'' is a 2002 British post-apocalyptic horror film directed by Danny Boyle and written by Alex Garland. It stars Cillian Murphy as a bicycle courier who awakens from a coma to discover the accidental release of a highly contagiou ...
'' (2002) and ''
Shaun of the Dead
''Shaun of the Dead'' is a 2004 zombie comedy film directed by Edgar Wright and written by Wright and Simon Pegg. Pegg stars as Shaun, a downtrodden salesman in London who is caught in a zombie apocalypse with his friend Ed ( Nick Frost). The ...
'' (2004).
David Edelstein
David Edelstein (born 1959) is a freelance American film critic who has been the principal film critic for ''Slate'' and ''New York'' magazine, among others, and has appeared regularly on NPR's ''Fresh Air'' and ''CBS Sunday Morning'' programs. O ...
of ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' coined a term for a genre he described as "
torture porn
A splatter film is a subgenre of horror films that deliberately focuses on graphic portrayals of wikt:gore, gore and graphic violence. These films, usually through the use of special effects, display a fascination with the vulnerability of the h ...
" in a 2006 article, as a label for films described, often retroactively, to over 40 films since 2003. Edelstein lumped in films such as ''
Saw
A saw is a tool consisting of a tough blade, wire, or chain with a hard toothed edge. It is used to cut through material, very often wood, though sometimes metal or stone. The cut is made by placing the toothed edge against the material and mov ...
'' (2004) and ''
Wolf Creek'' (2005) under this banner suggesting audience a "titillating and shocking" while film scholars of early 21st century horror films described them as "intense bodily acts and visible bodily representations" to produce uneasy reactions. Kevin Wetmore, using the ''
Saw
A saw is a tool consisting of a tough blade, wire, or chain with a hard toothed edge. It is used to cut through material, very often wood, though sometimes metal or stone. The cut is made by placing the toothed edge against the material and mov ...
'' film series suggested these film suggested reflected a
post-9/11
The post-9/11 period is the time after the September 11 attacks, characterized by heightened suspicion of non-Americans in the United States, increased government efforts to address terrorism, and a more aggressive American foreign policy.
Pol ...
attitude towards increasing pessimism, specifically one of "no redemption, no hope, no expectations that 'we're going to be OK'"
2010s to present
After the film studio
Blumhouse
Blumhouse Productions (; also known as BH Productions or simply BH) is an American film and television production company founded in 2000 by Jason Blum.
It is known mainly for producing horror films, such as ''Paranormal Activity'', ''Insidiou ...
had success with ''Paranormal Activity'' (2007), the studio continued to produce films became hits in the 2010s with film series ''
Insidious
Insidious may refer to:
* ''Insidious'' (film series), a horror film series consisting of the films listed below
** ''Insidious'' (film), a 2010 American supernatural horror film
** '' Insidious: Chapter 2'', a 2013 sequel
** '' Insidious: Chapt ...
''. This led to what Newman described as the companies policy on "commercial savvy with thematic risk that has often paid off", such as ''
Get Out
''Get Out'' is a 2017 American psychological horror film written, co-produced, and directed by Jordan Peele in his directorial debut. It stars Daniel Kaluuya, Allison Williams, Lil Rel Howery, LaKeith Stanfield, Bradley Whitford, Caleb Land ...
'' (2017) and series like ''
The Purge
''The Purge'' is an American anthology media franchise centered on a series of dystopian action horror films distributed by Universal Pictures and produced by Blumhouse Productions and Platinum Dunes, which are written and in some cases also ...
''. Laura Bradley in her article for ''
Vanity Fair'' noted that both large and small film studios began noticing Blumhouse's success, including
A24
A24 is an American independent entertainment company that specializes in film and television production, as well as film distribution. It is based in New York City.
A24 was founded in 2012 by Daniel Katz, David Fenkel and John Hodges. Pr ...
, which became popular with films like ''
The Witch
A witch is a practitioner of witchcraft.
Witch, WITCH, or variations thereof may also refer to:
Animals
* Witch (lefteye flounder) (''Arnoglossus scapha''), a Pacific flatfish
* Witch (righteye flounder) (''Glyptocephalus cynoglossus''), a Euro ...
'' (2015) and ''
Midsommar
''Midsommar'' is a 2019 folk horror film written and directed by Ari Aster. The film stars Florence Pugh and Jack Reynor as a dysfunctional couple who travel to Sweden with a group of friends for a midsummer festival, only to find themselv ...
'' (2019). Bradley commented how some of these films had been classified as "
elevated horror", a term used for works that were 'elevated' beyond traditional or pure genre films, but declared "horror aficionados and some critics pushed back against the notion that these films are doing something entirely new" noting their roots in films like ''
Night of the Living Dead
''Night of the Living Dead'' is a 1968 American independent horror film directed, photographed, and edited by George A. Romero, with a screenplay by John Russo and Romero, and starring Duane Jones and Judith O'Dea. The story follows seven pe ...
'' (1968) and ''
Rosemary's Baby'' (1968). The increase in use of
streaming services in the 2010s has also been suggested as boosting the popularity of horror; as well as
Netflix
Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fi ...
and
Amazon Prime Video producing and distributing numerous works in the genre,
Shudder
Shudder may refer to:
*Shivering
* ''Shudder'' (album), a 2008 album by American band Bayside
*Shudder (streaming service)
Shudder is an American over-the-top subscription video on demand service featuring horror, thriller and supernatural fic ...
launched in 2015 as a horror-specific service. In the early 2010s, a wave of horror films began exhibiting what Virginie Sélavy described as
psychedelic tendency. This was inspired by experimentation and subgenres of the 1970s, specifically
folk horror
Folk horror is a subgenre of horror film that uses elements of folklore to invoke fear and foreboding. Typical elements include a rural setting, isolation, and themes of superstition, folk religion, paganism, sacrifice and the dark aspects of natu ...
. The trend began with ''
Enter the Void
''Enter the Void'' is a 2009 English-language experimental art film written and directed by Gaspar Noé and starring Nathaniel Brown, Paz de la Huerta, and Cyril Roy. It is a psychological drama fantasy film set in the neon-lit nightclub env ...
'' (2009) and ''
Beyond the Black Rainbow
''Beyond the Black Rainbow'' is a 2010 Canadian science fiction horror film written and directed by Panos Cosmatos in his feature film debut. It stars Michael Rogers and Eva Allan.
''Beyond the Black Rainbow'' was distributed by Mongrel Media ...
'' (2010) and continued throughout the decade with films like ''
Climax'' (2018).
Adapted from the
Stephen King novel, ''
It'' (2017) set a
box office record for horror films by grossing $123.1 million on opening weekend in the United States and nearly $185 million globally. The success of ''It'' led to further King novels being adapted into new feature films. The beginning of 2020 and the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...
had a
major impact on the film industry, leading to several horror films being held back from release, or having their production halted. During
lockdowns
A lockdown is a restriction policy for people, community or a country to stay where they are, usually due to specific risks (such as COVID-19) that could possibly harm the people if they move and interact freely.
The term is used for a prison ...
, streaming for films featuring a fictional apocalypse increased.
Sub-genres of horror films
Horror is a malleable genre and often can be altered to accommodate other genre types such as
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel uni ...
, making some films difficult to categorize.
Body horror
A genre that emerged in the 1970s, body horror films focus on the process of a bodily transformation. In these films, the body is either engulfed by some larger process or heading towards fragmentation and collapse. In these films, the focus can be on apocalyptic implication of an entire society being overtaken, but the focus is generally upon an individual and their sense of identity, primarily them watching their own body change. The earliest appearance of the sub-genre was the work of director
David Cronenberg, specifically with early films like ''
Shivers'' (1975). Mark Jancovich of the University of Manchester declared that the transformation scenes in the genre provoke fear and repulsion, but also pleasure and excitement such as in ''
The Thing'' (1982) and ''
The Fly'' (1986).
Comedy horror
Comedy horror combines elements of comedy and horror film. The comedy horror genre often crosses over with the
black comedy
Black comedy, also known as dark comedy, morbid humor, or gallows humor, is a style of comedy that makes light of subject matter that is generally considered taboo, particularly subjects that are normally considered serious or painful to discu ...
genre. It occasionally includes horror films with lower ratings that are aimed at a family audience. The short story ''
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
"The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" is a gothic story by American author Washington Irving, contained in his collection of 34 essays and short stories titled ''The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.'' Written while Irving was living abroad in Birm ...
'' by
Washington Irving
Washington Irving (April 3, 1783 – November 28, 1859) was an American short-story writer, essayist, biographer, historian, and diplomat of the early 19th century. He is best known for his short stories "Rip Van Winkle" (1819) and " The Legen ...
is cited as "the first great comedy-horror story".
Folk horror
Folk horror
Folk horror is a subgenre of horror film that uses elements of folklore to invoke fear and foreboding. Typical elements include a rural setting, isolation, and themes of superstition, folk religion, paganism, sacrifice and the dark aspects of natu ...
uses elements of
folklore
Folklore is shared by a particular group of people; it encompasses the traditions common to that culture, subculture or group. This includes oral traditions such as tales, legends, proverbs and jokes. They include material culture, rangin ...
or other
religious
Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatur ...
and cultural beliefs to instil fear in audiences. Folk horror films have featured
rural settings and themes of isolation, religion and nature.
Frequently cited examples are ''
Witchfinder General
Matthew Hopkins ( 1620 – 12 August 1647) was an English witch-hunter whose career flourished during the English Civil War. He claimed to hold the office of Witchfinder General, although that title was never bestowed by Parliament, a ...
'' (1968), ''
The Blood on Satan's Claw
''The Blood on Satan's Claw'' is a 1971 British supernatural horror film directed by Piers Haggard and starring Patrick Wymark, Linda Hayden, and Barry Andrews. Set in early 18th-century England, it follows the residents of a rural village w ...
