The History Of Horror

The History Of Horror

Horror stories are an ancient art form. People told ghost stories to terrify eachother. This then progressed into full length novels based around these horror stories, then into television programmes (once it became available) and then finally into full length films. Stephen King quoted, 'If movies are the dreams of the mass culture... horror movies are the nightmares', this shows how he sees horror films as being important to society in the modern day world. Horror movies are films that get a negative emotional response from the audience and are invented to play upon ones fears.

Horror films are very powerful and have derived from the ballads of the ancient world, which then developed into modern urban myths. The idea if being scared is particularly appealing to some people, they want the 'buzz' (for the want of a better expression) of the film, programme or whatever they get the adrenaline rush from. This rush is provided by the action and the terror, this triggers the senses, hence leading to he overall feeling of fear. 

The first real horror film was "Le Manoir du Diable" or "House Of the Devil" which was filmed by Georges Melies of France in 1896. The film runs for roughly three minutes and is completely silent. However, many people see the first 'real' horror film (including sound) as being "Frankenstein" (1931). Boris Karloff is simply addressed as '?' in the credits and at the start of the film - because it was the first of its time - there is a short speech from an actor to 'warn' you about the contents of the film, stating how it 'isn't for the weak hearted'. This was such an unusual beginning to a film as nobody had ever experienced a horror film before and even looking back on the film today it seems strange that they would have to warn people about the contents of the film they are about to watch. 

Horror films often embody such fears as of which are found in society like;
Alienation - 'The Hills Have Eyes'
Science gone to the extremes - 'I Am Legend'
People going insane - 'The Devil Inside'
Serial Killers - 'I Saw The Devil'
Family - 'Mama'

More modern horror films tend to focus on things like paranormal activity, zombie apocalypses, serial killers and often have under-lying messages about social, political and environmental issues, whereas, in older horror films, these conventions were used, but, to far less detail and executed to a far less professional level as the technology was not available for things such a CGI and Special FX to be added to the original capture.