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Item:202652460315NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET SIGN EARRINGS Freddy Krueger enamel horror jewelry RARE. Check out our other new & used items>>>>>HERE! (click me) FOR SALE: A cult classic horror-themed wearable accessory A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET "ST. SIGN" DANGLE EARRINGS DETAILS: Wear your scare with official A Nightmare on Elm Street earrings! Publicly endorse your favorite fictional serial slayer with this killer-looking pair of creepy-cute Elm St. earrings. These French, or fish hook, style earrings feature a metal alloy and enamel build, much like a lapel pin. The enamel paints have a lovely shimmer to them. Inspired by the classic, supernatural slasher film franchise SG@NYC created dangle style earrings that focus on the location of most evil in Nightmare . The dazzling, blood-splattered pair is a literal symbolic representation of the infamous street name that is central to the A Nightmare On Elm Street plot. The Elm St.
street sign is an iconic vision and that's why these earrings are iconic as well [laughs in Freddy Krueger]. A must-have for the fashionable Nightmare and Freddy fanatic! Makes a great gift for the swanky devotees of the frightening slasher film series and collectors of all things Freddy Krueger.
Perfect for wearing during the Halloween season; Halloween parties and
festivities, or if your style is always macabre then all-year-round! A rare pair! That's right! Manufactured
and originally sold at select locations in 2017 and have since been
retired. After the 2017 Halloween season the enamel and alloy "Elm St.
Sign" earrings were no longer available online or in-store — making them
hard to find and more collectible by the day. SG@NYC has no plans of
reproducing this great looking pair of earrings so get them while you
can. T he wonderful manufacturer of eye-catching jewelry got official license from New Line to design and produce their own A Nightmare on Elm Street -themed earrings and they did not disappoint. Dimensions: Elm St. sign: approx. 1/2" x 1-1/8" CONDITION: New. Please see photos. To ensure safe delivery all items are carefully packaged before shipping out. THANK YOU FOR LOOKING. QUESTIONS? JUST ASK. *ALL PHOTOS AND TEXT ARE INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY OF SIDEWAYS STAIRS CO. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.* "A
Nightmare on Elm Street is an American supernatural slasher-horror
media franchise consisting of nine films, a television series, novels,
comic books, and various other media. The franchise began with the film A
Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), written and directed by Wes Craven. The
overall plot of the franchise centers around the fictional character
Fred "Freddy" Krueger, the apparition of a former-child killer who was
burned alive by the vengeful parents of his victims, who returns from
the grave to terrorize and kill the teenage residents of Springwood,
Ohio in their dreams. Craven returned to the franchise to co-script the
second sequel, A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987), and
to write/direct New Nightmare (1994). The films collectively grossed
$472 million at the box office worldwide. The original film was
released in 1984. A series of sequels produced by the independent film
company New Line Cinema followed. New Line often attributes the growth
of their company to the success of the Nightmare series.[1] The film
series as a whole has received mixed reviews by critics, but has been a
financial success at the box office. When comparing the United States
box office grosses of other American horror film series, A Nightmare on
Elm Street is the third highest grossing series in adjusted US
dollars.[2] In 1988, a television series was produced with Freddy as the
host. The pilot episode focused on the night Freddy was burned alive by
the angry parents of the children he had killed, though the rest of the
series featured episodes with independent plots. Twelve novels,
separate from the adaptations of the films, and multiple comic book
series were published featuring Freddy Krueger, as well as a crossover
film featuring fellow horror icon Jason Voorhees from the Friday the
13th franchise. A remake of the 1984 film was released in 2010, while a
reboot is in development.[3][4][5] Films Film U.S. release date Directed by Screenwriter(s) Story by Produced by A Nightmare on Elm Street November 9, 1984 Wes Craven Robert Shaye A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge November 1, 1985 Jack Sholder David Chaskin A
Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors February 27, 1987
Chuck Russell Wes Craven, Bruce Wagner, Chuck Russell & Frank
Darabont Wes Craven & Bruce Wagner A Nightmare on Elm Street
4: The Dream Master August 19, 1988 Renny Harlin Jim Wheat,
Ken Wheat & Brian Helgeland Brian Helgeland & William
Kotzwinkle Robert Shaye & Rachel Talalay A Nightmare on Elm
Street 5: The Dream Child August 11, 1989 Stephen Hopkins
Leslie Bohem John Skipp, Leslie Bohem & Craig Spector Robert
Shaye & Rupert Harvey Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare
September 13, 1991 Rachel Talalay Michael De Luca Rachel
Talalay Aron Warner & Robert Shaye Wes Craven's New Nightmare October 14, 1994 Wes Craven Marianne Maddalena Freddy vs. Jason August 15, 2003 Ronny Yu Mark Swift & Damian Shannon Sean S. Cunningham A
Nightmare on Elm Street April 30, 2010 Samuel Bayer Wesley
Strick & Eric Heisserer Wesley Strick Brad Fuller, Andrew
Form & Michael Bay Overview The original film, written and
directed by Wes Craven and titled A Nightmare on Elm Street, was
released in 1984. The story focuses on Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund)
attacking Nancy Thompson (Heather Langenkamp) and her friends in their
dreams, successfully killing all but Nancy, in fictional Springwood,
Ohio. Krueger's back-story is revealed by Nancy's mother, Marge, who
explains he was a child murderer. The parents of Springwood killed
Krueger after he was acquitted on a technicality. Nancy defeats Freddy
by pulling him from the dream world and stripping him of his powers when
she stops being afraid of him.[6] Freddy returns to possesses
the body of Jesse Walsh (Mark Patton), the new teenager living in Nancy
Thompson's house, in 1985's A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's
Revenge. Jesse is temporarily saved by his girlfriend Lisa (Kim Myers),
who helps him exorcise Krueger's spirit.[7] Wes Craven returned
to write A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, released in 1987.
In the second sequel, Freddy is systematically killing the last of the
Elm Street children. The few remaining children have been placed in
Westin Hills Mental Institution, for allegedly attempting suicide. Nancy
Thompson arrives at Westin Hills as a new intern, and realizes the
children are being killed by Freddy. With the help of Dr. Neil Gordon
(Craig Wasson), Nancy helps Kristen Parker (Patricia Arquette), Joey
(Rodney Eastman), Taryn (Jennifer Rubin), Kincaid (Ken Sagoes), and Will
(Ira Heiden) find their dream powers, so they can kill Freddy once and
for all. Neil, unknowingly until the end, meets the spirit of Freddy's
mother, Amanda Krueger (Nan Martin), who instructs him to bury Freddy's
remains in hallowed ground in order to stop him for good. Neil completes
his task, but not before Freddy kills Nancy.[8] The story of
Kristen Parker would continue with 1988's A Nightmare on Elm Street 4:
The Dream Master. This time, Kristen (Tuesday Knight) unwittingly
releases Freddy, who immediately kills Kincaid and Joey. Before Freddy
can kill Kristen, she transfers her dream powers to Alice Johnson (Lisa
Wilcox), a friend from school. Alice begins inadvertently providing
victims for Freddy when she begins pulling people into her dreams while
she sleeps. Alice, who begins taking on traits of the friends who were
murdered, confronts Freddy. She uses the power of the Dream Master to
release all the souls Freddy has taken; they subsequently rip themselves
from Freddy's body, killing him in the process.[9] Picking up
shortly after the events of The Dream Master, A Nightmare on Elm Street
5: The Dream Child involves Freddy using Alice's unborn child, Jacob
(Whitby Hertford), to resurrect himself and find new victims. The spirit
of Amanda Krueger (Beatrice Boepple) returns, revealing that Freddy was
conceived when she, a nun working in a mental asylum, was accidentally
locked in a room with "100 maniacs" and raped "hundreds of times".
Amanda Krueger convinces Jacob to use the powers he was given by Freddy
against him, which gives her the chance to subdue Freddy long enough for
Alice and Jacob to escape the dream world.[10] Two years later,
1991's Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare followed the exploits of "John
Doe" (Shon Greenblatt), an amnesiac teenager from Springwood, who was
sent out to find Freddy's daughter Maggie (Lisa Zane), who he needs to
leave Springwood. Freddy's goal is to create new "Elm Streets", and
begin a new killing spree after having killed all of the children in
Springwood. Maggie, utilizing new dream techniques, uncovers Krueger's
past, which include: being taunted by schoolmates for being the "son of
100 maniacs", being cruel to animals, beaten by his stepfather, the
murder of his own wife when she discovers he has been killing children,
and the moment when the Dream Demons arrive in his boiler room to make
him the offer of eternal life. Eventually, Maggie pulls Freddy out of
the dream world, and uses a pipe bomb to blow him up.[11] Wes
Craven returned to the Nightmare series a third time with New Nightmare
in 1994. This film focuses on a fictional "reality", where Craven,
Langenkamp, and Englund all play themselves, and where the character of
Freddy Krueger is really an evil entity that has been trapped in the
realm of fiction by all the movies that have been made. Since the movies
have stopped, the entity, which likes being Freddy Krueger, is trying
to escape into the real world. The only person in its way is Heather
Langenkamp, who the entity sees as "Nancy" – the first person who
defeated him. Craven explains to Langenkamp the only way to keep the
entity contained is for her to "play Nancy one last time". Langenkamp
pursues "Krueger", who has kidnapped her son, into the dream world as
"Nancy". There, she and her son trap Krueger in a furnace until he is
finally destroyed.[12] In 2003, New Line pitted Friday the 13th's
Jason Voorhees against Freddy Krueger. The film, Freddy vs. Jason,
explains that Freddy Krueger has grown weak as people in Springwood, his
home, have suppressed their fear of him. Freddy, who is impersonating
Pamela Voorhees, the mother of Jason Voorhees, sends Jason (Ken
Kirzinger) to Springwood to cause panic and fear. Jason accomplishes
this, but refuses to stop killing. A battle ensues in both the dream
world and Crystal Lake between the two villains. The winner is left
ambiguous, as Jason surfaces from the lake holding Freddy's severed
head, which winks and laughs.[13] In 2010, a remake of the
original Nightmare on Elm Street was released. Here, Freddy (Jackie
Earle Haley) stalks the dreams of Nancy Holbrook (Rooney Mara) and her
friends as they discover that they all share a common link from their
childhood; they were all molested by Freddy before he was murdered by
their vengeful parents. Now a supernatural force in their dreams, Freddy
kills off the children that alerted the parents about his
transgressions. Freddy slowly works his way to Nancy, his favorite of
the children, and manipulates her into going without sleep long enough
that her body falls into a coma, resulting in permanent sleep and life
with Freddy forever. Nancy is awakened when her friend Quentin (Kyle
Gallner) injects adrenaline into her and pulls Freddy out of the
dreamworld, where she and Quentin kill him and burn the remains of his
body.[14] Development The basis for the original Nightmare on
Elm Street has been said to have been inspired by several newspaper
articles printed in the LA Times in the 1970s on a group of Khmer
refugees, who, after fleeing to America from the Khmer Rouge Genocide in
Cambodia, were suffering disturbing nightmares after which they refused
to sleep. Some of the men died in their sleep soon after. Medical
authorities called the phenomenon "Asian Death Syndrome". The condition
itself afflicted only men between the ages of 19-57 and is believed to
be sudden unexplained death syndrome and/or Brugada syndrome.[15] The
1970s pop song "Dream Weaver" by Gary Wright sealed the story for
Craven, giving him not only an artistic setting to "jump off" from, but a
synthesizer riff from the Elm Street soundtrack as well.[16] It has
also been stated that he drew some inspiration after studying eastern
religions.[17] Initially, Fred Krueger was intended to be a child
molester, but Craven eventually decided to characterize him as a child
murderer to avoid being accused of exploiting a spate of highly
publicized child molestation cases that occurred in California around
the time of production of the film.[18] By Craven's account, his own
adolescent experiences led to the naming of Fred Krueger. He had been
bullied at school by a child named Fred Krueger, and named his villain
accordingly.[18] The colored sweater he chose for his villain was based
on the DC Comics character Plastic Man, and Craven chose to make
Krueger's sweater colors that of red and green, after reading an article
in Scientific American in 1982 that said the two most clashing colors
to the human retina were this particular combination.[19] Robert
Englund has revealed that at a time, there was a serious development
toward a prequel for Freddy's story called The First Kills, which would
have been centered around two policemen chasing for the Springwood
Slasher and two lawyers during the legal proceedings. Englund claims
that John McNaughton was considered for directing the prequel, but these
plans were forgotten after New Line Cinema was merged with Turner
Broadcasting System in 1994.[20][21] McNaughton came back later around
the millennium shift and hoped to produce an alternative prequel story,
alongside scriptwriter R.J. Tsarov, which would have been set in Hell,