'' (1971), ''
The Wicker Man
''The Wicker Man'' is a 1973 British folk horror film directed by Robin Hardy and starring Edward Woodward, Britt Ekland, Diane Cilento, Ingrid Pitt, and Christopher Lee. The screenplay by Anthony Shaffer, inspired by David Pinner's 1967 ...
'' (1973) and ''
Midsommar
''Midsommar'' is a 2019 folk horror film written and directed by Ari Aster. The film stars Florence Pugh and Jack Reynor as a dysfunctional couple who travel to Sweden with a group of friends for a midsummer festival, only to find themselv ...
'' (2019).
Local folklore and beliefs have been noted as being prevalent in horror films from the
Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of mainlan ...
region, including
Thailand
Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
and
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
.
Found footage horror
The
found footage horror film "technique" gives the audience a
first person view of the events on screen, and presents the footage as being discovered after. Horror films which are framed as being made up of "found-footage" merge the experiences of the audience and characters, which may induce suspense, shock, and bafflement.
Alexandra Heller-Nicholas noted that the popularity of sites like
YouTube
YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...
in 2006 sparked a taste for amateur media, leading to the production of further films in the found footage horror genre later in the 2000s including the particularly financially successful ''
Paranormal Activity
Paranormal events are purported phenomena described in popular culture, folk, and other non-scientific bodies of knowledge, whose existence within these contexts is described as being beyond the scope of normal scientific understanding. Not ...
'' (2007).
Gothic horror
In their book ''Gothic film'', Richard J. McRoy and Richard J. Hand stated that "Gothic" can be argued as a very loose subgenre of horror, but argued that "Gothic" as a whole was a style like ''
film noir'' and not bound to certain cinematic elements like the
Western
Western may refer to:
Places
*Western, Nebraska, a village in the US
*Western, New York, a town in the US
*Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia
*Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia
*Western world, countries that id ...
or
science fiction film. The term "gothic" is frequently used to describe a stylized approach to showcasing location, desire, and action in film. Contemporary views of the genre associate it with imagery of castles at hilltops and labyrinth like ancestral mansions that are in various states of disrepair. Narratives in these films often focus on an audiences fear and attraction to social change and rebellion. The genre can be applied to films as early as ''The Haunted Castle'' (1896), ''Frankenstein'' (1910) as well as to more complex iterations such as
Park Chan-wook
Park Chan-wook ( ; born 23 August 1963) is a South Korean film director, screenwriter, producer, and former film critic. He is considered as one of the most prominent filmmakers of South Korean cinema as well as world cinema in 21st century. ...
's ''
Stoker'' (2013) and
Jordan Peele's ''
Get Out
''Get Out'' is a 2017 American psychological horror film written, co-produced, and directed by Jordan Peele in his directorial debut. It stars Daniel Kaluuya, Allison Williams, Lil Rel Howery, LaKeith Stanfield, Bradley Whitford, Caleb Land ...
'' (2017).
The gothic style is applied to several films throughout the history of the horror film. This includes the Universal's horror films of the 1930s, the revival of gothic horror in the 1950s and 1960s with films from Hammer,
Roger Corman
Roger William Corman (born April 5, 1926) is an American film director, producer, and actor. He has been called "The Pope of Pop Cinema" and is known as a trailblazer in the world of independent film. Many of Corman's films are based on works t ...
's Poe-cycle, and several Italian productions. By the 1970s American and British productions often had vampire films set in a contemporary setting, such as Hammer Films had their ''Dracula'' stories set in a modern setting and made other horror material which pushed the erotic content of their vampire films that was initiated by ''Black Sunday''. In the 1980s, the older horror characters of Dracula and Frankenstein's monster rarely appeared, with vampire themed films continued often in the tradition of authors like
Anne Rice
Anne Rice (born Howard Allen Frances O'Brien; October 4, 1941 – December 11, 2021) was an American author of gothic fiction, erotic literature, and Christian literature.
She was best known for her series of novels '' The Vampire Chronicles''. ...
where vampirism becomes a lifestyle choice rather than plague or curse. Following the release of
Francis Ford Coppola's ''
Bram Stoker's Dracula'' (1992), a small wave of high-budgeted gothic horror romance films were released in the 1990s.
Natural horror
:
Also described as "eco-horror", the
natural horror film
Natural horror is a subgenre of horror films that features natural forces, typically in the form of animals or plants, that pose a threat to human characters.
Though killer animals in film have existed since the release of '' The Lost World'' in ...
is a subgenre "featuring nature running amok in the form of mutated beasts, carnivorous insects, and normally harmless animals or plants turned into cold-blooded killers."
In 1963, Hitchcock defined a new genre nature taking revenge on humanity with ''
The Birds'' (1963) that was expanded into a trend into the 1970s. Following the success of ''
Willard'' (1971), a film about killer rats, 1972 had similar films with ''
Stanley
Stanley may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
Film and television
* ''Stanley'' (1972 film), an American horror film
* ''Stanley'' (1984 film), an Australian comedy
* ''Stanley'' (1999 film), an animated short
* ''Stanley'' (1956 TV series) ...
'' (1972) and an official sequel ''
Ben
Ben is frequently used as a shortened version of the given names Benjamin, Benedict, Bennett or Benson, and is also a given name in its own right.
Ben (in he, בֶּן, ''son of'') forms part of Hebrew surnames, e.g. Abraham ben Abraham ( he, ...
'' (1972). Other films followed in suit such as ''
Night of the Lepus
''Night of the Lepus'' (also known as ''Rabbits'') is a 1972 American science fiction horror film directed by William F. Claxton and produced by A. C. Lyles. Based upon Russell Braddon's 1964 science fiction novel '' The Year of the Angry Rabbi ...
'' (1972), ''
Frogs
A frog is any member of a diverse and largely carnivorous group of short-bodied, tailless amphibians composing the order Anura (ανοὐρά, literally ''without tail'' in Ancient Greek). The oldest fossil "proto-frog" '' Triadobatrachus'' is ...
'' (1972), ''
Bug'' (1975), ''
Squirm
''Squirm'' is a 1976 American natural horror film written and directed by Jeff Lieberman, starring Don Scardino, Patricia Pearcy, R. A. Dow, Jean Sullivan, Peter MacLean, Fran Higgins and William Newman. The film takes place in the fictiona ...
'' (1976) and what Muir described as the "turning point" in the genre with ''
Jaws
Jaws or Jaw may refer to:
Anatomy
* Jaw, an opposable articulated structure at the entrance of the mouth
** Mandible, the lower jaw
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Jaws (James Bond), a character in ''The Spy Who Loved Me'' and ''Moonraker''
* ...
'' (1975), which became the highest-grossing film at that point and moved the animal attacks genres "towards a less-fantastic route" with less giant animals and more real-life creatures such as ''
Grizzly
The grizzly bear (''Ursus arctos horribilis''), also known as the North American brown bear or simply grizzly, is a population or subspecies of the brown bear inhabiting North America.
In addition to the mainland grizzly (''Ursus arctos horri ...
'' (1976) and ''
Night Creature'' (1977), ''
Orca
The orca or killer whale (''Orcinus orca'') is a toothed whale belonging to the oceanic dolphin family, of which it is the largest member. It is the only extant species in the genus '' Orcinus'' and is recognizable by its black-and-white ...
'' (1977), and ''
Jaws 2
''Jaws 2'' is a 1978 American thriller film directed by Jeannot Szwarc and co-written by Carl Gottlieb. It is the sequel to Steven Spielberg's ''Jaws'' (1975), and the second installment in the ''Jaws'' franchise. The film stars Roy Scheider a ...
'' (1978). The film is linked with the environmental movements that became more mainstream in the 1970s and early 1980s such
vegetarianism,
animal rights movements, and organizations such as
Greenpeace. Following ''Jaws'', sharks became the most popular animal of the genre, ranging from similar such as ''
Mako: The Jaws of Death'' (1976) and ''
Great White'' (1981) to the ''
Sharknado
''Sharknado'' is a 2013 American made-for-television science fiction comedy disaster film directed by Anthony C. Ferrante. It tells about a waterspout that lifts sharks out of the ocean and deposits them in Los Angeles. It is the first install ...
'' film series.
James Marriott found that the genre had "lost momentum" since the 1970s while the films would still be made towards the turn of the millennium.
Slasher film
The
slasher film
A slasher film is a genre of horror films involving a killer stalking and murdering a group of people, usually by use of bladed or sharp tools like knife, chainsaw, scalpel, etc. Although the term "slasher" may occasionally be used informally as ...
is a horror subgenre, which involving a killer murdering a group of people (usually teenagers), usually by use of bladed tools.
In his book on the genre, author Adam Rockoff that these villains represented a "rogue genre" of films with "tough, problematic, and fiercely individualistic." Following the financial success of ''
Friday the 13th'' (1980), at least 20 other slasher films appeared in 1980 alone. These films usually revolved around five properties: unique social settings (campgrounds, schools, holidays) and a crime from the past committed (an accidental drowning, infidelity, a scorned lover) and a ready made group of victims (camp counselors, students, wedding parties). The genre was derided by several contemporary film critics of the era such as Ebert, and often were highly profitable in the box office. The release of ''
Scream
Scream may refer to:
*Screaming, a loud vocalization
Amusement rides
* Scream (Heide Park), a gyro drop tower in Soltau, Germany
* Scream! (ride), a tower ride at Six Flags Fiesta Texas and Six Flags New England
* Scream! (roller coaster), at ...
'' (1996), led to a brief revival of the slasher films for the 1990s. Other countries imitated the American slasher film revival, such as South Korea's early 2000s cycle with ''
Bloody Beach'' (2000), ''
Nightmare'' (2000) and ''
The Record'' (2000).
