A Guided Tour of Hell: A Brief History of Horror Films

Before Jigsaw, there was Freddy Kruger and Jason Vorhees. Before those two were slicing and dicing up teenagers, there were Michael Myers and Leatherface. And before them, there were Dracula, the Wolfman, Doctor Frankenstein and his monster. And before all of them was Nergal, Lord of Death

WHO IS NERGAL?

Who’s the monster? Frankenstein or Dr. Frankenstein?

Frankenstein 1931

So how did anyone every think of making a horror film?

The Great Train Robbery, 1903Edison Inventions

Kinetophone

Kinetograph

Kinetoscope

The Devil’s Castle (1897) by Georges Méliès

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1919)

The Death of Dracula 1921

Monster of Fate 1914

Hunch Back of Notre Dame (1939)

The Phantom of the Opera (1925)

The Thing from Another World (1951)

War of the Worlds (1953)

The Haunting (1963)

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

1960’s: A New Monster: ManThe Psychological Thriller

Psycho

Silence of the Lambs

MonsterMonster

Se7en

1970’s: Satan, Man, Society and Extermes

Rosemary’s Baby (1968)

The Exorcist (1973)

The SHINING (1979)

1980’s: Rise of the Slasher Film

1990’s: Remakes and Refinements

Fallen (1998)

Japan Rise Again: Homegrown Mass Murder

Fallen (1998)

Late 2000 and early 21st Century:Fantasy Horror in Latin America based on Social Issues

The Orphanage (2007)

Pan’s Labryinth (2006)

Cronos

Homework:• What SubGenre of Horror is

your film?• What is the mythology or

Folklore that sets the rules for your genre?

• Specifically, what are the rules of your film?

• Look up some screeplays on the internet to see how they write the characters growth.

• Do I believe the things I write about?

Research, Research, Research!