where McNaughton imagined Freddy to have been stuck in between his
lynching and the events of the 1984 film. New Line Cinema rejected this
idea due to the film Little Nicky (2000) having been partially set in
Hell while also being a box-office bomb, deterring the company from
producing another film set in Hell at that time.[22][23] On
January 29, 2008, Variety reported that Michael Bay and his Platinum
Dunes production company would be rebooting the Nightmare on Elm Street
franchise with a remake of the original 1984 film.[24] To provide a
freshness to the character, producer Brad Fuller explained that they
were abandoning the things that made the character less scary—Freddy
would not be "cracking jokes" as had become a staple of his character in
later sequels—and focus more on trying to craft a "horrifying
movie".[25] There was not agreement among the original crew as to
whether it would be a good idea to remake the film. Craven expressed his
displeasure, primarily because the filmmakers chose not to have him as a
consultant to the film, unlike with the 2009 remake The Last House on
the Left where he "shepherd[ed] it towards production".[26] In contrast,
Robert Englund felt it was time for A Nightmare on Elm Street to be
remade. Englund liked the idea of being able to "exploit the dreamscape"
with CGI and other technologies that did not exist when Craven was
making the original Nightmare on Elm Street in 1984.[27] Box office When
comparing A Nightmare on Elm Street with the other top-grossing horror
series—Child's Play, Friday the 13th, Halloween, the Hannibal Lecter
series, Psycho, Saw, Scream, and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre—and
adjusting for the 2010 inflation,[28] A Nightmare on Elm Street is the
third highest grossing horror series, in the United States, at
approximately $583.4 million.[2] The series is topped by Friday the 13th
at $671.5 million.[29] A Nightmare on Elm Street is after the Halloween
series with $620.4 million,[30] then Hannibal Lecter series with $579.4
million,[31] Saw with $404.5 million,[32] Scream with $398.3
million,[33] Psycho with $370.3 million,[34] The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
with $314.6 million,[35] and the Child's Play film series rounding out
the list with approximately $199.7 million.[36] Film Release date (US) Budget Box office revenue Reference United States Other territories Worldwide A
Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) November 9, 1984 $1,800,000[37]
$25,624,448 $31,560,686 $57,185,134 [38][39][40] A
Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge November 1, 1985
$3,000,000[41] $29,999,213 $29,999,213 [42] A
Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors February 27, 1987
$4,300,000–4,600,000[39][43] $44,793,222 $44,793,222
[44] A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master August 19,
1988 $6,500,000[39][45] $49,369,899 $49,369,899 [46] A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child August 11, 1989 $8,000,000[47] $22,168,359 $22,168,359 [48] Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare September 13, 1991 $9,000,000[39] $34,872,033 $34,872,033 [49] Wes Craven's New Nightmare October 14, 1994 $8,000,000[50] $18,090,181 $1,631,560 $19,721,741 [51] Freddy vs. Jason August 15, 2003 $30,000,000[52] $82,633,448 $34,009,973 $116,643,421 [53] A
Nightmare on Elm Street (2010) April 30, 2010 $35,000,000[54]
$63,075,011 $52,620,171 $115,695,182 [55][56] Totals $105,600,000–$105,900,000 $370,625,814 $119,822,390 $490,448,204 Future In
August 2015, it was reported that Warner Bros. Pictures and New Line
Cinema were developing a second remake with Orphan writer David Leslie
Johnson, with Toby Emmerich, Walter Hamada and Dave Neustadter producing
it.[57] In June 2016, Brad Fuller said the remake was in
development hell. Englund expressed interest in returning to the series
in a cameo role.[58] He later expressed interest in having Kevin Bacon
to portray Freddy.[59] In October 2018, Robert Englund reprised his role as Freddy Krueger on a Halloween-themed episode of The Goldbergs.[60] In
December 2018, Leslie Johnson said the remake of A Nightmare on Elm
Street was still in development, but New Line Cinema was more focused on
The Conjuring Universe: "It's still happening. Nothing is
percolating just yet. The Conjuring universe is sort of first and
foremost on [New Line Cinema's] horror burner. Everybody wants to see
Freddy again I think, so I think it's inevitable at some point".[61] In
September 2019, it was announced that film rights had reverted back to
Wes Craven's estate. By November, the estate had begun work on future
project pitches for new A Nightmare on Elm Street projects; with pitches
received for both feature film and a potential HBO Max series, with the
intent to have Robert Englund reprise his role as Freddy
Krueger.[62][63][64] Television Main article: Freddy's Nightmares Beginning
on October 9, 1988, Freddy's Nightmares was an anthology series, in the
vein of The Twilight Zone, which featured different horror stories each
week. The show was hosted by Freddy Krueger, with Robert Englund
reprising his role from the films. Freddy played more of a background
character, but occasionally showed up to influence the plot of
particular episodes. The series ran for two seasons and a total of 44
episodes, ending March 10, 1990.[65] Although most of the episodes did
not feature Freddy taking a major role in the plot, the pilot episode
"No More Mr. Nice Guy" depicts the events of Krueger's trial, and his
subsequent death at the hands of the parents of Elm Street after his
acquittal. Directed by Tobe Hooper, creator of The Texas Chainsaw
Massacre franchise, Freddy's acquittal is based on the arresting
officer, Lt. Tim Blocker, not reading him his Miranda rights, which is
different from the original Nightmare that stated he was acquitted
because someone forgot to sign a search warrant. After the town's
parents burn Freddy to death he returns to haunt Blocker in his dreams.
Freddy gets his revenge when Blocker is put to sleep at the dentist's
office, and Freddy shows up and kills him.[66] In other media Literature Novels Between
1987 and 2003, Freddy Krueger appeared in the novelization of each of
the films. The first five films were adapted by St. Martin's Press.
Those adaptations follow the films closely, with minor changes to
specific details that occurred in the film. A Nightmare on Elm Street 3
does not follow the respective film, instead utilizing the same plot
elements to tell a different story altogether. This novel also provides a
different backstory for Freddy.[67][68] In 1992, Abdo & Daughters
Publishing Company released adaptations of their own for the first six
films. Written by Bob Italia, each was under one hundred pages and
followed the films' plot.[69][70][71][72][73][74] The final two books,
Wes Craven's New Nightmare and Freddy vs. Jason, were published by Tor
Books and Black Flame. These novels also followed the films closely,
with the adaptation of Freddy vs. Jason containing a different ending
than the movie.[75][76] Comic books Main article: A Nightmare on Elm Street (comics) The
popularity of the film series also led to the creation of several comic
book series published by companies such as Marvel Comics, Innovation
Comics, Trident Comics, Avatar Press and, most recently, WildStorm
Comics. Writers such as Steve Gerber, Andy Mangels, Chuck Dixon and
Brian Pulido have all contributed stories to the various series. There
have been crossovers with other franchises, such as Freddy vs. Jason vs.
Ash: The Nightmare Warriors. Documentary Main article: Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy On
May 4, 2010, a 4-hour documentary chronicling the Nightmare on Elm
Street series was released. The documentary includes interviews with the
cast and crew for all of the Nightmare films.[77] In a wish to utilize
individuals who contributed to the series, the makers of the documentary
procured poster artist Matthew Joseph Peak to create the artwork for
the release poster and DVD cover, and composer Charles Bernstein for the
film's main title music.[78][79] As part of a special offering, the
filmmakers gave away a limited edition poster to anyone that ordered the
documentary from the official website. Those same individuals would
also be entered into a drawing to win one of three 27" × 40" teaser
posters signed by dozens of people who worked on the films and were
interviewed in the documentary.[80] Michael Gingold of Fangoria felt the
filmmakers did an amazing job bringing together all of the
behind-the-scenes footage, picture, never-before-seen deleted scenes, FX
scenes, and other "treasures". Gingold noted that even die-hard fans
would find something new.[81] Bloody Disgusting's Ryan Daley praised the
film for being educational, and looking at the legacy of both A
Nightmare on Elm Street and New Line Cinema. Daley believed that there
was no better horror documentary.[82] Nick Hyman of Under the Radar
noted that Never Sleep Again, unlike the earlier His Name Was Jason
documentary, provided a more candid interview process with the people
involved. Hyman pointed out that the best part of the documentary is the
look at New Line's success through the Elm Street films, and the
financial struggles and deadlines that plagued the film series.[83] Aside
from the Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy documentary, some
smaller documentaries have been made; The Making of 'Nightmare on Elm
Street IV' (1989) and The Making of Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare
(1991) covered the making of part 4 and 6 respectively.[84][85] MTV
released another short promotional special Slash & Burn: The Freddy
Krueger Story in 1991.[86] Robert Englund also narrated the documentary
Freddy Speaks in 1992, both as himself and as Freddy Krueger.[87]
Heather Langenkamp released her own documentary called I Am Nancy in
2011, while Mark Patton also released a personal documentary, Scream,
Queen! My Nightmare on Elm Street in 2019.[88] Merchandise In
February 2010, Funko released a Freddy Bobblehead.[89] Also in 2010,
NECA released a 10" puppet of Freddy Krueger from Phillip's death scene
in A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors,[90] a metal replica of
his glove, and two action figures: Freddy before he was burned, and the
other being him after the burning, including two interchangeable
heads.[91] Video games This section does not cite any
sources. Please help improve this section by adding citations to
reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.
(March 2020) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) A
Nightmare on Elm Street is the shared name of two unrelated video games
released in 1989, both loosely based on the series. From among those
films, Dream Warriors and The Dream Master were particular influences on
the gameplay of each. LJN (programmed by Rare) released one title for
the NES, and Monarch Software the other for the Commodore 64 and IBM PC
compatibles. A Nightmare on Elm Street: A Nintendo
Entertainment System videogame released in 1989. Up to four players
control characters who jump and punch their way through Elm Street
locations as they collect the bones of Freddy Krueger to place them in a
furnace and end his reign of terror. Each character can withstand only
four hits from opponents before losing a life. An on-screen meter slowly
diminishes (more quickly when sustaining damage), representing how
close a particular character is to falling asleep. Obtaining cups of
coffee within the game restores characters' sleep bar. When any
character's sleep bar empties, all the players are transported to the
dream world, where enemies take on new appearances and are more
difficult to defeat. In the dream world, coffee cups are replaced with
radios, which return the characters to the normal world and difficulty.
Dream Warrior icons appear that once collected by any player, permit
transformation into one of three "Dream Warriors". Each warrior has a
projectile attack and improved movement: ninja (throwing stars, jump
kick), acrobat (javelins, somersault), and magician (fireballs,
hovering). These icons appear only in the normal world, and can be used
only in the dream. If a character remains asleep too long, the film's
theme song plays and a combative encounter with Freddy ensues. Upon
collecting all the bones in a level, the player is automatically put in
the dream world and battles Freddy, who takes on a special form similar
to those presented in the films. The final level is set at Elm Street
High School as players navigate to the boiler room to burn Freddy's
bones. Here one final battle with Freddy Krueger occurs. The game can
utilize the NES Four Score or NES Satellite accessories to enable
four-player gameplay. A Nightmare on Elm Street: A game produced
by Monarch Software for C64/IBM-PC gaming. Developed by Westwood
Associates, its role-playing elements and overhead viewpoint bear some
similarity to Gauntlet. The player chooses to play as either Kincaid,
Kristen Parker, Will, Nancy, or Taryn on a quest to save Joey and defeat
Freddy. The player must locate keys to open doors. Weapons and items
are scattered about the levels or can be purchased from vending
machines. Enemies are varied, from skeletons to wheelchairs. Freddy
assumes the role of "boss monster" and transforms into a snake, much
like his appearance in A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors. David
Bergantino, video game developer, wanted to produce a Freddy vs. Jason
game called Freddy vs. Jason: Hell Unbound, but the film being stuck in
development hell constantly delayed any release of a video game, and
once a release date had been set for the film, there would have been
insufficient time to develop the game to correspond with the film's
release date. The game would have continued on from Jason Goes to Hell:
The Final Friday (1993) and have been its own storyline instead of being
based on any screenplay. Bergantino considered Dreamcast, PlayStation 2
and later Xbox as possible platforms for the video game. The game would
have allowed up to four players with Freddy or Jason as player
characters, in various forms such as "Hooded Jason" or "Snake-Freddy".