Supernatural horror
Supernatural horror film
Supernatural horror film is a film genre that combines aspects of horror film and supernatural film. Supernatural occurrences in such films often include ghosts and demons, and many supernatural horror films have elements of religion. Common theme ...
s integrate
supernatural elements, such as the
afterlife,
spirit possession
Spirit possession is an unusual or altered state of consciousness and associated behaviors purportedly caused by the control of a human body by spirits, ghosts, demons, or gods. The concept of spirit possession exists in many cultures and re ...
and religion into the horror genre.
Teen horror
Teen horror is a horror subgenre that victimizes teenagers while usually promoting strong,
anti-conformity teenage leads, appealing to young generations. This subgenre often depicts themes of sex, under-aged drinking, and gore.
[Miller C, Van Riper A. Marketing, Monsters, and Music: Teensploitation Horror Films. Journal of American Culture erial online June 2015;38(2):130–141. Available from: Academic Search Complete, Ipswich, MA. Retrieved 21 March 2017.] Horror films aimed a young audience featuring teenage monsters grew popular in the 1950s with several productions from
American International Pictures
American International Pictures (AIP) is an American motion picture production label of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. In its original operating period, AIP was an independent film production and distribution company known for producing and releasing fi ...
(AIP) and productions of
Herman Cohen
Herman Cohen (August 27, 1925 – June 2, 2002) was an American producer of B-movies during the 1950s, and helped to popularize the teen horror movie genre with films like the cult classic ''I Was a Teenage Werewolf''.
Career
Born in Detroit, ...
with ''
I Was a Teenage Werewolf
''I Was a Teenage Werewolf'' is a 1957 horror film starring Michael Landon as a troubled teenager, Yvonne Lime and Whit Bissell. It was co-written and produced by cult film producer Herman Cohen and was one of the most successful films release ...
'' (1957) and ''
I Was a Teenage Frankenstein
''I Was a Teenage Frankenstein'' (U.K. title: ''Teenage Frankenstein'') is a film starring Whit Bissell, Phyllis Coates and Gary Conway, released by American International Pictures (AIP) in November 1957 as a double feature with '' Blood of Dra ...
'' (1957). This led to later productions like ''
Daughter of Dr. Jekyll'' (1957) and ''
Frankenstein's Daughter
''Frankenstein's Daughter'' is an independently made 1958 American black-and-white science fiction/ horror film drama, produced by Marc Frederic and George Fowley, directed by Richard E. Cunha, that stars John Ashley, Sandra Knight, Donald ...
'' (1958). Teen horror cycle in the 1980s often showcased explicit gore and nudity, with John Kenneth Muir described as cautionary conservative tales where most of the films stated if you partook in such vices such as drugs or sex, your punishment of death would be handed out.
Prior to ''Scream'', there were no popular teen horror films in the early 1990s. After the financial success of ''Scream'', teen horror films became increasingly reflexive and self-aware until the end of the 1990s with films like ''
I Know What You Did Last Summer
''I Know What You Did Last Summer'' is a 1997 American slasher film directed by Jim Gillespie, written by Kevin Williamson, and starring Jennifer Love Hewitt, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Ryan Phillippe and Freddie Prinze Jr. It is loosely base ...
'' (1997) and non-slasher ''
The Faculty
''The Faculty'' is a 1998 American science fiction horror film directed by Robert Rodriguez and written by Kevin Williamson. It stars Jordana Brewster, Clea DuVall, Laura Harris, Josh Hartnett, Shawn Hatosy, Famke Janssen, Piper Laurie, B ...
'' (1998). The genre lost prominence as teen films dealt with threats with more realism in films like ''
Donnie Darko
''Donnie Darko'' is a 2001 American science fiction psychological thriller film written and directed by Richard Kelly and produced by Flower Films. It stars Jake Gyllenhaal, Jena Malone, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Drew Barrymore, Mary McDonnell, ...
'' (2001) and ''
Crazy/Beautiful'' (2001). In her book on the 1990s teen horror cycle, Alexandra West described the general trend of these films is often looked down upon by critics, journals, and fans as being too glossy, trendy, and sleek to be considered worthwhile horror films.
Psychological horror
Psychological horror
Psychological horror is a subgenre of horror and psychological fiction with a particular focus on mental, emotional, and psychological states to frighten, disturb, or unsettle its audience. The subgenre frequently overlaps with the related subge ...
is a
subgenre
Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other for ...
of
horror and
psychological fiction
In literature, psychological fiction (also psychological realism) is a narrative genre that emphasizes interior characterization and motivation to explore the spiritual, emotional, and mental lives of the characters. The mode of narration examin ...
with a particular focus on mental, emotional, and
psychological states to frighten, disturb, or unsettle its audience. The subgenre frequently overlaps with the related subgenre of
psychological thriller
Psychological thriller is a genre combining the thriller and psychological fiction genres. It is commonly used to describe literature or films that deal with psychological narratives in a thriller or thrilling setting.
In terms of context and c ...
, and often uses
mystery
Mystery, The Mystery, Mysteries or The Mysteries may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional characters
*Mystery, a cat character in ''Emily the Strange''
Films
* ''Mystery'' (2012 film), a 2012 Chinese drama film
* ''Mystery'' ( ...
elements and characters with unstable, unreliable, or disturbed psychological states to enhance the
suspense
Suspense is a state of mental uncertainty, anxiety, being Decision-making, undecided, or being Doubt, doubtful. In a Drama, dramatic work, suspense is the anticipation of the wikt:outcome, outcome of a plot (narrative), plot or of the solution t ...
,
drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has b ...
,
action
Action may refer to:
* Action (narrative), a literary mode
* Action fiction, a type of genre fiction
* Action game, a genre of video game
Film
* Action film, a genre of film
* ''Action'' (1921 film), a film by John Ford
* ''Action'' (1980 fil ...
, and
paranoia
Paranoia is an instinct or thought process that is believed to be heavily influenced by anxiety or fear, often to the point of delusion and irrationality. Paranoid thinking typically includes persecutory beliefs, or beliefs of conspiracy co ...
of the setting and plot and to provide an overall unpleasant, unsettling, or distressing
atmosphere.
Regional horror films
Asian horror films
Horror films in
Asia
Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an are ...
have been noted as being inspired by national, cultural or religious
folklore
Folklore is shared by a particular group of people; it encompasses the traditions common to that culture, subculture or group. This includes oral traditions such as tales, legends, proverbs and jokes. They include material culture, rangin ...
, particularly beliefs in
ghosts or spirits.
In ''Asian Horror'', Andy Richards writes that there is a "widespread and engrained acceptance of
supernatural
Supernatural refers to phenomena or entities that are beyond the laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin (above, beyond, or outside of) + (nature) Though the corollary term "nature", has had multiple meanings si ...
forces" in many Asian cultures, and suggests this is related to
animist,
pantheist
Pantheism is the belief that reality, the universe and the cosmos are identical with divinity and a supreme supernatural being or entity, pointing to the universe as being an immanent creator deity still expanding and creating, which has e ...
and
karmic
Karma (; sa, कर्म}, ; pi, kamma, italic=yes) in Sanskrit means an action, work, or deed, and its effect or consequences. In Indian religions, the term more specifically refers to a principle of cause and effect, often descriptively ...
religious traditions, as in
Buddhism
Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religions, Indian religion or Indian philosophy#Buddhist philosophy, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha. ...
and
Shintoism
Shinto () is a religion from Japan. Classified as an East Asian religion by scholars of religion, its practitioners often regard it as Japan's indigenous religion and as a nature religion. Scholars sometimes call its practitioners ''Shintois ...
.
Although
Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
* Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity
**''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation
** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...
,
Japanese
Japanese may refer to:
* Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia
* Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan
* Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture
** Japanese diaspor ...
,
Thai
Thai or THAI may refer to:
* Of or from Thailand, a country in Southeast Asia
** Thai people, the dominant ethnic group of Thailand
** Thai language, a Tai-Kadai language spoken mainly in and around Thailand
*** Thai script
*** Thai (Unicode block ...
and
Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
horror has arguably received the most international attention,
horror also makes up a considerable proportion of
Cambodian
Cambodian usually refers to:
* Something of, from, or related to the country of Cambodia
** Cambodian people (or Khmer people)
** Cambodian language (or Khmer language)
** For citizens and nationals of Cambodia, see Demographics of Cambodia
** Fo ...
and
Malaysian
Malaysian may refer to:
* Something from or related to Malaysia, a country in Southeast Asia
* Malaysian Malay, a dialect of Malay language spoken mainly in Malaysia
* Malaysian people, people who are identified with the country of Malaysia regard ...
cinema.
India
The
Cinema of India produces the largest amount of films in the world, ranging from
Bollywood
Hindi cinema, popularly known as Bollywood and formerly as Bombay cinema, refers to the film industry based in Mumbai, engaged in production of motion pictures in Hindi language. The popular term Bollywood, is a portmanteau of "Bombay" (fo ...
(Hindi cinema based in
Mumbai
Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' fin ...
) to other regions such as
West Bengal
West Bengal (, Bengali: ''Poshchim Bongo'', , abbr. WB) is a state in the eastern portion of India. It is situated along the Bay of Bengal, along with a population of over 91 million inhabitants within an area of . West Bengal is the fou ...
and
Tamil Nadu
Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a state in southern India. It is the tenth largest Indian state by area and the sixth largest by population. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu is the home of the Tamil people, whose Tamil language ...
. Unlike Hollywood and most Western cinematic traditions, horror films produced in India incorporate romance, song-and-dance, and other elements in the "
masala" format, where as many genres as possible are bundled into a single film. Odell and Le Blanc described the Indian horror film as "a popular, but minor part of the country's film output" and that "has not found a true niche in mainstream Indian cinema." These films are made outside of Mumbai, and are generally seen as disreputable to their more respectable popular cinema. As of 2007, the
Central Board of Film Certification
The Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) is a statutory film-certification body in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting of the Government of India. It is tasked with "regulating the public exhibition of films under the provision ...
, India's censorship board has stated films "pointless or unavoidable scenes of violence, cruelty and horror, scenes of violence intended to provide entertainment and such scene that may have the effect of desensitising or dehumanizing people are not shown."
