History of Horror

History of Horror

The earliest depictions of horror were found in short films in the 1890's. The best well-known ones were French "Le Manoir du diable (1896)" and Japanese "Bake Jizo (1898)". However, horror really came to focus in the early 20th century when the first ever vampire move "Nosferatu (1922)" was released. This lead to a very successful beginning of the horror genre.

In the year 1931, Universal pictures ended up producing movies "Dracula" and "Frankenstein", which nowadays are presented as well-known and a classic staple to the horror genre. The will lead on to become household names that will get sequels and remakes. The director of "Dracula", Tod Browning, ended up releasing the movie "Freaks" a year later in 1932 which centre on a group of deformities in  Carnival slideshow.

 

Since the 1930's, the horror genre was split between 2 sub-genres. Armageddon and Demonic. At the time, most films were about people overcoming outside threats like aliens and mutations, and the American companies were dominating this genre at the time. In 1960, British Director Alfred Hitchcock released "Psycho" we was the first slasher film to be made and focuses on people against people. This was so successful that it is considered as on the best films ever made. Hitchcock's streak continued in 1963 when he released "The Birds" which was about people against nature. 1968 was when George A. Romero's "Night of the Living Dead" was released and helped started the zombie movie craze, and brought horror in real life.

the events of the 1960's helped to influence horror movies such as "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" and "The Hills Have Eyes" as both were inspired by the Vietnam war. The 1970's was the decade where more occult films were released, with 1973's "The Exorcist" being a prime example of the genre. It was also when the slasher genre started getting more violent and successful movies such as John Carpenter's "Halloween" in 1978, and Wes Craven's "A Nightmare on Elm Street" in 1980. The 1980's ended up garnering more gory films with Sam Raimi's "Evil Dead" movies being a well-known example of it.

Because of the success of slasher films in the 1980's, the horror genre started to decline, but classic films did stick out such as 1991's "Silence of the Lambs". So in order to reconnect audiences with the horror genre, they decided become a parody and self-mock themselves. Movies such as "I Know What You Did Last Summer" and "Urban Legend" helped to re-ignite the slasher genre, but it was Wes Craven's "Scream" that started the typical conventions of slasher films.

The 2000's and onwards were more quiet of the horror genre. Their are still successful original movies mad, but it mostly consists of remakes of classic horror films. This decade saw the return of the horror genre with movies such as "Resident Evil" and "28 Days Later" playing a big part in the return. It was also when the torture films started, with the "Saw" franchise becoming very popular with its massive amount of gore involved.