The premise would have been that Freddy and Jason are permanently stuck
in Hell due to their countless unforgivable sins; Death makes the offer
that whoever of the two can fight their way out of Hell, against demons
and others of its denizens, gaining the highest body-count, would have
been allowed to leave Hell, while the loser will remain stuck there
forever. As each of the slashers are stuck in their personal hells,
versions of Elm Street and Camp Crystal Lake would have existed there in
some form. Freddy-based levels would have been more surreal, while
Freddy could have toyed with Jason's perceptions." (wikipedia.org) "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 Langenkamp, John Saxon, Ronee Blakley, Robert Englund as
Freddy Krueger,[6][7] and Johnny Depp in his film debut. The plot
concerns four teenagers living on one street in the fictitious town of
Springwood, Ohio[N 1], who are invaded and killed in their dreams, and
thus killed in reality, by a burnt killer with a bladed leather glove. Craven
filmed A Nightmare on Elm Street on an estimated budget of $1.1
million.[3] The film was released on November 9, 1984, and grossed $57
million worldwide.[4][5] A Nightmare on Elm Street[11] was met with rave
critical reviews and is considered to be one of the greatest horror
films ever made, spawning a franchise consisting of six sequels, a
television series, a crossover with Friday the 13th, and various other
merchandise. A remake of the same name was released in 2010,[12][13]
and, aside from Stunts, Polyester, and Alone in the Dark, it was one of
the first films produced by New Line Cinema, who by that point mostly
distributed films, leading the company to become a successful film
studio up till 2008[14] and was even nicknamed "The House that Freddy
Built". The film is credited with using many of the tropes found
in the low-budget horror films of the 1970s and 1980s that originated
with John Carpenter's Halloween (1978) and led this subgenre to be
called the slasher film. The film includes a morality play where
sexually promiscuous teenagers are killed.[13][15] Critics and film
historians state that the film's premise is the struggle to define the
distinction between dreams and reality, manifested by the lives and
dreams of the teens in the film.[16] Critics today praise the film's
ability to transgress "the boundaries between the imaginary and
real",[17] toying with audience perceptions.[18] The film was followed by A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge.... Plot In
March 1981, Tina Gray awakens from a nightmare wherein she is attacked
by a disfigured man wearing a blade-fixed glove in a boiler room. Her
mother points out four mysterious slashes on her nightgown. The
following morning, Tina is consoled by her best friend Nancy Thompson
and Nancy's boyfriend, Glen Lantz. The two stay at Tina's house when
Tina's mother goes out of town, but their sleepover is interrupted by
Tina's boyfriend, Rod Lane. When Tina falls asleep, she dreams of being
chased by the disfigured man. Rod is awoken by Tina's thrashing and sees
her dragged and fatally slashed by an unseen force, forcing him to flee
as Nancy and Glen awaken to find Tina bloodied and dead. The
next day, Rod is arrested by Nancy's father, Don Thompson, despite his
pleas of innocence. At school, Nancy falls asleep in class and dreams
that the man chases her to the boiler room where she is cornered. She
then deliberately burns her arm on a pipe. The burn startles her awake
in class and she notices a burn mark on her arm. Nancy goes to Rod at
the police station, who tells her details about what happened to Tina
along with his own recent nightmares. This makes Nancy believe that the
man is responsible for Tina's death. At home, Nancy falls asleep
in the bathtub and is nearly drowned. Nancy then depends on caffeine to
stay awake and invites Glen to watch over her as she sleeps. In her
dream, Nancy sees the man prepare to kill Rod in his cell but then he
turns his attention towards her. Nancy runs away and wakes up when her
alarm clock goes off. The man kills Rod by wrapping bed sheets around
his neck like a noose, making it look like a suicide. At Rod's funeral,
Nancy's parents become worried when she describes her dreams. Her
mother, Marge, takes her to a sleep disorders clinic where, in a dream,
Nancy grabs the man's fedora (with the name "Fred Krueger" written in
it) and pulls it from the dream into reality. Upon barricading
the house, Marge reveals to Nancy that Krueger was an insane child
murderer who was released on a technicality and then burned alive by
parents living on their street seeking vigilante justice. Nancy realizes
that Krueger, now a vengeful ghost, desires revenge and to satiate his
psychopathic needs. Nancy tries to call Glen to warn him, but his father
prevents her from speaking to him. Glen falls asleep and is killed by
Krueger. Now alone, Nancy puts Marge to sleep and asks Don, who
is across the street investigating Glen's death, to break into the house
in twenty minutes. Nancy rigs booby traps around the house and grabs
Krueger out of the dream and into the real world. The booby traps affect
Krueger enough that Nancy can light him on fire and lock him in the
basement. Nancy rushes to the door for help. The police arrive to find
that Krueger has escaped from the basement. Nancy and Don go upstairs to
find a burning Krueger smothering Marge in her bedroom. After Don puts
out the fire, Krueger and Marge vanish into the bed. When Don
leaves the room, Krueger rises from the bed behind Nancy. Nancy realizes
that Krueger is powered by his victim's fear and she calmly turns her
back to him. Krueger evaporates when he attempts to lunge at her. Nancy
steps outside into a bright and foggy morning where all her friends and
her mother are still alive. Nancy gets into Glen's convertible to go to
school and then the top suddenly comes down and locks them in as the
car drives uncontrollably down the street. Three girls in white dresses
playing jump rope are heard chanting Krueger's nursery rhyme as Marge is
grabbed by Krueger through the front door window. Cast Main articles: List of cast members of the Nightmare on Elm Street series and List of A Nightmare on Elm Street characters The
cast of A Nightmare on Elm Street included a crew of veteran actors
such as Robert Englund and John Saxon and several aspiring young actors
like Johnny Depp and Heather Langenkamp. Heather Langenkamp as Nancy Thompson John Saxon as Lt. Donald "Don" Thompson Robert Englund as Fred "Freddy" Krueger[N 2] Johnny Depp as Glen Lantz Ronee Blakley as Marge Thompson Amanda Wyss as Christina "Tina" Gray Nick Corri as Rod Lane Leslie Hoffman as Hall Guard Joseph Whipp as Sgt. Parker Charles Fleischer as Dr. King Lin Shaye as Teacher Mimi Craven as Nurse Jack Shea as Minister Ed Call as Mr. Lantz Sandy Lipton as Mrs. Lantz David Andrews as Foreman Jeff Levine as Coroner Donna Woodrum as Mrs. Gray Paul Grenier as Mrs. Gray's boyfriend Ash Adams and Don Hannah as Surfers Shashawnee Hall, Brian Reise and Carol Pritikin as Cops Kathi Gibbs, John Richard Peterson, Chris Tashima and Antonia Yannouli as Kids (uncredited) Robert Shaye has two uncredited roles as broadcasters for local television news and KRGR Radio station. Make-up
artist David Miller designed Krueger's disfigured face based on
photographs of burn victims obtained from the UCLA Medical Center.[20] Production Development A
Nightmare on Elm Street contains many biographical elements from
director Wes Craven's childhood.[21] The basis of the film was inspired
by several newspaper articles printed in the Los Angeles Times in the
1970s about Hmong refugees, who, after fleeing to the United States
because of war and genocide in Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam, suffered
disturbing nightmares and refused to sleep. Some of the men died in
their sleep soon after. Medical authorities called the phenomenon Asian
Death Syndrome. The condition afflicted men between the ages of 19 and
57 and was believed to be sudden unexplained death syndrome or Brugada
syndrome or both.[22] Craven stated that "It was a series of articles in
the LA Times; three small articles about men from South East Asia, who
were from immigrant families and had died in the middle of
nightmares—and the paper never correlated them, never said, 'Hey, we've
had another story like this."[23] The 1970s pop song "Dream Weaver" by
Gary Wright sealed the story for Craven, giving him not only an artistic
setting to jump off from, but a synthesizer riff for the movie
soundtrack.[24] Craven has also stated that he drew some inspiration for
the film from Eastern religions.[25] Other sources attribute the
inspiration for the film to be a 1968 student film project made by
Craven's students at Clarkson University. The student film parodied
contemporary horror films, and was filmed along Elm Street in Potsdam,
New York.[26][27] The film's villain, Freddy Krueger, is drawn
from Craven's early life. One night, a young Craven saw an elderly man
walking on the sidepath outside the window of his home. The man stopped
to glance at a startled Craven and walked off. This served as the
inspiration for Krueger.[21] Initially, Fred Krueger was intended to be a
child molester, but Craven eventually characterized him as a child
murderer to avoid being accused of exploiting a spate of highly
publicized child molestation cases that occurred in California around
the time of production of the film.[20] On Freddy's nature, Craven
states that "in a sense, Freddy stands for the worst of parenthood and
adulthood – the dirty old man, the nasty father and the adult who wants
children to die rather than help them prosper. He's the boogey man and
the worst fear of children – the adult that's out to get them. He's a
very primal figure, sort of like Kronos devouring his children – that
evil, twisted, perverted father figure that wants to destroy and is able
to get them at their most vulnerable moment, which is when they're
asleep!".[28] By Craven's account, his own adolescent experiences
led him to the name Freddy Krueger; he had been bullied at school by a
child named Fred Krueger.[20] Craven had done the same thing in his film
The Last House on the Left (1972), where the villain's name was
shortened to Krug. The colored sweater he chose for his villain was
based on the DC Comics character Plastic Man. Craven chose to make
Krueger's sweater red and green after reading an article in a 1982
Scientific American that said these two colors were the most clashing
colors to the human retina.[23] Craven strove to make Krueger
different from other horror film villains of the era. "A lot of the
killers were wearing masks: Leatherface, Michael Myers, Jason," he
recalled in 2014. "I wanted my villain to have a mask, but be able to
talk and taunt and threaten. So I thought of him being burned and
scarred." He also felt the killer should use something other than a
knife because it was too common. "So I thought, 'How about a glove with
steak knives?' I gave the idea to our special effects guy, Jim Doyle."
Ultimately two models of the glove were built: the hero glove that was
only used whenever anything needed to be cut, and the stunt glove that
was less likely to cause injury.[3] At a time Craven had considered a
sickle to be the weapon of choice for the killer, but around the third
or fourth drafts of the script, the iconic glove had become his final
choice.[28] Writing Wes Craven began writing the screenplay
for A Nightmare on Elm Street around 1981, after he had finished
production on Swamp Thing (1982). He pitched it to several studios, but
each one of them rejected it for different reasons. The first studio to
show interest was Walt Disney Productions, although they wanted Craven
to tone down the content to make it suitable for children and preteens.
Craven declined.[20][23] Another studio Craven pitched to was Paramount
Pictures, which passed on the project due to its similarity to
Dreamscape (1984). Universal Studios also passed; Craven, who was in
desperate personal and financial straits during this period, later
framed the company's rejection letter on the wall of his office,[3]
which reads in its December 14, 1982 print: "We have reviewed the script
you have submitted, A Nightmare on Elm Street. Unfortunately, the
script did not receive an enthusiastic enough response from us to go
forward at this time. However, when you have a finished print, please
get in touch and we would be delighted to screen it for a possible
negative pick up."[29] Finally, the fledgling and independent New
Line Cinema corporation, which had up to that point only distributed
films, agreed to produce the film.[20] During filming, New Line's
distribution deal for the film fell through and for two weeks it was
unable to pay its cast and crew. Although New Line has gone on to make
bigger and more profitable films, A Nightmare on Elm Street was its
first commercial success and the studio is often referred to as "The
House That Freddy Built".[30][31] New Line Cinema lacked the
financial resources for the production themselves and so had to turn to
external financers. They found two investors in England who each
contributed 40% and 30% respectively to the necessary funds; one of the
producers of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre contributed 10%, and home
video distributor Media Home Entertainment contributed 20% of the
original budget. Four weeks before production began, the English
investor who had contributed 40% backed out, but Media Home
Entertainment added in another 40% to the budget. Among the backers were
also Heron Communications and Smart Egg Pictures.[30] According to
Shaye, all the film's original investors backed out at one point or
another during pre-production. The original budget was $700,000. "It
ended up at $1.1 million ... half the funding came from a Yugoslavian
guy[N 3] who had a girlfriend he wanted in movies."[3] Casting Freddy “I
looked at hundreds of guys and a lot of old men. I wanted somebody that
was very agile. I learned from making films like The Hills Have Eyes
that it wasn't the bigness of the villain that paid off, it was the evil
he was able to transmit as an actor. I wanted somebody who was an actor
rather than a stuntman, somebody who could convey a sense of evil and
who was very enthusiastic about getting to an evil state. You really
have to get malicious and malevolent and a lot of actors just don't want
to get there; their heart isn't in it. You have to find somebody who is
comfortable with that idea and isn't threatened by it; he knows it
isn't him, but can go there. Robert Englund filled the bill after we
found him quite late in the casting. His delight with it is that he had
been playing nebishes and good guys and was looking forward to playing
somebody older and evil.” — Wes Craven on the casting of Robert Englund[28] Actor
David Warner was originally cast to play Freddy.[32] Make-up tests were
done,[33] but he had to drop out due to scheduling conflicts. Replacing
him was difficult at first. Kane Hodder, who would later be best known
for playing fellow slasher icon Jason Voorhees, was among those who Wes
Craven talked with about the role of Freddy. According to Hodder, "I had
a meeting with Wes Craven about playing a character he was developing
called Freddy Krueger. At the time, Wes wasn't sure what kind of person
he wanted for the role of Freddy, so I had as good a shot as anybody
else. He was initially thinking of a big guy for the part, and he was
also thinking of somebody who had real burn scars. But obviously, he
changed his whole line of thinking and went with Robert Englund, who's
smaller. I would have loved to play the part, but I do think Wes made
the right choice". Hodder would in a way eventually play Freddy, as the
hand that grabs Jason's mask at the epilogue in Jason Goes to Hell: The
Final Friday (1993).[34] Wes Craven explains that “I couldn't
find an actor to play Freddy Krueger with the sense of ferocity I was
seeking," Craven recalled on the film's 30th anniversary. "Everyone was
too quiet, too compassionate towards children. Then Robert Englund
auditioned. [He] wasn't as tall I'd hoped, and he had baby fat on his
face, but he impressed me with his willingness to go to the dark places
in his mind. Robert understood Freddy.”[3] Englund has stated
that Craven was indeed in search of a "big, giant man" originally, but
casting director Annette Benson had talked Craven into seeing him about
the role after Englund had auditioned for National Lampoon's Class
Reunion (1982) previously.[28] Before Englund's agent at the time, Joe
Rice, sent him to the casting office, Rice's friend Rhet Topham
recommended Englund to act "rat-like", "weasel-like", adding that "When
we read about abusers and molesters in the newspaper, they're not big,
hulking men, but weasels. I thought he should go in and play it like
that. And it worked!".[35] Englund had darkened his lower eyelids with
cigarette ash on his way to the audition and slicked his hair back. "I
looked strange. I sat there and listened to Wes talk. He was tall and
preppy and erudite. I posed a bit, like Klaus Kinski, and that was the
audition," he said later. He took the part because it was the only
project that fit his schedule during the hiatus between the V miniseries
and series.[3] Nancy Craven said he wanted someone very
non-Hollywood for the role of Nancy, and he believed Langenkamp met this
quality.[21] Langenkamp, who had appeared in several commercials and a
TV film, had taken time off from her studies at Stanford to continue
acting. Eventually she landed the role of Nancy Thompson after an open
audition, beating out more than 200 actresses.[3] Langenkamp was already
known to Anette Benson as she had auditioned for Night of the Comet and
The Last Starfighter previously, losing out to Catherine Mary Stewart
at both occasions. Demi Moore, Courteney Cox, Tracey Gold, and Jennifer
Grey have all been rumoured to have auditioned for A Nightmare on Elm
Street, but Benson definitely ruled out Moore and Cox while also being
unsure of Gold and Grey.[36] Langenkamp returned as Nancy in A Nightmare
on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987), and also played a fictionalized
version of herself in Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994).[37][38] There
were no separate auditions for the characters of Tina and Nancy; all
actresses who auditioned for one of the two female roles read for the
role of Nancy, and upon potentially being called back, were mixed with
other actresses trying to find a pair that had chemistry. Amanda Wyss
was among those switched to Tina after a callback. Wes Craven decided
immediately upon mixing Wyss and Langenkamp that this was the duo he
wanted. Craven then mixed the duo with auditioners for the male teenage
roles trying to find actors who had chemistry with Wyss and/or
Langenkamp.[39][40] Glen Johnny Depp was another unknown when
he was cast; he initially went to accompany a friend (Jackie Earle
Haley, who went on to play Freddy in the 2010 remake) but eventually got
the part of Glen.[21][failed verification][unreliable source?]