![1949 mahaal](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/92/1949_mahaal.jpg)
The earliest Indian horror films were films about ghosts and reincarnation or rebirth such as ''
Mahal'' (1949). These early films tended to be spiritual pieces or tragic dramas opposed to having visceral content. While prestige films from Hollywood productions had been shown in Indian theatres, the late 1960s had seen a parallel market for minor American and European co-productions to films like the
James Bond film series
James Bond is a fictional character created by British novelist Ian Fleming in 1953. A British secret agent working for MI6 under the codename 007, Bond has been portrayed on film in twenty-seven productions by actors Sean Connery, David Niv ...
and the films of
Mario Bava
Mario Bava (31 July 1914 – 27 April 1980) was an Italian filmmaker who worked variously as a director, cinematographer, special effects artist and screenwriter, frequently referred to as the "Master of Italian Horror" and the "Master of the M ...
. In the 1970s and 1980s, the Ramsay Brothers created a career in the lower reaches of the Bombay film industry making low-budget horror films, primarily influenced by Hammer's horror film productions, with little known about their production or distribution history. The Ramsay Brothers were a family of seven brothers who made horror films that were featured monsters and evil spirits that mix in song and dance sections as well as comic interludes. Most of their films played at smaller cinema in India, with Tulsi Ramsay, one of the brothers, later stating "Places where even the trains don't stop, that's where our business was." Their horror films are generally dominated by low-budget productions, such as those by the
Ramsay Brothers
Ramsay Brothers is a pseudonym or brand name used for a family of Bollywood filmmakers, the sons and grandsons of F.U. Ramsay. They are famous for making the genre of horror films synonymous with the name "Ramsay Brothers."
History
The actual surn ...
. Their most successful film was ''
Purana Mandir
''Purana Mandir'' ( ''The Old Temple'') is a 1984 Indian Hindi-language horror film directed by the Ramsay brothers and produced by Kanta Ramsay. The soundtrack was composed by Ajit Singh.
Typical of Ramsay's other works, the film chronicles th ...
'' (1984), which was the second highest-grossing film in India that year. The influence of American productions would have an effect on later Indian productions such as ''The Exorcist'' which would lead to films involving demonic possession such as ''
Gehrayee
''Gehrayee'' () is a 1980 Indian horror thriller film directed by Vikas Desai and Aruna Raje based on a script by Vijay Tendulkar, Desai and Raje, and starring Anant Nag, Padmini Kolhapure, Sriram Lagoo and Indrani Mukherjee with Amrish Puri in ...
'' (1980). India has also made films featuring zombies and vampires that drew from American horror films opposed to indigenous myths and stories. Other directors, such as
Mohan Bhakri
Mohan Bhakri was a popular B movie producer and director in the 1980s. He produced many Hindi B movies, mostly in the horror genre. He is best known for his two horror films, Apradhi Kaun? (1982) and Cheekh (1984).
Filmography
* ''Ab Tumhari ...
made low budget highly exploitive films such as ''Cheekh'' (1985) and his biggest hit, the monster movie ''
Khooni Mahal
''Khooni Mahal'' is a 1987 Bollywood horror film directed by Mohan Bhakri. It is a pornographic Hindi horror film. It was the first film of its kind of Bollywood where unknown naked female was picturised without being censored having sex with ...
'' (1987).
Horror films are not self-evident categories in
Tamil
Tamil may refer to:
* Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia
**Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils
**Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia
* Tamil language, nativ ...
and
Telugu films
Telugu cinema, also known as Tollywood, is the segment of Indian cinema dedicated to the production of motion pictures in the Telugu language, widely spoken in the states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. Telugu cinema is based in Film Nagar, Hy ...
and it was only until the late 1980s that straight horror cinema was regularly produced with films like ''
Uruvam
''Uruvam'' () is a 1991 Indian Tamil-language horror film, directed by G. M. Kumar. The film stars Mohan, Pallavi, R. P. Viswam, débutante Veera Pandiyan and Jaimala . It was released on 15 March 1991.
Plot
The illegitimate son of a rich ...
'' (1991), ''
Sivi'' (2007), and ''
Eeram
''Eeram'' () is a 2009 Indian Tamil-language supernatural crime thriller film written and directed by Arivazhagan in his directorial debut and produced by S. Shankar. The film stars Aadhi, Nandha, Sindhu Menon, and Saranya Mohan, while Srinath ...
'' (2009) were released. The first decade of the twenty-first century saw a flurry of commercially successful Telugu horror films like ''
A Film by Aravind
''A Film by Aravind'' is 2005 Indian Telugu language mystery thriller film produced by Maroju Sridhar Rao, Sridhar Cinema and directed by Sekhar Suri. The story is that a director and an actor who fall in love with a mysterious woman. It was fol ...
'' (2005), ''
Mantra
A mantra ( Pali: ''manta'') or mantram (मन्त्रम्) is a sacred utterance, a numinous sound, a syllable, word or phonemes, or group of words in Sanskrit, Pali and other languages believed by practitioners to have religious, ...
'' (2007), and ''
Arundhati'' (2009) were released.
Ram Gopal Varma
Penmetsa Ram Gopal Varma (born 7 April 1962), often referred to by his initials RGV, is an Indian film director, screenwriter and producer, known for his works in Telugu cinema in addition to Hindi, Kannada language films, and television.**
*
...
made films that generally defied the conventions of popular Indian cinema, making horror films like ''
Raat'' (1992) and ''
Bhoot'' (2003), with the latter film not containing and comic scenes or musical numbers. In 2018, the horror film ''
Tumbbad
''Tumbbad'' is a 2018 Indian/Swedish Hindi-language period horror film film directed by Rahi Anil Barve. Additionally, Anand Gandhi served as the creative director, and Adesh Prasad served as the co-director. Written by Mitesh Shah, Prasad, B ...
'' premiered in the critics' week section of the
75th Venice International Film Festival—the first ever Indian film to open the festival.
Indonesia
Japan
Some Japanese horror films have inspired American
remakes. The visual interpretations of films can be lost in the translation of their elements from one culture to another, like in the adaptation of the Japanese film ''
Ju on'' into the American film ''
The Grudge
''The Grudge'' is a 2004 supernatural horror film directed by Takashi Shimizu, written by Stephen Susco, and produced by Sam Raimi, Robert Tapert, and Takashige Ichise. A remake of Shimizu's 2002 Japanese horror film '' Ju-On: The Grudge'', i ...
''. The cultural components from Japan were slowly "siphoned away" to make the film more relatable to a western audience.
This deterioration that can occur in an international remake happens by over-presenting negative cultural assumptions that, as time passes, sets a common ideal about that particular culture in each individual.
Holm's discussion of ''The Grudge'' remakes presents this idea by stating, "It is, instead, to note that ''The Grudge'' films make use of an un-theorized notion of Japan... that seek to directly represent the country."
South Korea
The Korean horror film originated in the 1960s and became a more prominent part of the countries film production in the early 2000s. While ghosts have appeared as early as 1924 in Korean film, attempting to chart the history of the genre from this period was described by Alison Peirse and Daniel Martin, the authors of "Korean Horror Cinema" as "problematic", due to the control of the Japanese colonial government blocking artistic or politically independent films. Regardless of settings or time period, many Korean horror films such as ''Song of the Dead'' (1980) have their stories focused on female relationships, rooted in
Korean Confucianism tradition with an emphasis on biological families. Despite the influence of folklore in some films, there is no key single canon to define the Korean horror film. Korean horror cinema is also defined by melodrama, as it does in most of Korean cinema.
''
The Housemaid'' (1960) is widely credited as initiating the first horror cycle in Korean cinema, which involved films of the 1960s about supernatural revenge tales, focused on cruelly murdered women who sought out revenge. Several of these films are in dept to Korean folklore and ghost stories, with stories of animal transformation. Traces of international cinema are found in early Korean horror cinema. such as
Shin Sang-ok
Shin Sang-ok ( ko, 신상옥; born Shin Tae-seo; October 11, 1926 – April 11, 2006) was a South Korean filmmaker with more than 100 producer and 70 director credits to his name. His best-known films were made in the 1950s and 60s, many of them ...
's ''Madame White Snake'' (1960) from the traditional Chinese folktale
Legend of the White Snake
The Legend of the White Snake is a Chinese legend. It has since been presented in a number of major Chinese operas, films, and television series.
The earliest attempt to fictionalize the story in printed form appears to be ''The White Maiden ...
. Despite bans of Japanese cultural products that lasted from 1945 to 1998, the influence of Japanese culture are still found in ''
Kaibyō eiga'' (ghost cats) themed films, such as ''
A Devilish Homicide
''A Devilish Homicide'' () is a 1965 South Korean film written and directed by Lee Yong-min. It tells the story of a woman, who, having been murdered by her jealous cousin and mother-in-law, returns as a spirit to take vengeance on her killers. T ...
'' (1965) and ''
Ghosts of Chosun
''Ghosts of Chosun'' (informal title: ''A Ghost Story of Joseon Dynasty'') () is a 1970 South Korean film directed by Shin Sang-ok
Shin Sang-ok ( ko, 신상옥; born Shin Tae-seo; October 11, 1926 – April 11, 2006) was a South Korean filmmak ...
'' (1970). Other 1960s films featured narratives involving ''
kumiho
A kumiho or gumiho (, literally " nine-tailed fox") is a creature that appears in the folktales on East Asia and legends of Korea. It is similar to the Chinese and the Japanese . It can freely transform, among other things, into a beautiful woma ...
'' such as ''The Thousand Year Old Fox'' (''Cheonnyeonho'') (1969). These tales based on folklore and ghosts continued into the 1970s. Korea also produced giant monster films that received release in the United States such as ''
Yongary, Monster from the Deep
''Yongary, Monster from the Deep'' (, ) is a 1967 ''kaiju'' film directed by Kim Ki-duk, with special effects by Kenichi Nakagawa. The film was a South Korean- Japanese co-production between Keukdong Entertainment Company and Toei Company. The fi ...
