History of Horror Films

Since even before the 20th century, man has always enjoyed the thrill that goes with the sudden shock and prolonged anxiety experienced when we're afraid. From the tales of the ancient world to modern day urban myths, the audience willingly offer themselves up to sadistic storytellers to be scared witless, and they are happy to pay for the privilege of it. We constantly ask the question as to why this is so; do we derive basic thrills from triggering the rush of adrenalin which fear brings, or do horror stories serve a wider moral purpose, reinforcing the rules and taboos of our society and showing the morbid fate of those who object?

With all given thought, the origin of horror films comes from horror within literature.
The genre has ancient origins which were reformulated in the eighteenth century as Gothic horror, with publication of the ‘Castle of Otranto’ (1764) by Horace Walpole.

Supernatural horror has its roots in folklore and religious traditions on death, the afterlife, evil, the demonic and the principle of evil embodied in The Devil. These were manifested in stories of witches, vampires, werewolves, ghosts.
The eighteenth century Gothic horror drew on these sources within such work as The Italian (1797) by Ann Radcliffe. A lot of horror fiction written in this era was by women authors and this gothic horror tradition carried on through the 19th century when Mary Shelly wrote the T first great horror classic ‘Frankenstein’ (1818).

H.P. Lovecraft and M.R. James are classed as two of the great gothic horror writers of the 20th century.

One of the first interpretations of horror films was created by Georges Méliès (1896) with his silent short film ‘Le Manoir du diable’ ("The House of the Devil"). This film starts off with a large bat flying into a medieval castle. Once in, the bat circles slowly while flapping its monstrous wings before suddenly changing into Mephistopheles. After preparing a cauldron, the demon produces skeletons, ghosts, and witches from its bubbling contents before one of the summoned underworld cavaliers holds up a crucifix and Satan vanishes in a blast of smoke. The film contained many traditional pantomime elements and was intentionally meant to amuse people, rather than frighten them. Nonetheless, it is considered to be the first horror film.

The 20th century brought more milestones for the horror genre. Many of the first feature length horror films were created by German film makers in 1910’s/20’s. For example ‘Nosferatu’, this was the first vampire themed feature film. Early Hollywood dram films lead into horror themed movies such as ‘The Phantom of the Opera’ and ‘Dr. Jekyll and Hyde’. These were both silent horror film adaptations from the book/novel.

In the early 1930’s Horror in Hollywood was popularised a lot by the American producers. It brought a series of gothic horror movies to the screen. Some films were blended with science – fiction and Gothic horror, such as ‘The Invisible Man’. These films in this era were designed to thrill and incorporate serious elements but were mainly influenced by German Expressionist films from the 1920’s. Even though some studious didn’t give of a reputation of spectacular films of their day, they did produce some films that are very important within the history of horror movies. For example; the remake of ‘Dr. Jekyll and Hyde’ and ‘Mystery of the Wax Museum’.