According to Depp, the role was originally written as a "big, blond,
beach-jock, football-player guy", far from his own appearance,[41] but
Wes Craven's daughters picked Depp's headshot from the set he showed
them.[3] Depp got his own nod in a cameo role in Freddy's Dead: The
Final Nightmare as a man on TV and later in the Freddy vs. Jason intro,
in clips from earlier films.[42][43] Charlie Sheen was considered for
the role but allegedly wanted too much money.[3] Anette Benson states
that they did in fact offer the part to Sheen but he passed on it due to
his agent demanding twice of the weekly wage of $1,142 for Sheen, which
New Line Cinema did not consider themselves to have the budget for.
Sheen himself objects to the sentiment that he turned down the role for
the reason of money, saying “I didn't price myself out of it
because I didn't get greedy until years later. That came much later. I
just didn't get it, and I've never been more wrong about interpreting a
script” ... “I just didn't get it completely, but I still took a meeting
with Wes. And when I met him, I said, 'Look, with all due respect, and
as a fan of your talents, I just don't see this guy wearing a funny hat
with a rotted face and a striped sweater and a bunch of clacky fingers. I
just don't see this catching on.'” Mark Patton, who would later
be cast as Jesse Walsh in the sequel, auditioned for the role of Glen
Lantz and claimed that the auditioners had been winnowed down to him and
Johnny Depp before Depp got the role.[44] Other actors like John
Cusack, Brad Pitt, Kiefer Sutherland, Nicolas Cage, and C. Thomas Howell
have been mentioned over the years, but Anette Benson has failed to
definitely recall those actors as having been among the auditioners.
Though Cage had probably not auditioned for A Nightmare on Elm Street,
he was in fact involved in introducing Johnny Depp to acting, through
Cage's own agent who introduced Benson to him, resulting in an audition
for the film.[36][41] Filming Principal photography began on
June 11, 1984 and lasted a total of 32 days,[28][45] in and around Los
Angeles, California.[7] The high school the protagonists attend was
filmed at John Marshall High School, where many other productions such
as Grease and Pretty in Pink have been filmed.[46] The fictional street
address of Nancy's house in the film is 1428 Elm Street; in real life
this house is a private home located in Los Angeles at 1428 North
Genesee Avenue.[47][48][49] The Lantz' family home was at 1419 North
Genesee Avenue on the other side of the road. The boiler room scenes and
police station interior were shot in the Lincoln Heights Jail (closed
since 1965) building, while the exterior used for the police station was
Cahuenga Branch Library. The American Jewish University on 15600
Mulholland Drive was used for the Katja Institute for the Study of Sleep
Disorders visited by Marge and Nancy.[50] During production,
over 500 gallons of fake blood were used for special effects
production.[51] For the blood geyser sequence, the filmmakers used the
same revolving room set that was used for Tina's death. While filming
the scenes, the cameraman and Craven himself were mounted in fixed seats
taken from a Datsun B-210 car while the set rotated. The film crew
inverted the set and attached the camera so that it looked like the room
was right side up, then they poured the red water into the room. They
used dyed water because the special effects blood did not have the right
look for a geyser. During filming of this scene, the red water poured
out in an unexpected way and caused the rotating room to spin. Much of
the water spilled out of the bedroom window covering Craven and
Langenkamp.[52] Earth's gravity was also used to film another take for
the TV version in which a skeleton shoots out from the hollowed out bed
and smashes into the "ceiling".[53] More work was done for
Freddy's boiler room than made it into the film; the film crew
constructed a whole sleeping place for Freddy, showing that he was quite
a hobo, an outcast and reject from society, living and sleeping where
he worked, and surrounding himself with naked Barbie dolls and other
things as a showcase of his fantasies and perversions. This place was
supposed to be where he forged his glove and abducted and murdered his
victims.[54][36] The scene where Nancy is attacked by Krueger in
her bathtub was accomplished with a special bottomless tub. The tub was
put in a bathroom set that was built over a swimming pool. During the
underwater sequence, Heather Langenkamp was replaced with a stuntwoman.
The melting staircase in Nancy's dream was Robert Shaye's idea based on
his own nightmares; it was created using pancake mix.[52] The film's
special effects artist Jim Doyle portrayed Freddy on the scene where his
face and hands that stretch through the wall and reach out for Nancy
when she dreams; the wall was built by Doyle out of spandex.[55] In
the scene where Freddy walks through the prison bars to threaten Rod as
seen by Nancy, Wes Craven explains that, "we took triangulations of the
camera so we knew exactly the height of it from the floor and the angle
towards the point where the killer was going to walk through", and then
"we put the camera again at the exact height and walked the actor
through that space. Then those two images were married and a rotoscope
artist went through and matted out the bars so it appeared they were
going straight through his body."[45] Jsu Garcia, who was cast as Rod
and credited as Nick Corri, says the production was difficult for him.
He was dealing with depression due to recent homelessness by snorting
heroin in the bathroom between takes. In 2014, he revealed that he was
high on heroin during the scene with Langenkamp in the jail cell. "His
eyes were watery and they weren't focused," Langenkamp said. "I thought,
'Wow, he's giving the best performance of his life.'"[3] About
halfway through the film, when Nancy is trying to stay awake, a scene
from Sam Raimi's The Evil Dead appears on a television. Craven decided
to include the scene because Raimi had featured a Hills Have Eyes
(Craven, 1977) poster in The Evil Dead. In return, Raimi featured a
Freddy Krueger glove in the tool shed scene of Evil Dead II: Dead by
Dawn, and later in Ash vs Evil Dead.[56] Sean Cunningham, whom
Wes Craven had previously worked with while filming The Last House on
the Left (1972), helped Craven at the end of the shooting, heading the
second film unit during the filming of some of Nancy's dream scenes.[57] Craven
originally planned for the film to have a more evocative ending: Nancy
kills Krueger by ceasing to believe in him, then awakens to discover
that everything that happened in the film was an elongated nightmare.
However, New Line leader Robert Shaye demanded a twist ending, in which
Krueger disappears and all seems to have been a dream, only for the
audience to discover that it was a
dream-within-a-dream-within-a-dream.[52] According to Craven,
The original ending of the script has Nancy come out the door. It's an
unusually cloudy and foggy day. A car pulls up with her dead friends in
it. She's startled. She goes out and gets in the car wondering what the
hell is going on, and they drive off into the fog, with the mother left
standing on the doorstep and that's it. It was very brief, and
suggestive that maybe life is sort of dream-like too. Shaye wanted
Freddy Krueger to be driving the car, and have the kids screaming. It
all became very negative. I felt a philosophical tension to my ending.
Shaye said, "That's so 60s, it's stupid." I refused to have Freddy in
the driver's seat, and we thought up about five different endings. The
one we used, with Freddy pulling the mother through the doorway amused
us all so much, we couldn't not use it.[58] Craven explains that
the effect of the mentioned fog did not work out for the team and they
had to film without it: there were around 20 persons with fog machines,
but the breeze at the time was too much, and the fog was gone before
they had the opportunity to film the intendendly foggy scene.[59] Though
several variants of an end scene were considered and filmed, Heather
Langenkamp states that "there always was this sense that Freddy was the
car", while according to Sara Risher, "it was always Wes' idea to pan to
the little girls' jumping rope".[32] Both a happy ending and a twist
ending were filmed, but the final film used the twist ending. As a
result, Craven who never wanted the film to be an ongoing franchise, did
not work on the first sequel, Freddy's Revenge (1985).[52] Filming
wrapped at the end of July, and the film was rushed to get ready for its
November release. Music A Nightmare on Elm Street (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) Soundtrack album Released 1984 Genre Electronic, film score Length 33:32 Label Varèse Sarabande Producer Charles Bernstein Charles Bernstein chronology Love at First Bite (1979) A Nightmare on Elm Street (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (1984) April Fool's Day (1986) Professional ratingsAggregate scores Source Rating Album of the Year 9.1/10[60] Rate Your Music 3.5/5 stars[61] Sputnikmusic 3.9/5[62] Review scores Source Rating AllMusic 3.5/5 stars[63] Starburst Magazine 9/10 stars[64] The
film score was written by composer Charles Bernstein and first released
in 1984 on label Varèse Sarabande.[65] The label re-released the
soundtrack in 2015 in an 8-CD box for the franchise soundtracks
excluding the remake[66] and again in 2016 in the 12-CD box Little Box
of Horror with various other horror film scores.[67] Bernstein's film
score was also re-released in 2017, along with the soundtracks of the
first seven films, on the label Death Waltz Recording Company in another
8-LP vinyl box set named A Nightmare On Elm Street: Box Of Souls.[68]
In 2017 and 2019, the label also released standalone extended versions
of the soundtrack with many snippets that were left out of the original
releases.[69] Freddy's theme song The lyrics for Freddy's
theme song, sung by the jumprope children throughout the series and
based on One, Two, Buckle My Shoe, was already written and included in
the script when Bernstein started writing the soundtrack, while the
melody for it was not set by Bernstein, but by Heather Langenkamp's
boyfriend and soon-to-be husband at the time, Alan Pasqua, who was a
musician himself. Bernstein integrated Pasqua's contribution into his
soundtrack as he saw fit.[32] One of the three girls who recorded the
vocal part of the theme was Robert Shaye's then 14-year-old
daughter.[70] Per the script, the lyrics are as follows:[10] One two, Freddy's coming for you. Three four, better lock your door. Five six, grab your crucifix. Seven eight, gonna stay up late. Nine ten, never sleep again. Censorship issues When
the film was submitted to the Motion Picture Association of America
film rating system (MPAA), they required two cuts to grant it an R
rating.[24] The theatrical version was released with an R rating and
thirteen seconds of cuts. In the United Kingdom, the film was released
theatrically and on home video uncut.[71] The Australian theatrical
release was edited to an M rating,[72] but the VHS home video was
released uncut in 1985 with an Australian R rating.[73] The uncut
version would not see a release in the United States until the 1996
Elite Entertainment Laserdisc release.[74] All DVD, digital, and Blu-ray
releases use the R rated theatrical version; the uncut version has yet
to be released on a digital format.[71] Themes Freddy
exclusively attacks teenagers and his actions have been interpreted as
symbolic of the often traumatic experiences of adolescence.[75] Nancy,
like the archetypal teenager, experiences social anxiety and her
relationship with her parents becomes strained. Sexuality is present in
Freudian images and is almost exclusively displayed in a threatening and
mysterious context (e.g., Tina's death visually evokes a rape, Freddy's
glove between Nancy's legs in the bath). The original script called for
Krueger to be a child molester, rather than a child killer, before
being murdered.[76] Wes Craven has explained that "the notion of
the screenplay is that the sins of the parents are visited upon the
children, but the fact that each child is not necessarily stuck with
their lot is still there."[45] Robert Englund observes that "in
Nightmare, all the adults are damaged: They're alcoholic, they're on
pills, they're not around". Blakley says the parents in the film "verge
on being villains." Englund adds: "the adolescents have to wade through
that, and Heather is the last girl standing. She lives. She defeats
Freddy." Langenkamp agrees: "Nightmare is a feminist movie, but I look
at it more as a 'youth power' film."[3] Release It was
released in the United States on November 9, 1984 through New Line
Cinema and in the United Kingdom in 1985 through Palace
Pictures.[77][78] Home media The film was first introduced to
the home video market by Media Home Entertainment in early 1985 and was
eventually released on Laserdisc. It has since been released on DVD,
first in 1999 in the United States as part of the Nightmare on Elm
Street Collection box set (along with the other six sequels), and once
again in a restored Infinifilm special edition in 2006, containing
various special features with contributions from Wes Craven, Heather
Langenkamp, John Saxon and the director of photography. The
special edition consisted of two DVDs, one with the film picture and
sound restored (DTS 5.1, Dolby Digital 5.1, and original mono audio
track) and another DVD with special features. Along with the restored
version of the film, DVD one also had two commentaries, and other
nightmares (if not all) from the film's sequels (two through seven and