'' (1967) and ''
Ape
Apes (collectively Hominoidea ) are a clade of Old World simians native to sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia (though they were more widespread in Africa, most of Asia, and as well as Europe in prehistory), which together with its sister g ...
'' (1976).
By the end of the 1970s, the Korean horror film entered a period known commonly as the "dark time" for South Korean cinema with audience attracted to Hong Kong and American imports. The biggest influence on this was the "3S" policy adopted by the
Chun Doo-hwan
Chun Doo-hwan (; or ; 18 January 1931 – 23 November 2021) was a South Korean army general and military dictator who ruled as an unelected strongman from 1979 to 1980 before replacing Choi Kyu-hah as president of South Korea from 1980 to 198 ...
government which promoted the production of "sports, screen and sex" for the film industry leading to more relaxed censorship leading to a boom in Erotic Korean films. Horror films followed this trend with ''
Suddenly at Midnight'' (1981), a reimagining of ''The Housemaid'' (1960). As of 2013, many pre-1990 Korean horror films are only available through the
Korean Film Archive
The Korean Film Archive or called Korean Federation of Film Archives and KOFA is the sole film archive in South Korea with nationwide coverage. It was founded in Seoul in 1974 as a non-profit organization. In 1976 KOFA joined the International Fe ...
(KOFA) in
Seoul
Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 of ...
. It was not until the 1998 release of ''
Whispering Corridors
''Whispering Corridors'' () is a 1998 South Korean supernatural horror film directed and co-written by Park Ki-hyung. It was part of the explosion in South Korean cinema following the liberalization of censorship in the aftermath of the end of th ...
'' was the Korean horror film reinvigorated, with its style containing traces of traditional Korean cinema (culturally specific themes and melodrama) but also the American pattern of making a franchise of horror films, as the film received four sequels. Since the film's release, Korean horror films had had strong diversity with gothic tales like ''
A Tale of Two Sisters
''A Tale of Two Sisters'' (; lit. "Rose Flower, Red Lotus") is a 2003 South Korean psychological horror-drama film written and directed by Kim Jee-woon. The film is inspired by a Joseon Dynasty era folktale entitled Janghwa Hongryeon jeon, which ...
'' (2003), gory horror films like ''
Bloody Reunion
''Bloody Reunion'' () (aka ''To Sir, with Love'', ''My Teacher'' or ''Teacher's Mercy'') is a 2006 South Korean horror film, and the feature film debut of director Im Dae-Woong.
Plot
Detective Ma investigates a mass murder at the residence of ...
'' (2006), horror comedy (''
To Catch a Virgin Ghost
''Sisily 2 km'' (), released internationally as ''To Catch a Virgin Ghost'', is a 2004 South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula ...
'' (2004)), vampire films (''
Thirst
Thirst is the craving for potable fluids, resulting in the basic instinct of animals to drink. It is an essential mechanism involved in fluid balance. It arises from a lack of fluids or an increase in the concentration of certain osmolites, suc ...
'' (2009)), and independent productions (''Teenage Hooker Became a Killing Machine'' (2000)). These films varied in popularity with
Ahn Byeong-ki's ''
Phone'' (2002) reaching the top ten in the domestic box office sales in 2002 while in 2007, no locally produced Korean horror films were financially successful with local audiences. In 2020, Anton Bitel declared in ''
Sight & Sound
''Sight and Sound'' (also spelled ''Sight & Sound'') is a British monthly film magazine published by the British Film Institute (BFI). It conducts the well-known, once-a-decade ''Sight and Sound'' Poll of the Greatest Films of All Time, ongoing ...
'' that South Korea was one of the international hot spots for horror film production in the last decade, citing the international and popular releases of films like ''
Train to Busan
''Train to Busan'' () is a 2016 South Korean action horror film directed by Yeon Sang-ho and starring Gong Yoo, Jung Yu-mi, Ma Dong-seok, Kim Su-an, Choi Woo-shik, Ahn So-hee, and Kim Eui-sung. The film mostly takes place on a high-speed train ...
'' (2016), ''
The Odd Family: Zombie on Sale'' (2019) ''
Peninsula'' (2020) and ''
The Wailing'' (2016).
Thailand
Oceania
Australia
It is unknown when
Australia's cinema first horror title may have been, with thoughts ranging from ''
The Strangler's Grip'' (1912) to ''
The Face at the Window'' (1919) while stories featuring ghosts would appear in ''
Guyra Ghost Mystery'' (1921). By 1913, the more prolific era of Australian cinema ended with production not returning with heavy input of government finance in the 1970s. It took until the 1970s for Australia to develop sound film with television films that eventually received theatrical release with ''
Dead Easy'' (1970) and ''
Night of Fear
"Night of Fear" is the debut single by British rock band the Move, written by Roy Wood. The song was first released on 9 December 1966, and reached number 2 in the UK Singles Chart on 26 January 1967, staying for ten weeks in the charts. "Night ...
'' (1973). ''
The Cars That Ate Paris
''The Cars That Ate Paris'' is a 1974 Australian horror comedy film, produced by twin brothers Hal and Jim McElroy and directed by Peter Weir. It was his first feature film, and was also based on an original story he had written. Shot mostly i ...
'' (1974) was the first Australian horror production made for theatrical release. 1970s Australian art cinema was funded by state film corporations, who considered them more culturally acceptable than local exploitation films (
Ozploitation
Ozploitation films are exploitation films – a category of low-budget horror, comedy, sexploitation and action films – made in Australia after the introduction of the R rating in 1971. The year also marked the beginnings of the Australian ...
), which was part of the Australian phenomenon called the
cultural cringe
Cultural cringe, in cultural studies and social anthropology, is an internalized inferiority complex that causes people in a country to dismiss their own culture as inferior to the cultures of other countries.
It is closely related to the conc ...
. The greater success of genre films like ''
Mad Max
''Mad Max'' is an Australian post-apocalyptic action film series and media franchise created by George Miller and Byron Kennedy. It began in 1979 with '' Mad Max'', and was followed by three sequels: ''Mad Max 2'' (1981, released in the Unite ...
'' (1979), ''
The Last Wave
''The Last Wave'' (also released, in the US, as ''Black Rain'') is a 1977 Australian mystery drama film directed by Peter Weir.''Variety'' film review; 16 November 1977, p. 21. It is about a white solicitor in Sydney whose seemingly normal lif ...
'' (1977) and ''
Patrick Patrick may refer to:
* Patrick (given name), list of people and fictional characters with this name
* Patrick (surname), list of people with this name
People
* Saint Patrick (c. 385–c. 461), Christian saint
*Gilla Pátraic (died 1084), Patrick ...
'' (1978) led to the
Australian Film Commission to change its focus to being a more commercial operation. This closed in 1980 as its funding was abused by investors using them as tax avoiding measures. A new development known as the
10BA tax shelter scheme was developed ushering a slew of productions, leading to what Peter Shelley, author of ''Australian Horror Films'', suggested meant "making a profit was more important than making a good film." Shelley called these films derivative of "American films and presenting generic American material". These films included the horror film productions of
Antony I. Ginnane. While Australia would have success with international films between the mid-1980s and the 2000s, less than 5 horror films were produced in the country between 1993 and 2000. It was only after the success of ''
Wolf Creek'' (2005) that a new generation of filmmakers would continuously make horror genre films in Australia that continued into the 2010s.
New Zealand
By 2005,
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
has produced around 190 feature films, with about 88% of them being made after 1976. New Zealand horror film history was described by Philip Matthews of
Stuff as making "po-faced gothic and now we do horror for laughs." Among the earliest known New Zealand horror films productions are ''
Strange Behavior'' (1981), a co-production with Australia and ''
Death Warmed Up'' (1984) a single production. Early features such as
Melanie Read's ''
Trial Run'' (1984) where a mother is sent to remote cottage to photograph penguins and finds it habitat to haunted spirits, and Gaylene Preston's ''
Mr. Wrong
''Mr. Wrong'' is a 1996 American romantic black comedy film starring Ellen DeGeneres and Bill Pullman. It was a critical failure and box office bomb. DeGeneres used to mention it occasionally in her talk show, ''The Ellen DeGeneres Show'', pok ...
'' (1984) purchases a car that is haunted by its previous owner. Other films imitate American slasher and splatter films with ''
Bridge to Nowhere
A bridge to nowhere is a bridge where one or both ends are broken, incomplete, or unconnected to any roads. If it is an overpass or an interchange, the term overpass to nowhere or interchange to nowhere may be used respectively. There are fi ...
'' (1986), and the early films of
Peter Jackson who combined splatter films with comedy with ''
Bad Taste
''Bad Taste'' is a 1987 New Zealand science-fiction comedy horror film directed, produced and filmed by Peter Jackson, who also stars in and co-wrote the screenplay, along with Tony Hiles and Ken Hammon. Independently produced on a low budge ...
'' (1988) and ''
Braindead'' (1992) which has the largest following of the mentioned films. Film producer
Ant Timpson
Ant Timpson (born 21 April 1966) is a New Zealand film producer best known for producing '' The ABCs of Death'' series, ''Turbo Kid'', '' Deathgasm'' and '' The Greasy Strangler''. He founded and hosts the 48Hours film contest.
Career
In 200 ...
had an influence curating New Zealand horror films, creating the Incredibly Strange Film Festival in the 1990s and producing his own horror films over the 2010s including ''
The ABCs of Death
''The ABCs of Death'' is a 2012 American comedy horror anthology film produced by international producers and directed by filmmakers from around the world. The film contains 26 shorts, each by different directors spanning fifteen countries, inc ...
'' (2012), ''
Deathgasm
''Deathgasm'' is a 2015 New Zealand independent comedy horror film written and directed by Jason Lei Howden in his directorial debut. The film premiered on 14 March 2015 at South by Southwest and was released in theaters later that year to pos ...