Freddy Vs. Jason). It also included additional, extended or alternate
scenes of the film, such as one scene where Marge reveals to Nancy that
she had another sibling who was killed by Freddy. These unused clips and
scenes were not included or added to the DVD film but could be viewed
separately from the DVD's menus. On April 13, 2010, the film was
released on Blu-ray Disc by Warner Home Video,[79] with all the same
extras from the 2006 special edition;[80] a DVD box set containing all
of the films up to that point was released on the same day.[81] Reception Box office A
Nightmare on Elm Street premiered in the United States with a limited
theatrical release on November 9, 1984, opening in 165 cinemas across
the country.[82] Grossing $1,271,000 during its opening weekend, the
film was considered an instant commercial success. The film eventually
earned a total of $25,504,513 at the US and Canadian box office[82] and
$57 million worldwide.[4][5] Critical response Contemporaneous In
a contemporary review, Kim Newman wrote in the Monthly Film Bulletin
that A Nightmare on Elm Street was closer to a Stephen King adaptation
with its small-town setting, and "invented monster myth".[1] Newman
concluded that the film found "Craven emerging from the his recent
career slump (Swamp Thing, The Hills Have Eyes Part 2, Invitation to
Hell) with a fine, perhaps definitive bogeyman to back him up" and that
the film was "a superior example of an over-worked genre".[1] Paul
Attanasio of The Washington Post praised the film, stating that "for
such a low-budget movie, Nightmare on Elm Street is extraordinarily
polished. The script is consistently witty, the camera work (by
cinematographer Jacques Haitkin) is crisp and expressive."[83] The
review noted that "the genre has built-in limitations... but Craven
faces the challenge admirably; A Nightmare on Elm Street is halfway
between an exploitation flick and classic surrealism". The review also
commented on Freddy Krueger, calling him "the most chilling figure in
the genre since 'The Shape' made his debut in Halloween."[83] Variety
commented that the film was "a highly imaginative horror film", praising
the special effects while finding that the film "fails to tie up his
thematic threads satisfyingly at the conclusion."[84] The review
commented negatively on some of the scenes involving Nancy's family,
noting that "the movie's worst scenes involve Nancy and her alcoholic
mother".[83] On the character development, Newman stated that "the
impression that about two hundred pages worth of characterisation has
been compressed into cliché details like boozy Ronee Blakley
demonstrating her renewed self-respect by throwing away a half-full
bottle."[1] Newman also said that the nightmares in the film worked
against itself, stating that "while the kissing telephone and bottomless
bathtub are disorienting in the [David] Cronenberg spirit, they get in
the way of the relentless, pursuing-monster aspect that Carpenter
manages so well."[1] Retrospective Author Ian Conrich praised
the film's ability to rupture "the boundaries between the imaginary and
real",[85] and critic James Berardinelli said it toys with audience
perceptions.[18] Kelly Bulkeley interpreted the overriding theme as a
social subtext, "the struggles of adolescents in American society".[86] The
film has a 94% approval rating based on 53 reviews on Rotten Tomatoes
with and average rating of 7.77/10 and with the site's consensus saying:
"Wes Craven's intelligent premise, combined with the horrifying visual
appearance of Freddy Krueger, still causes nightmares to this day."[87]
The film is also considered one of the best of 1984 by Filmsite.org.[88]
In 2010, the Independent Film & Television Alliance selected the
film as one of the 30 most significant independent films of the past 30
years.[89] It ranked at number 17 on Bravo's The 100 Scariest Movie
Moments (2004)—a five-hour program that selected cinema's scariest
moments. In 2008, Empire ranked A Nightmare on Elm Street 162nd on their
list of the 500 greatest movies of all time.[90] It also was selected
by The New York Times as one of the best 1000 movies ever made.[91] American Film Institute recognition AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains – #40, Freddy Krueger, Villain Accolades Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films – Best Horror Film (1985) (nomination) Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films – Best Performance by a Young Actor – Jsu Garcia (1985) (nomination) Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films – Best DVD Classic Film Release (2007) (nomination) Avoriaz Fantastic Film Festival – Critics Award – Wes Craven (1985) (winner) Avoriaz Fantastic Film Festival – Special Mention for Acting – Heather Langenkamp (1985) (winner)[92] Related works Adaptions and literature Concept
art of the planned, never finished or released comic book adaption of
the 1984 film, illustrating one of Nancy's struggles with Freddy. Art by
Andy Mangels.[93] A joint novelization of the 1984 film and the
sequels Freddy's Revenge and Dream Warriors was released in 1987,
written by Jeffrey Cooper.[94] An eight part comic book adaption in 3D
was commissioned in early 1989 to be published by Blackthorne
Publishing[95] and were to be written by Andy Mangels;[96] these plans
fell apart due to the collapse and bankruptcy of said publisher
throughout later 1989 and 1990. Some lost concept art was finished of
this planned comic book adaption before the folding of Blackthorne;[93]
Mangels explains that "Blackthorne had the 3-D rights, but they went
bankrupt after I had written three issues, one had been pencilled, and
none had been published". A 3D comic book adaption written by Mangels
would eventually be released of the fifth sequel Freddy's Dead: The
Final Nightmare on Innovation Publishing.[97] Cinematic deratives
of A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) includes the two separate Bollywood
horror films Khooni Murda (1989)[98] and Mahakaal (1994),[99][100] the
Indonesian horror film Batas Impian Ranjang Setan or Satan's Bed
(1986)[101][102] and the American pornographic parody film named A Wet
Dream on Elm Street (2011).[103][104] Remake In 2010, a remake
was released, also titled A Nightmare on Elm Street, starring Jackie
Earle Haley as Freddy Krueger. The film was produced by Michael Bay,
directed by Samuel Bayer, and written by the team of Wesley Strick and
Eric Heisserer. The film was intended as a reboot to the franchise, but
plans for a sequel never came to fruition after the film received mostly
negative reviews despite being a financial success. On August 7,
2015, it was reported that New Line Cinema was developing a second
remake with Orphan writer David Leslie Johnson.[105] Englund expressed
interest in returning to the series in a cameo role.[106] Leslie Johnson
later added in that the work is in limbo due to the success of The
Conjuring Universe, saying that "Nothing is percolating just yet", and
"Everybody wants to see Freddy again I think, so I think it's inevitable
at some point"." (wikipedia.org) "A
horror film is one that seeks to elicit fear in its audience for
entertainment purposes.[1] Horror films additionally aim to evoke
viewers' nightmares, fears, revulsions and terror of the unknown or the
macabre. Initially inspired by literature from authors such as Edgar
Allan Poe, Bram Stoker, and Mary Shelley, horror has existed as a film
genre for more than a century. Horror may also overlap with the fantasy,
supernatural fiction, and thriller genres. Plots within the
horror genre often involve the intrusion of an evil force, event, or
personage into the everyday world. Prevalent elements include ghosts,
extraterrestrials, vampires, werewolves, mummies, demons, Satanism, The
Devil, evil clowns, gore, torture, evil witches, demonic possession,
Oujia boards, monsters, zombies, disturbed children, cannibalism,
psychopaths, natural forces, cults, dark magic, dystopian or apocalyptic
worlds, and serial killers. An example of sub-genre is psychological horror.... 1890s–1910s The
first depictions of the supernatural on screen appeared in several of
the short silent films created by the French pioneer filmmaker Georges
Méliès in the late 1890s. The best known of these early
supernatural-based works is the 2 and a half-minute short film Le Manoir
du Diable (1896), known in English as both "The Haunted Castle" or "The
House of the Devil". The film is sometimes credited as being the first
ever horror film.[3] In The Haunted Castle, a mischievous devil appears
inside a medieval castle where he harasses the visitors. Méliès' other
popular horror film is La Caverne maudite (1898), which translates
literally as "the accursed cave". The film, also known by its English
title The Cave of the Demons, tells the story of a man stumbling over a
cave that is populated by the spirits and skeletons of people who died
there.[3] Méliès would also make other short films that historians
consider now as horror-comedies. Une nuit terrible (1896), which
translates to A Terrible Night, tells a story of a man who tries to get a
good night's sleep but ends up wrestling a giant spider. His other
film, L'auberge ensorcelée (1897), or The Bewitched Inn, features a
story of a hotel guest being pranked and tormented by an unseen
presence.[4] Colorized scene from Georges Méliès 1896 short film Le Manoir du diable, or The Haunted Castle In
1897, the American photographer-turned director George Albert Smith
created The X-Ray Fiend (1897), a horror-comedy trick film that came out
a mere two years after x-rays were invented. The film shows a couple of
skeletons courting each other. An audience full of people unaccustomed
to seeing moving skeletons on screen would have found it frightening and
otherworldly.[5] The next year, Smith created the short film
Photographing a Ghost (1898), considered a precursor to the paranormal
investigation subgenre. The film portrays three men attempting to
photograph a ghost, only to fail time and again as the ghost eludes the
men and throws chairs at them. Satán se divierte, or Satan at Play (1907) Japan
also made early forays into the horror genre. In 1898, a Japanese film
company called Konishi Honten released two horror films both written by
Ejiro Hatta. These were Shinin No Sosei (Resurrection of a Corpse), and
Bake Jizo (Jizo the Spook)[6] The film Shinin No Sosei told the story of
a dead man who comes back to life after having fallen from a coffin
that two men were carrying. The writer Hatta played the dead man role,
while the coffin-bearers were played by Konishi Honten employees. Though
there are no records of the cast, crew, or plot of Bake Jizo, it was
likely based on the Japanese legend of Jizo statues, believed to provide
safety and protection to children. In Japan, Jizō is a deity who is
seen as the guardian of children, particularly children who have died
before their parents. Jizō has been worshiped as the guardian of the
souls of mizuko, namely stillborn, miscarried, or aborted fetuses. Segundo
de Chomón produced a handful of impressive trick films, including this
one; La casa hechizada, or The House of Ghosts made in 1908. Spanish
filmmaker Segundo de Chomón is also one of the most significant silent
film directors in early filmmaking.[7] He was popular for his frequent
camera tricks and optical illusions, an innovation that contributed
heavily to the popularity of trick films in the period. His famous works
include Satán se divierte (1907), which translates to Satan Having Fun,
or Satan at Play; La casa hechizada (1908), or The House of Ghosts,
considered to be one of the earliest cinematic depictions of a haunted
house premise; and Le spectre rouge (1907) or The Red Spectre, a
collaboration film with French director Ferdinand Zecca about a demonic
magician who attempts to perform his act in a mysterious grotto. The
Selig Polyscope Company in the United States produced one of the first
film adaptations of a horror-based novel. In 1908, the company produced
the film Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, directed by Otis Turner and starring
Hobart Bosworth in the lead role. The film is, however, now considered a
lost film. The story was based on Robert Louis Stevenson's classic
gothic novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, published 15 years
prior, about a man who transforms his personality between two
contrasting personas. (The book tells the classic story of a man with an
unpredictably dual nature: usually very good, but sometimes shockingly
evil as well.) Georges Méliès also liked adapting the Faust
legend into his films. In fact, the French filmmaker produced at least
six variations of the German legend of the man who made a pact with the
devil. Among his notable Faust films include Faust aux enfers (1903),
known primarily for its English title The Damnation of Faust, or Faust
in Hell. It is the filmmaker's third film adaptation of the Faust
legend. In it, Méliès took inspiration from Hector Berlioz's Faust
opera, but it pays less attention to the story and more to the special
effects that represent a tour of hell. The film takes advantage of stage
machinery techniques and features special effects such as pyrotechnics,
substitution splices, superimpositions on black backgrounds, and
dissolves.[8] Méliès then made a sequel to that film called Damnation du
docteur Faust (1904), released in the U.S. as Faust and Marguerite.
This time, the film was based on the opera by Charles Gounod. Méliès'
other devil-inspired films in this period include Les quat'cents farces
du diable (1906), known in English as The Merry Frolics of Satan or The
400 Tricks of the Devil, a tale about an engineer who barters with the
Devil for superhuman powers and is forced to face the consequences.
Méliès would also make other horror-based short films that aren't
inspired by Faust, most notably the fantastical and unsettling Le
papillon fantastique (1909), where a magician turns a butterfly woman
into a spider beast. In 1910, Edison Studios produced the first motion picture adaptation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. In
1910, Edison Studios in the United States produced the first filmed
version of Mary Shelley's 1818 classic Gothic novel Frankenstein, the
popular story of a scientist creating a hideous, sapient creature
through a scientific experiment. Adapted to the screen for the first
time by director J. Searle Dawley, his movie Frankenstein (1910) was
deliberately designed to de-emphasize the horrific aspects of the story
and focus on the story's mystical and psychological elements.[9] Yet,
the macabre nature of its source material made the film synonymous with
the horror film genre.[10] The United States continued producing
films based on the 1886 Gothic novella the Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and
Mr Hyde, a classic tale about a doctor or scientist whose evil persona
emerges after getting in contact with a magical formula. New York City's
Thanhouser Film Corporation's one-reel Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1912)
was directed by Lucius Henderson and stars future director James Cruze
in the title role. A year later, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1913) came
out. This time it was independently produced by IMP (the future
Universal Studios) and stars King Baggot as the doctor.[11] Italian silent epic film L'Inferno (1911), based on Inferno, the first canticle of Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy. In
March 1911, the hour-long Italian silent film epic L'Inferno was
screened in the Teatro Mercadante in Naples.[12] The film was adapted
from the first part of Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy and took visual
inspiration from Gustave Doré's haunting illustrations. It is widely
considered to be the best adaptation of The Inferno and is regarded by
many scholars as the finest film adaptation of any of Dante's works to
date. The film became an international success and is arguably the first
true blockbuster in all of cinema. L'Inferno was directed by three
artists; Francesco Bertolini, Adolfo Padovan, and Giuseppe de Liguoro.
Their film is well-remembered for its stunning visualization of the nine
circles of Hell and special effects that convey haunting visuals. The
film presents a massive Lucifer with wings that stretch out behind him
in front of a black void. He is seen devouring the Roman figures Brutus
and Cassius in a display of double exposure and scale manipulation.
According to critics, L'Inferno is able to capture some of the manic,
tortuous, and bizarre imagery and themes of Dante's complex
masterwork.[13] In the 1910s Georges Méliès would continue
producing his Faustian films, the most significant of this period was
1912's Le Chevalier des Neiges (The Knight of the Snows). It was Méliès'
last film with Faustian themes[14] and the last of many films in which
the filmmaker appeared as the Devil.[15] The film tells a story of a
princess kidnapped by Satan and thrown into a dungeon. Her lover, the
brave Knight of the Snows, must then go on a journey to rescue her.
Special effects in the film were created with stage machinery,
pyrotechnics, substitution splices, superimpositions, and dissolves.[15]
It is among a few of the best examples of trick films that Georges
Méliès and Segundo de Chomón helped popularized. Marfa Koutiloff
(Stacia Napierkowska) dancing as a vampire bat in the second episode of
Les Vampires entitled "The Ring That Kills" In 1912, French
director Abel Gance released his short film Le masque d'horreur (The
Mask of Horror). The film tells a story of a mad sculptor who searches
for the perfect realization of "the mask of horror". He places himself
in front of a mirror after smearing blood over himself with the glass of
an oil lamp. He then swallows a virulent poison to observe the effects
of pain.[16] In 1913, German directors Stellan Rye and Paul
Wegener made the silent horror film Der Student von Prag (The Student of
Prague) loosely based on a short story by Edgar Allan Poe. The film
tells a story of a student who inadvertently makes a Faustian bargain.
In the film, a student asks a stranger to turn him into a rich man. The
stranger visits the student later in his dorm room and conjures up
pieces of gold and a contract for him to sign. In return, the stranger
is granted to take anything he wants from the room. He chooses to take
the student's mirror. Upon moving it from the wall, a doppelgänger steps
out and causes trouble. (In Western culture, a doppelgänger is a
supernatural or ghostly double or look-alike of a specific person. It is
usually seen as a harbinger of bad luck.) Cinematographer Guido Seeber
utilized groundbreaking camera tricks to create the effect of the
doppelgänger by using a mirror double which produces a seamless double
exposure. The film was written by Hanns Heinz Ewers, a noted writer of
horror and fantasy stories. His involvement with the screenplay lent a
much needed air of respectability to the fledgling art form of horror
film and German Expressionism[17] From November 1915 until June
1916, French writer/director Louis Feuillade released a weekly serial
entitled Les Vampires where he exploited the power of horror imagery to
great effect. Consisting of 10 parts or episodes and roughly 7 hours
long if combined, Les Vampires is considered to be one of the longest
films ever made. The series tells a story of a criminal gang called the
Vampires, who play upon their supernatural name and style to instill
fear in the public and the police who desperately want to put a stop to
them.[18] Marked as Feuillade's legendary opus, Les Vampires is
considered a precursor to movie thrillers. The series is also a close
cousin to the surrealist movement.[19] Paul Wegener (as the Golem) and Lyda Salmonova (as Jessica), in the 1915 German, partially lost horror film Der Golem. Paul
Wegener followed up the success of The Student of Prague by adapting a
story inspired by the ancient Jewish legend of the golem, an
anthropomorphic being magically created entirely from clay or mud.
Wegener teamed up with Henrik Galeen to create Der Golem (1915). The
film, which is still partially lost, tells a story of an antiques dealer
who finds a golem, a clay statue, brought to life centuries before. The
dealer resurrects the golem as a servant, but the golem falls in love
with the antiques dealer's wife. As she does not return his love, the
golem commits a series of murders. Wegener made a sequel to the film two
years later.This time he teamed up with co-director Rochus Gliese and
made Der Golem und die Tänzerin (1917), or The Golem and the Dancing
Girl as it is known in English. It is now considered a lost film.
Wegener would make a third golem film another three years later to
conclude his Der Golem trilogy. In 1919, Austrian director
Richard Oswald released a German silent anthology horror film called
Unheimliche Geschichten, also known as Eerie Tales or Uncanny Tales. In
the film, a bookshop closes and the portraits of the Strumpet, Death,
and the Devil come to life and amuse themselves by reading stories—about
themselves, of course, in various guises and eras. The film is split
into five stories: The Apparition, The Hand, The Black Cat (based on the
Edgar Allan Poe short story), The Suicide Club (based on the Robert
Louis Stevenson short story collection) and Der Spuk (which translates
to The Spectre in English). The film is described as the "critical link
between the more conventional German mystery and detective films of the
mid 1910s and the groundbreaking fantastic cinema of the early
1920s."[20]" Trick Films File:The Haunted Curiosity Shop (1901).ogvPlay media The
Haunted Curiosity Shop was clearly devised purely as a showcase for
Booth and Paul's bag of tricks and according to Michael Brooke of BFI
Screenonline, "it's an effective and engrossing experience. As
the 19th century gave way to the 20th, artists and engineers were all
pushing the boundaries of film. Artists like Méliès first achieved fame
as a magician. During the time, stage magicians entertained large crowds
with illusions and magic tricks, and decked out their sets with
elaborate sets, costumes, and characters. While filmmakers like the
Lumière brothers were tinkering with motion picture devices and shot
documentary-like films, Méliès, and to an extent, Segundo de Chomón as
well, were developing magic tricks on film. They created sophisticated
sight gags and theatrical special effects to either entertain or scare
the audience.[21] In his autobiography, Méliès recalled a day
when he was capturing footage on a Paris street when his camera jammed.
Frustrated, he fiddled with the hand crank, fixed the problem, and
started shooting again. When he developed the film later and played it
back, he discovered a new trick. The shot started with people walking,
children skipping, and a horse-drawn omnibus workers trundling up the
street. Then, in the blink of an eye, everything changed. Men turned
into women, children were replaced by horses, and – spookiest of all –
the omnibus full of workers changed into a hearse. Because of this,
Méliès had found a way to perform actual magic with editing, to fool an
audience and pull off illusions he'd never been able to do on stage.
This was the birth of trick films.[21] Most of the early films in
cinema history consist of continuous shots of short skits and/or scenes
from everyday life [i.e., The Kiss (1898) or Train Pulling into a
Station (1896)]. Filmmakers doing trick films attempted to do the
impossible on screen; like levitating heads, making people disappear, or
turning them into skeletons. Trick films were silent films designed to
feature innovative special effects. This style of filmmaking was
developed by innovators such as Georges Méliès and Segundo de Chomón in
their first cinematic experiments. In the first years of film,
especially between 1898 and 1908, the trick film was one of the world's
most popular film genres. Techniques explored in these trick films
included slow motion and fast motion created by varying the camera
cranking speed; the editing device called the substitution splice; and
various in-camera effects, such as multiple exposures.[22] Double
exposures, especially, are achieved to show faded or ghostly images on
the screen. The spectacular nature of trick films lives on
especially in horror films. Trick films convey energetic whimsy that
makes impossible events seem to occur on screen. Trick films are in
essence films in which artists use camera techniques to create magic
tricks or special effects that feel otherworldly. Other examples of
trick films include 1901's The Big Swallow in which a man tries to
swallow the audience, and 1901's The Haunted Curiosity Shop in which
apparitions appear inside an antique shop.[23] 1920s German Expressionism The
premiere of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari in February 1920 was so
successful, women in the audience were said to have screamed during the
famous scene in which Cesare Conrad Veidt is revealed. Robert
Wiene's 1920 Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari (The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari)
became a worldwide success and had a lasting impact on the film world,
particularly for horror. It was not so much the story but the style that
made it distinguishable from other films, "Dr. Caligari's settings,
some simply painted on canvas backdrops, are weirdly distorted, with
caricatures of narrow streets, misshapen walls, odd rhomboid windows,
and leaning doorframes. Effects of light and shadow were rendered by
painting black lines and patterns directly on the floors and walls of
sets."[24] Critic Roger Ebert called it arguably "the first true horror
film", and film reviewer Danny Peary called it cinema's first cult film
and a precursor to arthouse films. Considered a classic, The Cabinet of
Dr. Caligari helped draw worldwide attention to the artistic merit of
German cinema and had a major influence on American films, particularly
in the genres of horror and film noir, introducing techniques such as
the twist ending and the unreliable narrator to the language of
narrative film. Writing for the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You
Die, horror film critic Kim Newman called The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
"a major early entry in the horror genre, introducing images, themes,
characters, and expressions that became fundamental to the likes of Tod
Browning's Dracula and James Whales' Frankenstein, both from 1931".[25]
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari is also a leading example of what a German
Expressionist film looks like. In October 1920, Paul Wegener
teamed up with co-director Carl Boese to make the final Golem film
entitled Der Golem, wie er in die Welt kam, known in English as The
Golem: How He Came into the World. The final film in the Der Golem
trilogy is a prequel to Der Golem from 1915. In this film, Wegener stars
as the golem who frightens a young lady with whom he is infatuated. The
film is the best known of the series, as it is the only film that is
completely preserved. It is also a leading example of early German
Expressionism. F. W. Murnau arguably made the first
vampire-themed movie, Nosferatu (1922). It was an unauthorized
adaptation of Bram Stoker's gothic horror novel Dracula. In Nosferatu,
Murnau created some of cinema's most lasting and haunting imagery which
famously involve shadows of the creeping Count Orlok. This helped
popularized the expressionism style in filmmaking. Many expressionist
works of this era emphasize a distorted reality, stimulating the human
psyche and have influenced the horror film genre. The visual style of
German Expressionist films included deliberately distorted forms and
shadows as seen here in The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari For most of
the 1920s, German filmmakers like Wegener, Murnau, and Wiene would
significantly influence later productions not only in horror films but
in filmmaking in general. They would become the leading innovators of
the German Expressionist movement. The plots and stories of the German
Expressionist films often dealt with madness and insanity. Arthur
Robison's film, Schatten – Eine nächtliche Halluzination (1923),
literally Shadows – a Nocturnal Hallucination, also known as Warning
Shadows in English, is also one of the leading German Expressionist
films. It tells the story of house guests inside a manor given visions
of what might happen if the manor's host, the count played by Fritz
Kortner, stays jealous and the guests do not reduce their advances
towards his beautiful wife. Kortner's bulging eyes and twisted features
are facets of a classic Expressionist performance style, as his
unnatural feelings contort his face and body into something that appears
other than human.[26] In 1924, German filmmaker Paul Leni made
another representative German Expressionist film with Das
Wachsfigurenkabinett, or Waxworks as it is commonly known. The horror
film tells a story of a writer who accepts a job from a wax museum to
write a series of stories on different controversial figures including
Ivan the Terrible and Jack the Ripper in order to boost business.