'' (2015), and ''
Housebound'' (2014). Timpson noted the latter horror entries from New Zealand are all humorous films like ''
What We Do in the Shadows
''What We Do in the Shadows'' is a 2014 New Zealand mockumentary horror comedy film written and directed by Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi and the first installment in the ''What We Do in the Shadows'' franchise. The film also stars Clem ...
'' (2014) with
Jonathan King
Jonathan King (born Kenneth George King; 6 December 1944) is an English singer, songwriter and record producer. He first came to prominence in 1965 when "Everyone's Gone to the Moon", a song that he wrote and sang while still an undergraduate, ...
, director of ''
Black Sheep'' (2006) and ''
The Tattooist
''The Tattooist'' is a 2007 New Zealand horror film directed by Peter Burger and starring Jason Behr, Nathaniel Lees, Michael Hurst and Robbie Magasiva among others. The film is the first in a series of official co-productions between New Zeala ...
'' (2007) stating "I'd love to see a genuinely scary New Zealand film but I don't know if New Zealand audiences – or the funding bodies – are keen."
European horror films
Ian Olney described the horror films of
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...
were often more erotic and "just plain stranger" than their British and American counter-parts. European horror films (generally referred to as Euro Horror) draw from distinctly European cultural sources, including
surrealism,
romanticism
Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic, literary, musical, and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century, and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate ...
,
decadent tradition, early 20th century
pulp-literature,
film serials
A serial film, film serial (or just serial), movie serial, or chapter play, is a motion picture form popular during the first half of the 20th century, consisting of a series of short subjects exhibited in consecutive order at one theater, ge ...
, and
erotic comics
Erotic comics are adult comics which focus substantially on nudity and sexual activity, either for their own sake or as a major story element. As such they are usually not permitted to be sold to legal minors. Like other genres of comics, they ca ...
. In comparison to the narrative logic in American genre films, these films focused on imagery, excessiveness, and the irrational.
Between the mid-1950s and the mid-1980s, European horror films emerged from counties like Italy, Spain and France and were shown in the United States predominantly at drive-in theatre and
grindhouse theatres.
As producers and distributors all over the world were interested in horror films, regardless of their origin changes started occurring in European low-budget filmmaking that allowed for productions in the 1960s and 1970s for horror films from Italy, France, Germany, United Kingdom and Spain, as well as co-productions between these countries. Several productions, such as those in Italy were co-productions due to the lack of international stars within the country. European horror films began developing strong
cult following since the late 1990s.
France
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...
never truly developed a horror film movement to the volume that the United Kingdom or Italy had produced. In their book ''European Nightmares'', editors Patricia Allmer, Emily Brick, and David Huxley noted that French cinema was generally perceived as having a tradition of the fantastic, rather than horror films. The editors noted that French cinema had produced a series of outstanding individual horror films, from directors who did not specialize in the field. In their book ''Horror Films'', Colin Odell & Michelle Le Blanc referred to director
Jean Rollin
Jean Michel Rollin Roth Le Gentil (3 November 193815 December 2010) was a French film director, actor, and novelist best known for his work in the fantastique genre.
Overview
Rollins' career, spanning over fifty years, featured early short film ...
as one of the countries most consistent horror ''auteurs'' with 40 years of productions described as "highly divisive" low budget horror films often featuring erotic elements, vampires, low budgets, pulp stories and references to both high and low European art. Another of the few French directors who specialized in horror is
Alexandre Aja, who stated that "the problem with the French is that they don't trust their own language
hen it comes to horror American horror movies do well, but in their own language, the French just aren't interested."
A 21st-century movement of
transgressive French cinema known as
New French Extremity
New French Extremity (New French Extremism or, informally, New French Extreme) is a term coined by ''Artforum'' critic James Quandt for a collection of transgressive films by French directors at the turn of the 21st century. Also available othe ...
was named by film programmer James Quandt in 2004, who declared and derided that films of
Catherine Breillat
Catherine Breillat (; born 13 July 1948) is a French filmmaker, novelist and professor of auteur cinema at the European Graduate School. In the film business for over 40 years, Catherine Breillat chooses to normalize previously taboo subjects ...
,
Claire Denis
Claire Denis (; born 21 April 1946) is a French film director and screenwriter. Her feature film ''Beau Travail'' (1999) has been called one of the greatest films of the 1990s, as well as of all time. Other acclaimed works include '' Trouble Ev ...
,
Gaspar Noé
Gaspar Noé (, ; born 27 December 1963) is an Argentine filmmaker based in Paris, France. He is the son of Argentine painter, writer, and intellectual Luis Felipe Noé.
In the early 1990s, Noé along with his wife Lucile Hadžihalilović were ...
, and
Bruno Dumont, among others, had made "cinema suddenly determined to break every taboo, to wade in rivers of viscera and spumes of sperm, to fill each frame with flesh, nubile, or gnarled, and subject it to all manner of penetration mutilation and defilement." In her book ''Films of the New French Extremity'', Alexandra West described the phenomenon as initially an art house movement, but as the directors of those films started making horror films fitting
arthouse
An art film (or arthouse film) is typically an independent film, aimed at a niche market rather than a mass market audience. It is "intended to be a serious, artistic work, often experimental and not designed for mass appeal", "made primarily ...
standards such as ''
Trouble Every Day'' (2001) and
Marina de Van
Marina de Van (; born 8 February 1971) is a French film director, screenwriter and actress. Her film, '' Don't Look Back'', was screened out of competition at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival.
Her brother is , he appeared with her in the 1998 f ...
's ''
In My Skin'' (2002), other directors began making more what West described as "outright horror films" such as Aja's ''
High Tension
''High Tension'' (French: ''Haute Tension'', ; released in the United Kingdom as ''Switchblade Romance'') is a 2003 French slasher film directed by Alexandre Aja, co-written with Grégory Levasseur, and starring Cécile de France and Maïwenn, ...
'' (2003) and
Xavier Gens
Xavier Gens (born on in Dunkirk, France) is a French film director.
Filmography
Director
*''Lights Out'' (TBA)
*''Vanikoro'' (TBA)
*'' Gangs of London'' (2020) Season 1 Episodes 6, 7 and 8
*''Budapest'' (2018)
*'' Cold Skin'' (2017)
*''The Cr ...
' ''
Frontier(s)
''Frontier(s)'' (french: Frontière(s)) is a 2007 French-Swiss independent horror film written and directed by Xavier Gens in his feature length debut and stars Karina Testa, Aurélien Wiik, Estelle Lefébure, and Samuel Le Bihan. It follows a ...
'' (2007). Some of these horror films of the New French Extremity movement would regularly place on "Best Of" genre lists, such as ''
Martyrs
A martyr (, ''mártys'', "witness", or , ''marturia'', stem , ''martyr-'') is someone who suffers persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, or refusing to renounce or advocate, a religious belief or other cause as demanded by an external ...
'' (2008), ''
Inside
Inside may refer to:
* Insider, a member of any group of people of limited number and generally restricted access
Film
* ''Inside'' (1996 film), an American television film directed by Arthur Penn and starring Eric Stoltz
* ''Inside'' (2002 f ...
'' (2007) and ''
High Tension
''High Tension'' (French: ''Haute Tension'', ; released in the United Kingdom as ''Switchblade Romance'') is a 2003 French slasher film directed by Alexandre Aja, co-written with Grégory Levasseur, and starring Cécile de France and Maïwenn, ...
'' (2003) while
Julia Ducournau
Julia Ducournau (; born 18 November 1983) is a French film director and screenwriter. She made her feature film debut in 2016 with ''Raw (film), Raw''. At the 2021 Cannes Film Festival, she won the Palme d'Or for her film ''Titane'', which made he ...
's film ''
Titane
''Titane'' (, "Titanium") is a 2021 body horror drama film, drama film written and directed by Julia Ducournau. The French-Belgian co-production stars Agathe Rousselle in her feature film debut as Alexia, a woman who, after being injured in a ...
'' (2021) won the
Palme d'Or
The Palme d'Or (; en, Golden Palm) is the highest prize awarded at the Cannes Film Festival. It was introduced in 1955 by the festival's organizing committee. Previously, from 1939 to 1954, the festival's highest prize was the Grand Prix du Fe ...
at the
2021 Cannes Film Festival
The 74th annual Cannes Film Festival took place from 6 to 17 July 2021, after having been originally scheduled from 11 to 22 May 2021. American director Spike Lee was invited to be the head of the jury for the festival for a second time, after t ...
.
Germany
![IFFR 2015 - German Angst-10](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/62/IFFR_2015_-_German_Angst-10.jpg)
German postwar horror films remained marginal after its success during the silent film era. The Third Reich ended production of horror films and German productions never gained a mass audience in Germany's horror film output leading the genre to not return in any major form until the late 1960s. Between 1933 and 1989, Randall Halle stated about only 34 films that could be described as horror films and 45 which were co-productions with other countries, primarily Spain and Italy. Outside of Herzog's ''Nosferatu'' (1979) most of these films low-budget that focused on erotic themes over horrific turns in narrative. In the mid-1970s, ''
Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons'' was tasked with protection of minors from violent, racist and pornographic content in literature and comic books which led to increased the code which became law in 1973. These laws expanded to home video in 1985 following the release of titles such as
Sam Raimi's ''
The Evil Dead'' (1981) and the political change when
Helmut Kohl
Helmut Josef Michael Kohl (; 3 April 1930 – 16 June 2017) was a German politician who served as Chancellor of Germany from 1982 to 1998 and Leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) from 1973 to 1998. Kohl's 16-year tenure is the longes ...
became chancellor in 1982. The amount of West German film productions were already low in the 1980s, leaving the genre to be shot by amateurs who had little to no budgets. In the early 1980s, West Germany's government cracked down on graphic horror films similar to the United Kingdom's
Video nasty
Video nasty is a colloquial term popularised by the National Viewers' and Listeners' Association (NVALA) in the United Kingdom to refer to a number of films, typically low-budget horror or exploitation films, distributed on video cassette that ...
panic. A direct response to this led to West German independent directors in the late 1980s and early 1990s, West German indie directors to release a comparatively high number of what Kai-Uwe Werbeck described as low-budget "hyper-violent horror films" sometimes described as
German underground horror. Werbeck described the most prominent of these were of
Jörg Buttgereit, described by Werbeck as "arguably the most visible German horror director of the 1980s and early 1990s", one which Harald Harzheim claimed to be "the first German director since the 1920s to give the horror genre new impulses". Similar gory films such as
Olaf Ittenbach
Olaf Ittenbach (born 1 April 1969) is a German people, German German underground horror, horror movie film director, director, actor and special effects artist.
Filmography
*''Black Past'' (1989)
*''The Burning Moon'' (1992)
*''Premutos: The Fal ...
's ''
The Burning Moon'' was the first, and last film to be made in Germany that is still banned there as of 2016.
German horror films made a comeback in what Werbeck described as a mainstream fashion in the 21st century. This included the box office hit ''
Anatomy
Anatomy () is the branch of biology concerned with the study of the structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old science, having it ...
'' (2000) and ''
Antibodies'' (2005), who Odell and Le Blanc described as being a similar to the 1960s ''
krimi
Edgar Wallace (1875–1932) was a British novelist and playwright and screenwriter whose works have been adapted for the screen on many occasions.
British adaptations
His works were adapted for the silent screen as early as 1916, and continued ...
'' genre of crime films. The second were films made for international markets such as ''
Legion of the Dead'' (2001) and the video game adaptations directed
Uwe Boll
Uwe Boll (; born June 22, 1965) is a German filmmaker. He came to prominence during the 2000s for his adaptations of video game franchises which often starred international stars like Jason Statham, Burt Reynolds, Ray Liotta, Christian Slater, ...
such as ''
House of the Dead'' (2003) and ''
Alone in the Dark'' (2005).
Italy
Early silent Italian ''
fantastique
''Fantastique'' is a French term for a literary and cinematic genre that overlaps with science fiction, horror, and fantasy.
The ''fantastique'' is a substantial genre within French literature. Arguably dating back further than English lan ...
'' films focused more on adventure and farce opposed to Germany's
expressionism. The
National Fascist Party
The National Fascist Party ( it, Partito Nazionale Fascista, PNF) was a political party in Italy, created by Benito Mussolini as the political expression of Italian Fascism and as a reorganization of the previous Italian Fasces of Combat. Th ...
in Italy had forced film in the early sound era to "spread the civilization of Rome throughout the world as quickly as possible." Another influence was the Centro Cattolico Cinematografico (Catholic Cinematic Centre) that was described by Curti as "permissive towards propaganda and repressive against anything related to sexuality or morality." The
Vatican City
Vatican City (), officially the Vatican City State ( it, Stato della Città del Vaticano; la, Status Civitatis Vaticanae),—'
* german: Vatikanstadt, cf. '—' (in Austria: ')
* pl, Miasto Watykańskie, cf. '—'
* pt, Cidade do Vati ...
's newspaper ''
L'Osservatore Romano
''L'Osservatore Romano'' (, 'The Roman Observer') is the daily newspaper of Vatican City State which reports on the activities of the Holy See and events taking place in the Catholic Church and the world. It is owned by the Holy See but is not ...
'' for example, critiqued the circulation of films like ''
Bride of Frankenstein
''Bride of Frankenstein'' is a 1935 American science fiction horror film, and the first sequel to Universal Pictures' 1931 film ''Frankenstein''. As with the first film, ''Bride of Frankenstein'' was directed by James Whale starring Boris Kar ...
'' (1935) in 1940.
As
Italian neorealism
Italian neorealism ( it, Neorealismo), also known as the Golden Age, is a national film movement characterized by stories set amongst the poor and the working class. They are filmed on location, frequently with non-professional actors. They pri ...
had monopolized Italian cinema in the 1940s, and as the average Italian standard for living increased, Italian critic and historian
Gian Piero Brunetta stated that it would "appear legitimate to start exploring the fantastic." Italian film historian Goffredo Fofi echoed these statements, stating in 1963 that "ghosts, monsters and the taste for the horrible appears when a society that became wealthy and evolves by industrializing, and are accompanied by a state of well-being which began to exist and expand in Italy only since a few years" Initially, this was a rise in ''
peplum'' films after the release of ''
Hercules
Hercules (, ) is the Roman equivalent of the Greek divine hero Heracles, son of Jupiter and the mortal Alcmena. In classical mythology, Hercules is famous for his strength and for his numerous far-ranging adventures.
The Romans adapted the ...
'' (1958). Italy started moving beyond peplums making
Westerns
The Western is a genre set in the American frontier and commonly associated with folk tales of the Western United States, particularly the Southwestern United States, as well as Northern Mexico and Western Canada. It is commonly referred ...
and horror films which were less expensive to produce than the previous sword-and-sandal films.
Italy's initial wave of horror films were
gothic horror
Gothic fiction, sometimes called Gothic horror in the 20th century, is a loose literary aesthetic of fear and haunting. The name is a reference to Gothic architecture of the European Middle Ages, which was characteristic of the settings of ea ...
were rooted in popular cinema, and were often co-productions with other countries. Curti described the initial wave of the 1960s Italian gothic horror allowed directors like
Mario Bava
Mario Bava (31 July 1914 – 27 April 1980) was an Italian filmmaker who worked variously as a director, cinematographer, special effects artist and screenwriter, frequently referred to as the "Master of Italian Horror" and the "Master of the M ...
,
Riccardo Freda
Riccardo Freda (24 February 1909 – 20 December 1999) was an Italian film director. He worked in a variety of genres, including sword-and-sandal, horror, ''giallo'' and spy films.
Freda began directing '' I Vampiri'' in 1956. The film became ...
and
Antonio Margheriti
Antonio Margheriti (19 September 1930 – 4 November 2002), also known under the pseudonyms Anthony M. Dawson and Antony Daisies ("daisies" is "margherite" in Italian), was an Italian filmmaker. Margheriti worked in many different genres in th ...
to helm what Curti described as "some of their very best works." Bava's ''Black Sunday'' (1960) was particularly influential. Many productions of this era were often written in a hurry, sometimes developed during filming production by production companies that often did not last very long, sometimes for only one film production. After 1966, the gothic cycle ended, primarily through a broader crisis that effected the Italian film industry with its audience rapidly shrinking. Some gothics continued to be produced into the beginning of the 1970s, while the influence of the genre was felt in other Italian genres like the spaghetti western.
![Jessica Harper in Suspiria](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/69/Jessica_Harper_in_Suspiria.jpg)
The term ''
giallo
In Italian cinema, ''Giallo'' (; plural ''gialli'', from ''giallo'', Italian for yellow) is a genre of mystery fiction and thrillers that often contains slasher, crime fiction, psychological thriller, psychological horror, sexploitation, and, ...
'', which means "yellow" in Italian, is derived from ''Il Giallo Mondadori'', a long-running series of mystery and crime novels identifiable by their distinctive uniform yellow covers, and is used in Italy to describe all mystery and thriller fiction. English-language critics use the term to describe more specific films within the genre, involving a murder mystery that revels in the details of the murder rather than the deduction of it or police procedural elements. Tim Lucas deemed early films in the genre such as Bava's ''The Girl Who Knew Too Much (1963 film), The Girl Who Knew Too Much'' (1963) while Curti described ''Blood and Black Lace'' (1964) as predominantly a series of violent, erotically charged set pieces that are "increasingly elaborate and spectacular" in their construction, and that Bava pushed these elements to the extreme which would solidify the genre. It was not until the success of
Dario Argento
Dario Argento (; born 7 September 1940) is an Italian film director, producer, screenwriter, actor and critic. His influential work in the horror genre during the 1970s and 1980s, particularly in the subgenre known as ''giallo'', has led him ...
's 1970 film ''The Bird with the Crystal Plumage'' that the ''giallo'' genre started a major trend in Italian cinema.
Other smaller trends permutated in Italy in the 1970s such as films involving Cannibal film, cannibals, Zombie film, zombies and Nazi exploitation, Nazis which Newman described as "disreputable crazes". In Italy entered the 1980s, the Italian film industry would gradually move towards making films for television. The decade started with a high-budgeted production of Argento's ''Inferno (1980 film), Inferno'' (1980) and with the death of Mario Bava, Fulci became what historian Roberto Curti called "Italy's most prominent horror film director in the early 1980s". Several zombie films were made in the country in the early 80s from Fulci and others while Argento would continue directing and producing films for others such as Lamberto Bava. As Fulci's health deteriorated towards the end of the decade, many directors turned to making horror films for Joe D'Amato's Filmirage company, independent films or works for television and home video.
Spain
The highest point of production of Spanish horror films took place during late Francoism, between 1968 and 1975, a period associated to the so-called Fantaterror, the local expression of Euro Horror, identifiable for its "disproportionate doses of sex and violence". During this period, several Spanish filmmakers appeared with unique styles and themes such as Jesús Franco's ''The Awful Dr. Orloff'' (1962), first internationally successful horror and exploitation film production from Spain. Dr. Orloff would appears in other films of Franco's during the period. Paul Naschy, the actor and screenwriter., and Amando de Ossorio with his zombie like medieval knights in ''Tombs of the Blind Dead'' (1972). These directors adapted established monsters from popular films, comics and pulp fiction and imbuing them with what Lazaro-Reboll described as "certain local flavour and relevance." A partial overview of films from this era focused on classic monsters (''Frankenstein's Bloody Terror'' (1968), ''Dr. Jekyll y el Hombre Lobo'' (1972)) and films that grew from trends created by ''Night of the Living Dead'' and ''The Exorcist'' (''The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue'' (1974), ''Exorcismo'' (1975)). Most films of the period were low-budget films with short shooting schedules, while occasional films had respectable budgets such as ''99 Women'' (1969) and others that had art house directors attempt commercial production such as Vicente Aranda's ''The Blood Spattered Bride'' and Jorge Grau's ''Bloody Ceremony'' (1973) Antonio Lazaro-Reboll wrote in 2012 that in the last forty years, the horror film has formed as a significant part of Spain's local transnational filmic production, that created its own ''auteurs'', stars and cycles. For decades, it was described by Beck and Rodríguez-Ortega in ''Contemporary Spanish Cinema and Genre'' that the view of the genre has been "almost exclusively been constructed negatively" and that the rise in horror film productions in the late 1960s and 1970s in Spain was "reviled by contemporary critics, film historians and scholars". In his 1974 book ''Cine español, cine de subgéneros'', author Román Gurbern saw contemporary Spanish horror films as "derivative of Authentic American and European traditions" that will "never make it into the histories of Spanish cinema, unless it is dealt with in a succinct footnote."
Film production decreased dramatically in the late 1970s and 1980s for several reasons, including the boom in historical and political films in Spain during early year of democracy. The film legislation implemented by general director of cinematography Pilar Miró in 1983 introduced a selective subvention system, causing the overall number of annually made films (including horror films) to shrink, thereby dealing a heavy blow to horror industry and the Fantaterror craze. In addition, there were changing habits on audiences and the visual material they sought. It was not until the late 1990s and the 2000s that Spanish horror reached another production peak.
After the success of private television operator Canal+ (Spanish TV channel), Canal+ from the 1990s onward investing in the production of films by the likes of Álex de la Iglesia (''The Day of the Beast''; 1995) or Alejandro Amenábar (''Tesis''; 1996 and ''The Others (2001 film), The Others''; 2001) through Sogecine, other television companies such as Antena 3 (Spanish TV channel), Antena 3 and Telecinco (through Telecinco Cinema) came to see horror as a profitable niche, and the genre thereby became a successful formula for box-office hits in the 2000s, underpinning the wider switch in the industry from the largely State-dependent model of the 1980s to the hegemony of mass media holdings in domestic film production. Jaume Balagueró's ''The Nameless (film), The Nameless'' (1999), which became a popular film both in Spain and abroad, paved the way for new Spanish horror films. Filmax tried to capitalise on the success of the former film by creating the Fantastic Factory genre label and eventually came to develop one of the most successful Spanish film franchises with the Rec (film series), ''Rec'' film series. The success of Juan Antonio Bayona's ''The Orphanage (2007 film), The Orphanage'' (2007) ensued with the release of ersatz gothic films featuring creepy children. Other key names for the development of the genre in the 21st-century Spanish industry include Juan Carlos Fresnadillo and Paco Plaza.
United Kingdom
Americas
Mexico
After the 1931 release of a US-produced Spanish-language version of ''Dracula (1931 Spanish-language film), Dracula'' by George Melford for the Latin-American market employing Mexican actors, Mexican horror films were produced throughout the 1930s and 1940s, often reflecting on the overarching theme of Relationship between religion and science, science vs. religion conflict. Ushered by the release of ''El vampiro'', the Mexploitation horror film era started in 1957, with films characterised by their low production values and camp appeal, often featuring vampires, wrestlers, and aztec mummies. A key figure in the Mexican horror scene (particularly in Germán Robles-starred vampire films) was producer Abel Salazar (actor), Abel Salazar. The late 1960s saw the advent of the prominence of Carlos Enrique Taboada as an standout Mexican horror filmmaker, with films such as ''Hasta el viento tiene miedo'' (1967), ''El libro de piedra'' (1968), ''Más negro que la noche'' (1975) or ''Veneno para las hadas'' (1984). Mexican horror cinema has been noted for the mashup of classic gothic and romantic themes and characters with autochthonous features of the Mexican culture such as the Ranchería setting, the colonial past or the myth of La Llorona (shared with other Hispanic-American nations).
Horror has proven to be a dependable genre at the Mexican box office in the 21st-century, with Mexico ranking as having the world's largest relative popularity of the genre among viewers (ahead of South Korea), according to a 2016 research.
Effects on audiences
Psychological effects
In a study done by Uri Hasson et al., brain waves were observed via functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). This study used the inter-subject correlation analysis (ISC) method of determining results. It was shown that audience members tend to focus on certain facets in a particular scene simultaneously and tend to sit as still as possible while watching horror films.
In another study done by John Greene & Glenn Sparks, it was found that the audience tends to experience the Excitation-transfer theory, excitation transfer process (ETP) which causes a physiological arousal in audience members. The ETP refers to the feelings experienced immediately after an emotion-arousing experience, such as watching a horror film. In this case, audience members' heart rate, blood pressure and respiration all increased while watching films with violence. Audience members with positive feedback regarding the horror film have feelings similar to happiness or joy felt with friends, but intensified. Alternatively, audience members with negative feedback regarding the film would typically feel emotions they would normally associate with negative experiences in their life.
Only about 10% of the American population enjoy the physiological rush felt immediately after watching horror films. The population that does not enjoy horror films could experience emotional fallout similar to that of Posttraumatic stress disorder, PTSD if the environment reminds them of particular scenes.
A 2021 study suggested horror films that explore grief can provide psychological benefits to the bereaved, with the genre well suited to representing grief through its genre conventions.
Physical effects
In a study by Medes et al., prolonged exposure to infrasound and low-frequency noise (<500 Hz) in long durations has an effect on vocal range (i.e. longer exposure tends to form a lower phonation frequency range). Another study by Baliatsas et al. observed that there is a correlation between exposure to infrasound and low-frequency noises and sleep-related problems. Though most horror films keep the audio around 20–30 Hz, the noise can still be unsettling in long durations.
Another technique used in horror films to provoke a response from the audience is cognitive dissonance, which is when someone experiences tension in themselves and is urged to relieve that tension. Dissonance is the clashing of unpleasant or harsh sounds. A study by Prete et al. identified that the ability to recognize dissonance relied on the left hemisphere of the brain, while consonance relied on the right half.
There is a stronger preference for consonance; this difference is noticeable even in early stages of life.
Previous musical experience also can influence a dislike for dissonance.
Skin conductance responses (SCRs), heart rate (HR), and Electromyography, electromyographic (EMG) responses vary in response to emotional stimuli, showing higher for negative emotions in what is known as the "negative bias."
When applied to dissonant music, HR decreases (as a bodily form of adaptation to harsh stimulation), SCR increases, and EMG responses in the face are higher.
The typical reactions go through a two-step process of first orienting to the problem (the slowing of HR), then a defensive process (a stronger increase in SCR and an increase in HR).
This initial response can sometimes result in a fight-or-flight response, which is the characteristic of dissonance that horror films rely on to frighten and unsettle viewers.
Reception
In film criticism
Critic
Robin Wood was not the first film critic to take the horror film seriously, but his article ''Return of the Repressed'' in 1978 helped inaugurate the horror film into academic study as a genre. Wood later stated that he was surprised that his work, as well as the writing of Richard Lippe and Andrew Britton would receive "historic importance" intellectual views of the film genre. William Paul in his book ''Laughing Screaming'' comments that "the negative definition of the lower works would have it that they are less subtle than higher genres. More positively, it could be said that they are more direct. Where lower forms are explicit, higher forms tend to operate more by indirection. Because of this indirection the higher forms are often regarded as being more metaphorical, and consequently more resonant, more open to the exegetical analyses of the academic industry."
Steffen Hantke noted that academic criticism about horror cinema had "always operated under duress" noting that challenges in legitimizing its subject, finding "career-minded academics might have always suspected that they were studying something that was ultimately too frivolous, garish, and sensationalistic to warrant serious critical attention".
Some commentary has suggested that horror films have been underrepresented or underappreciated as serious works worthy of film criticism and major films awards. As of 2021, only six horror films have been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture, with The Silence of the Lambs (film), ''The Silence of the Lambs'' being the sole winner. However, horror films have still won major awards.
Critics have also commented on the Gender in horror films, representation of women
and Disability in horror films, disability in horror films, as well as the Racism in horror films, prevalence of racial stereotypes.
Censorship
Many horror films have been the subject of moral panic, Film censorship, censorship and legal controversy.
In the United Kingdom, Film censorship in the United Kingdom, film censorship has frequently been applied to horror films. A moral panic over several Slasher film, slasher films in the 1980s led to many of them being banned but released on videotape; the phenomenon became popularly termed "
video nasties
Video nasty is a colloquial term popularised by the National Viewers' and Listeners' Association (NVALA) in the United Kingdom to refer to a number of films, typically low-budget horror or exploitation films, distributed on video cassette that ...
". Constraints on permitted subject matter in Cinema of Indonesia, Indonesian films has also influenced Indonesian horror, Indonesian horror films. In March 2008, Film censorship in China, China banned all horror films from its market.
In the U.S., the Motion Picture Production Code which was implemented in 1930, set moral guidelines for film content, restraining movies containing controversial themes, graphic violence, explicit sexuality and/or nudity. The gradual abandonment of the Code, and its eventual formal repeal in 1968 (when it was replaced by the Motion Picture Association of America film rating system, MPAA film rating system)
offered more freedom to the movie industry.
References
Notes
Bibliography
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Further reading
* Dixon, Wheeler Winston. ''A History of Horror''. (Rutgers University Press; 2010), .
* Steffen Hantke, ed. ''American Horror Film: The Genre at the Turn of the Millennium'' (University Press of Mississippi; 2010), 253 pages.
* Petridis, Sotiris (2014).
A Historical Approach to the Slasher Film. Film International 12 (1): 76–84.
External links
Horror genreon IMDb
{{Authority control
Film genres
Horror films,
Horror fiction, *
Thrillers
Articles containing video clips