Although Waxworks is often credited as a horror film, it is an anthology
film that goes through several genres including a fantasy adventure,
historical film, and horror film through its various episodes. Waxworks
contain many elements present in a German Expressionist movie. The film
features deep shadows, moving shapes, and warped staircases. The
director said of the film, "I have tried to create sets so stylized that
they evidence no idea of reality." Waxworks was director Paul Leni's
last film in Germany before heading to Hollywood to make some of the
most important horror films of the late silent era.[citation needed] Universal Classic Monsters (Silent Era) Lon Chaney, Sr. and Mary Philbin in the 1925 film The Phantom of the Opera. Though
the word horror to describe the film genre would not be used until the
1930s (when Universal Pictures began releasing their initial monster
films), earlier American productions often relied on horror and gothic
themes. Many of these early films were considered dark melodramas
because of their stock characters and emotion-heavy plots that focused
on romance, violence, suspense, and sentimentality.[27] In 1923,
Universal Pictures started producing movies based on Gothic Horror
literature from authors like Victor Hugo and Edgar Allan Poe. This
series of pictures from Universal Pictures have retroactively become the
first phase of the studio's Universal Classic Monsters series that
would continue for three more decades. Universal Pictures' classic
monsters of the 1920s featured hideously deformed characters like
Quasimodo, The Phantom, and Gwynplaine. The first film of the
series was The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) starring Lon Chaney as the
hunchback Quasimodo. The film was adapted from the classic French
gothic novel of the same name written by Victor Hugo in 1833, about a
horribly deformed bell ringer in the cathedral of Notre-Dame. The film
elevated Chaney, already a well-known character actor, to full star
status in Hollywood, and also helped set a standard for many later
horror films. Two years later, Chaney stars as The Phantom who
haunts the Paris Opera House in 1925's silent horror film, The Phantom
of the Opera, based on the mystery novel by Gaston Leroux published 15
years earlier. Roger Ebert said the film "creates beneath the opera one
of the most grotesque places in the cinema, and Chaney's performance
transforms an absurd character into a haunting one."[28] Adrian Warren
of PopMatters called the film "terrific: unsettling, beautifully shot
and imbued with a dense and shadowy Gothic atmosphere".[29] Included in
the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, 1925's The Phantom of
the Opera is lauded for Lon Chaney's masterful acting, Universal
Pictures' incredible set design, and its many masterly moments including
the unmasking of the tragic villain's disfigured skullface, so shocking
that even the camera is terrified, going briefly out of focus.[30] In
1927, German director Paul Leni directed his first of two films for
Universal Pictures. His silent horror film The Cat and the Canary is the
third film in the Universal Classic Monsters series and is considered
"the cornerstone of Universal's school of horror."[31] The Cat and the
Canary is adapted from John Willard's black comedy play of the same
name. The plot revolves around the death of a man and the reading of his
will 20 years later. His family inherits his fortunes, but when they
spend the night in his haunted mansion they are stalked by a mysterious
figure. Meanwhile, a lunatic known as "the Cat" escapes from an asylum
and hides in the mansion. The film is part of a genre of comedy horror
films inspired by 1920s Broadway stage plays. Paul Leni's adaptation of
Willard's play blended expressionism with humor, a style Leni was
notable for and critics recognized as unique. Alfred Hitchcock cited
this film as one of his influences[32] and Tony Rayns called it the
"definitive haunted house movie."[33] Paul Leni's second film for
Universal Pictures was The Man Who Laughs (1928), an adaptation of
another Victor Hugo novel. The film, starring Conrad Veidt is known for
the bleak carnival freak-like grin on the character Gwynplaine's face.
His exaggerated smile was the inspiration for DC Comics' The Joker. (A
graphic novel in 2005 exploring the origins of the Joker was also titled
Batman: The Man Who Laughs in homage to this film).[34] Film critic
Roger Ebert stated, "The Man Who Laughs is a melodrama, at times even a
swashbuckler, but so steeped in Expressionist gloom that it plays like a
horror film".[35] The fifth and last film of the Universal
Classic Monsters series in the 1920s is The Last Performance (1929). It
was directed by Paul Fejos and stars Conrad Veidt and Mary Philbin.
Veidt plays a middle-aged magician who is in love with his beautiful
young assistant. She, on the other hand, is in love with the magician's
young protege, who turns out to be a bum and a thief. The film received
mixed reviews and a 1929 New York Times article even said that "Dr.
Fejos has handled his scenes with no small degree of imagination."[36] A
Letterboxd reviewer called it a "backstage melodrama with eerie
intimations of horror."[37] Other productions in the 1920s The
trend of inserting an element of macabre into American pre-horror
melodramas was popular in the 1920s. Directors known for relying on
macabre in their films during the decade were Maurice Tourneur, Rex
Ingram, and Tod Browning. Ingram's The Magician (1926) contains one of
the first examples of a "mad doctor" and is said to have had a large
influence on James Whale's version of Frankenstein.[38] The Unholy Three
(1925) is an example of Tod Browning's use of macabre and unique style
of morbidity; he remade the film in 1930 as a talkie. In 1927, Tod
Browning cast Lon Chaney in his horror film The Unknown. Chaney played a
carnival knife thrower called Alonzo the Armless and Joan Crawford as
the scantily clad carnival girl he hopes to marry. Chaney did
collaborative scenes with a real-life armless double whose legs and feet
were used to manipulate objects such as knives and cigarettes in frame
with Chaney's upper body and face.[39] 1928's The Terror by
Warner Bros. Pictures was the first all-talking horror film, made using
the Vitaphone sound-on-disc system.[40] The film tells a simple story of
guests at an old English manor being stalked by a mysterious killer
known only as "The Terror". The plot centered on sound, with much of the
ghost's haunting taking place in vis-a-vis creepy organ music, creaky
doors and howling winds. The film was poorly received by audiences and
critics. John MacCormac, reporting from London for The New York Times
upon the film's UK premiere, wrote; "The universal opinion of London
critics is that The Terror is so bad that it is almost suicidal. They
claim that it is monotonous, slow, dragging, fatiguing and boring."[41] Original Swedish poster for Häxan. Other
European countries also, contributed to the genre during this period.
In Sweden, Victor Sjöström created Körkarlen (The Phantom Carriage) in
1921. This is what the Criterion have to say about the film; "The last
person to die on New Year's Eve before the clock strikes twelve is
doomed to take the reins of Death's chariot and work tirelessly
collecting fresh souls for the next year. So says the legend that drives
The Phantom Carriage (Körkarlen), directed by the father of Swedish
cinema, Victor Sjöström. The story, based on a novel by Nobel Prize
winner Selma Lagerlöf, concerns an alcoholic, abusive ne’er-do-well
(Sjöström himself) who is shown the error of his ways, and the
pure-of-heart Salvation Army sister who believes in his redemption. This
extraordinarily rich and innovative silent classic (which inspired
Ingmar Bergman to make movies) is a Dickensian ghost story and a deeply
moving morality tale, as well as a showcase for groundbreaking special
effects."[42] In 1922, Danish filmmaker Benjamin Christensen
created the Swedish-Danish production Häxan (also known as The Witches
or Witchcraft Through the Ages), a documentary-style silent horror film
based partly on Christensen's study of the Malleus Maleficarum, a
15th-century German guide for inquisitors. Häxan is a study of how
superstition and the misunderstanding of diseases and mental illness
could lead to the hysteria of the witch-hunts.[2] The film was made as a
documentary but contains dramatized sequences that are comparable to
horror films.[43] To visualize his subject matter, Christensen fills the
frame with every frightening image he can conjure out of the historical
records, often freely blending fact and fantasy. There are shocking
moments in which we witness a woman giving birth to two enormous demons,
see a witches' sabbath, and endure tortures by inquisition judges. The
film also features an endless parade of demons of all shapes and sizes,
some of whom look more or less human, whereas others, are almost fully
animal—pigs, twisted birds, cats, and the like.[44] French
filmmaker Jean Epstein produced an influential film, La Chute de la
maison Usher (The Fall of the House of Usher) in 1928. It is one of
multiple films based on the Edgar Allan Poe Gothic short story of the
same name. Future director Luis Buñuel co-wrote the screenplay with
Epstein, his second film credit, having previously worked as assistant
director on Epstein's film Mauprat from 1926. Roger Ebert included the
film on his list of "Great Movies" in 2002, calling the great hall of
the film as "one of the most haunting spaces in the movies".[45] Il mostro di Frankenstein (1921), one of only a few Italian horror films before the late 1950s, is now considered lost.[46] 1930s Universal Classic Monsters (Golden Age) In
the 1930s Universal Pictures continued producing films based on Gothic
horror. The studio entered a Golden Age of monster movies in the '30s,
releasing a string of hit horror movies. In this decade, the studio
assembled several iconic monsters in motion picture history including
Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy, and The Invisible Man.[47] Each movie
starring these monsters would go on to make sequels and each of the
characters would go on to cross-over with one another in a cinematic
shared universe. The films would retroactively be classified together as
part of the Universal Classic Monsters series.[48] Universal
Pictures created a monopoly on the mainstream horror film, producing
stars such as Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff, and grossing large sums of
money at the box office in the process. Not only did Universal bring the
subgenre of "creature features" into the limelight, they also gave them
their golden years, now reflected back on as "The Monsters Golden
Era."[49] In the 1920s, the studio only put out five features, in the
1930s however, they produced about 21. In the year 1930,
Universal Pictures released the mystery film The Cat Creeps. It was a
sound remake of the studio's earlier film, The Cat and the Canary from
three years ago. Simultaneously, Universal also released a
Spanish-speaking version of the film called La Voluntad del Muerto (The
Will of the Dead Man). The film was directed by George Melford who would
later direct the Spanish version of Dracula. Both The Cat Creeps and La
Voluntad del Muerto are considered lost films. 1931: The two Dracula movies and Frankenstein File:Dracula trailer (1931).webmPlay media Universal Pictures' trailer for the vampire movie Dracula (1931) On
14 February 1931, Universal Pictures premiered their first film
adaptation of Dracula, the popular story of an ancient vampire who
arrives in England where he preys upon a virtuous young girl. The film
was based on the 1924 stage play by Hamilton Deane and John L.
Balderston, which in turn was loosely based on the classic 1897 novel by
Bram Stoker. February 1931's Dracula was an English-language
vampire-horror film directed by Tod Browning and stars Bela Lugosi as
the Count Dracula, the actor's most iconic role. The film was generally
well received by critics. Variety praised the film for its "remarkably
effective background of creepy atmosphere."[50] Film Daily declared it
"a fine melodrama" and also lauded Lugosi's performance, calling it
"splendid" and remarking that he had created "one of the most unique and
powerful roles of the screen".[51] Kim Newman, writing for the book
1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, said that Dracula signaled the
"true beginning of the horror film as a distinct genre and the vampire
movie as its most popular subgenre."[52] Two months later on 24
April 1931, Universal Pictures premiered the Spanish-language version of
Dracula directed by George Melford. April 1931's Drácula was filmed at
night on the same sets that were being used during the day for the
English-language version. Of the cast, only Carlos Villarías (playing
Count Dracula) was permitted to see rushes of the English-language film,
and he was encouraged to imitate Bela Lugosi's performance. Some long
shots of Lugosi as the Count and some alternative takes from the English
version were used in this production.[53] In recent years, this version
has become more highly praised than Tod Browning's English-language
version.[54] The Spanish crew had the advantage of watching the English
dailies when they came in for the evening, and they would devise better
camera angles and more effective use of lighting in an attempt to
improve upon it.[55] In 2015, the Library of Congress selected the film
for preservation in the National Film Registry, finding it "culturally,
historically, or aesthetically significant".[56] Boris Karloff as Frankenstein's monster in the 1935 Bride of Frankenstein. On
21 November 1931, Universal Pictures released another hit film with
Frankenstein. The story is about a scientist and his assistant who dig
up corpses in the hopes to reanimated them with electricity. The
experiment goes awry when Dr. Frankenstein's assistant accidentally
gives the creature a murderer's abnormal brain. 1931's Frankenstein was
based on a 1927 play by Peggy Webling which in turn was based on Mary
Shelley's classic 1818 Gothic novel. The film was directed by James
Whale and stars Boris Karloff as Frankenstein's monster in one of his
most iconic roles. A hit with both audiences and critics, the film was
followed by multiple sequels and along with the same year's Dracula, has
become one of the most famous horror films in history. "Universal’s
makeup artist Jack Pierce created the main look of the monster, devising
the flattop, the neck terminals, the heavy eyelids, and the elongated
scarred hands, while director James Whale outfitted the creature with a
shabby suit."[57] At the end of 1931, Paramount came out with Dr.
Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, starring Fredric March, who shared the Best Actor
Oscar with Wallace Beery for The Champ. March is the first actor to win
the Best Actor Oscar for a portrayal in a horror role.[58] 1932: Edgar Allan Poe Double Feature and The Mummy On
21 February 1932, Universal Pictures released a double-feature. The
first one is Murders in the Rue Morgue. It stars Bela Lugosi as a
lunatic scientist who abducts women and injects them with blood from his
ill-tempered caged ape. The film was loosely based on an 1841 short
story by Edgar Allan Poe. Universal Pictures would release two more Poe
adaptations later in the decade. The second film in the double-feature
is the James Whale-directed The Old Dark House. It's a mystery horror
story starring Boris Karloff. Five travelers are admitted to a large
foreboding old house that belongs to an extremely strange family. The
story was based on a 1927 novel by J.B. Priestly. In December
1932, the studio released The Mummy starring Boris Karloff as the
Egyptian monster. The film, based on an original screenplay, is about an
ancient Egyptian mummy named Imhotep who is discovered by a team of
archaeologists and inadvertently brought back to life through a magic
scroll. Review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reports a 93% score,
based on 27 reviews, with an average rating of 7.9/10. The site's
consensus states: "Relying more on mood and atmosphere than the thrills
typical of modern horror fare, Universal's The Mummy sets a masterful
template for mummy-themed films to follow."[59] The Mummy character was
so popular that it spawned sequels and remakes over the next decades. Make-up
artist Jack Pierce was responsible for the look of the Mummy. After
studying photos of ancient mummies, Pierce came up with the look bearing
a resemblance to the mummy of Ramesses III. Pierce began transforming
Karloff at 11 a.m., applying cotton, collodion and spirit gum to his
face; clay to his hair; and wrapping him in linen bandages treated with
acid and burnt in an oven, finishing the job at 7 p.m. Karloff finished
his scenes by 2 a.m., and another two hours were spent removing the
make-up. Boris Karloff found the removal of gum from his face painful,
and overall found the day "the most trying ordeal I [had] ever
endured".[60] The image of Karloff wrapped in bandages has become one of
the most iconic images in the series. Jack Pierce would also come to
design the Satanic make-up for Lugosi in the independently produced
White Zombie (1932). 1933: The Invisible Man debuts In 1933,
after the release of The Mummy, Universal Pictures released two
pictures. The first one was in July. It was a murder-mystery film called
The Secret of the Blue Room. The plot of the film is that, according to
legend, the "blue room" inside a mansion is cursed. Everyone who has
ever spent the night there has met with an untimely end. Three men wager
that each can survive a night in the forbidding room.[61] In November,
the studio premiered another iconic character with Dr. Jack Griffin, aka
the Invisible Man in the classic science fiction-horror film The
Invisible Man. The film was directed by James Whale and stars Claude
Rains as the titular character. The movie was based on a science fiction
novel of the same name by H. G. Wells published in 1897. The film has
been described as a "nearly perfect translation of the spirit of the
book".[62] It spawned a number of sequels, plus many spinoffs using the
idea of an "invisible man" that were largely unrelated to Wells'
original story. The Invisible Man is known for its clever and
groundbreaking visual effects by John P. Fulton, John J. Mescall and
Frank D. Williams, whose work is often credited for the success of the
film.[63] When the Invisible Man had no clothes on, the effect was
achieved through the use of wires, but when he had some of his clothes
on or was taking his clothes off, the effect was achieved by shooting
Claude Rains in a completely black velvet suit against a black velvet
background and then combining this shot with another shot of the
location the scene took place in using a matte process. Claude Rains was
claustrophobic and it was hard to breathe through the suit.
Consequently, the work was especially difficult for him, and a double,
who was somewhat shorter than Rains, was sometimes used. 1934: "The Black Cat" premieres In
1934, Universal Pictures released the successful psychological horror
film The Black Cat. It stars both Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. It was
the first of six movies where Universal Pictures paired the two iconic
actors together. The Black Cat became Universal Pictures' biggest box
office hit of the year and is considered by many to be the one that
created and popularized the psychological horror subgenre, emphasizing
on atmosphere, eerie sounds, the darker side of the human psyche, and
emotions like fear and guilt to deliver its scares, something that was
not used in the horror genre before. Although it was credited the film
was based on Edgar Allan Poe's classic 1841 short story, the film
actually has little to do with Poe's story. In the film, American
honeymooners in Hungary become trapped in the home of a Satan-worshiping
priest when the bride is taken there for medical help following a road
accident. The film exploited a sudden public interest in psychiatry.[64]
Peter Ruric (better known as pulp writer Paul Cain) wrote the
screenplay.[65] 1935: "Bride of Frankenstein" premieres In
1935, Universal Pictures released four pictures from February to July.
The first picture they released in 1935 was The Mystery of Edwin Drood, a
mystery drama film starring Claude Rains. The story revolves around an
opium-addicted choirmaster who develops an obsession for a beautiful
young girl and will not stop short of murder in order to have her. The
film was based on the final novel by Charles Dickens in 1870. In
April 1935, Bride of Frankenstein premiered. The science-fiction/horror
film was the first sequel to the 1931 hit Frankenstein. It is widely
regarded as one of the greatest sequels in cinematic history, with many
fans and critics considering it to be an improvement on the original
film. As with the original, Bride of Frankenstein was directed by James
Whale and stars Boris Karloff as the Monster. In the film, Dr.
Frankenstein, goaded by an even madder scientist, builds his monster a
mate, often referred to as the Monster's Bride. Makeup artist Jack
Pierce returned to create the makeup for the Monster and his Bride. Over
the course of filming, Pierce modified the Monster's makeup to indicate
that the Monster's injuries were healing as the film progressed.[66]
Pierce co-created the Bride's makeup with strong input from Whale,
especially regarding the Bride's iconic hair style, which was based on
the Egyptian queen Nefertiti. Actress Elsa Lanchester portrayed the
Monster's Bride. The bride's conical hairdo, with its white
lightning-trace streaks on each side, has become an iconic symbol of
both the character and the film. Elsa Lanchester played the Monster's
Bride in Bride of Frankenstein. Her conical hairdo and white
lightning-trace steaks on each side, has become an iconic symbol of the
character. A month after the release of Bride of Frankenstein,
Universal Pictures premiered the influential werewolf movie Werewolf of
London, the first Hollywood mainstream movie to feature a werewolf, a
creature of folklore who shape-shifts from a human into a wolf. The film
stars Henry Hull as the titular character. In the movie, he is a
botanist who gets attacked by a strange animal. The bite causes him to
turn into a bloodthirsty monster. Jack Pierce created the make-up for
the creature. Screenwriter and journalist Frank Nugent, writing for The
New York Times, thought the film was "designed solely to amaze and
horrify." He continued by writing, "Werewolf of London goes about its
task with commendable thoroughness, sparing no grisly detail and
springing from scene to scene with even greater ease than that oft
attributed to a daring young aerialist. Granting that the central idea
has been used before, the picture still rates the attention of
action-and-horror enthusiasts."[67] Six years later, Universal Pictures
would release the second werewolf picture, The Wolf Man, which would
garner greater deal of influence on Hollywood's depiction of the legend
of the werewolf.[68] In July 1935, Universal Pictures paired Bela
Lugosi and Boris Karloff together for a second time in the studio's
third Edgar Allan Poe picture. The film was The Raven. The film was not
actually a direct adaptation of the classic 1845 poem, but rather
inspired from it. In the film, a brilliant surgeon, played by Bela
Lugosi, is obsessed with the writer Edgar Allan Poe. He saves the life
of a beautiful dancer but goes mad when he can't have her. Meanwhile,
Boris Karloff plays a fugitive murderer on the run from the police.
1935's The Raven contains themes of torture, disfigurement, and grisly
revenge. The film did not do particularly well at the box office during
its initial release, and indirectly led to a temporary ban on horror
films in England. At the time, it was beginning to look like the horror
genre was no longer economically viable, and paired with the strict
production code of the era, American filmmakers struggled to make
creative works on screen, and horror eventually went out of vogue. This
proved a devastating development at the time for Lugosi, who found
himself losing work and struggling to support his family. Universal
Pictures changed ownership in 1936, and the new management was less
interested in the macabre. 1936: "Dracula's Daughter" premieres In
1936, Universal Pictures continued to make films for the series. In
January, the studio premiered the science fiction melodrama The
Invisible Ray. The film pairs Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff a third
time. In the film, a scientist creates a telescope-like device that
captures light waves from the Andromeda Galaxy, giving him a way to view
the distant past. He and several colleagues go to Africa to locate a
large, unusual meteorite that the light-waves showed fell there a
billion years earlier. After discovering that the meteorite is composed
of a poisonous unknown element, "Radium X", he begins to glow in the
dark, and his touch becomes deadly. These radiation effects also begin
to slowly drive him mad. Critics noted the tone of the film to be
somber, dignified, and tragic. The Invisible Ray is a morality play,
particularly given the film's final lines of dialog, uttered nine years
before the events of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, by Madame Rukh: "My son,
you have broken the first law of science...Janos Rukh is dead, but part
of him will go on to eternity, working for humanity". In May
1936, Universal Pictures released a sequel to 1931's Dracula. The film
was called Dracula's Daughter and stars Gloria Holden in the title role.
Dracula's Daughter doesn't feature Bela Lugosi or his character, but
instead tells the story of Countess Marya Zaleska, the daughter of Count
Dracula and herself a vampire. Following Dracula's death, she believes
that by destroying his body she will be free of his influence and live
normally. When this fails, she turns to a psychiatrist, played by Otto
Kruger. He, in turn, has a fiancé, Janet. The Countess kidnaps Janet and
takes her to Transylvania, leading to a battle between Dr. Garth and
the Countess. While not as successful as the original upon its release,
the film was generally well-reviewed. In the intervening decades,
criticism has been deeply divided. Contemporary critics and scholars
have noted the film's strong lesbian overtones, which Universal
acknowledged from the start of production and exploited in some early
advertising. Universal would complete their initial Dracula trilogy
seven years later with Son of Dracula. Gloria Holden as the Countess in Dracula's Daughter 1937–1939: The decline of the studio's Golden Age In
1937, Universal Pictures only released one film in the series. The film
was Night Key, a science fiction crime thriller starring Boris Karloff.
In Night Key, Karloff plays an elderly inventor of a burglar alarm who
attempts to get back at the man who stole the profits to his invention.
Later, his device is subverted by gangsters who threaten him and use his
own device to facilitate burglaries. Letterboxd users call the film "a
delightfully corny, old-fashioned thriller" and praised the film for
Karloff's performance.[69] In 1938, Universal Pictures did not
release any film related to horror, thriller, or science fiction.
Instead, they made re-releases of their previous Dracula and
Frankenstein films. It was only in January 1939, a full year and a half
after the release of Night Key that the studio continued putting out
original horror movies. On 7 January 1939, Universal Pictures premiered
their 12-part serial The Phantom Creeps. It stars Bela Lugosi as a mad
scientist who attempts to rule the world by creating various elaborate
inventions. In a dramatic fashion, foreign agents and G-Men (government
men) try to seize the inventions for themselves. A 78-minute version of
the film, cut down from the serial's original 265 minutes, was released
for television ten years later. The Phantom Creeps was Universal
Pictures' 112th serial and 44th to have sound. The innovation of the
scrolling text version of the synopsis at the beginning of each chapter
was used for the Star Wars films as the "Star Wars opening crawl". On
13 January 1939, Universal Pictures released Son of Frankenstein, the
third entry in the studio's Frankenstein series and the last to feature
Boris Karloff as the Monster. It is also the first to feature Bela
Lugosi as Ygor. The film is the sequel to James Whale's Bride of
Frankenstein, and stars top-billed Basil Rathbone, Karloff, Lugosi and
Lionel Atwill. Son of Frankenstein was a reaction to the popular
re-releases of Dracula and Frankenstein as double-features in 1938. In
the film, one of the sons of Frankenstein finds his father's monster in a
coma and revives him, only to find out he is controlled by Ygor who is
bent on revenge. Universal's declining horror output was revitalized
with the enormously successful Son of Frankenstein, in which the studio
cast both stars (Lugosi and Karloff) again for the fourth time. In
November 1939, Universal Pictures released their last horror film of
the 1930s with the historical and quasi-horror film, Tower of London. It
stars Basil Rathbone as the future King Richard III of England, and
Boris Karloff as his fictitious club-footed executioner Mord. Vincent
Price, in only his third film, appears as George, Duke of Clarence.
Tower of London is based on the traditional depiction of Richard rising
to become King of England in 1483 by eliminating everyone ahead of him.
Each time Richard accomplishes a murder, he removes one figurine from a
dollhouse resembling a throne room. Once he has completed his task, he
now needs to defeat the exiled Henry Tudor to retain the throne. Other productions in the 1930s Other
studios followed Universal's lead. MGM's controversial Freaks (1932)
frightened audiences at the time, featuring characters played by people
who had real deformities. The studio even disowned the film, and it
remained banned in the United Kingdom for 30 years.[70] Paramount
Pictures' Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931) is remembered for its
innovative use of photographic filters to create Jekyll's transformation
before the camera.[71] And RKO created the highly successful and
influential monster movie, King Kong (1933). With the progression of the
genre, actors like Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi were beginning to
build entire careers in horror. Also, early in the decade, Danish
director Carl Theodor Dreyer created the horror fantasy film Vampyr
(1932) based on elements from J. Sheridan Le Fanu's collection of
supernatural stories In a Glass Darkly. The German-produced sound film
tells the story of Allan Gray, a student of the occult who enters a
village under the curse of a vampire. According to the book 1001 Movies
You Must See Before You Die, Vampyr's "greatness derives partly from
Dreyer's handling of the vampire theme in terms of sexuality and
eroticism, and partly from its highly distinctive, dreamy look." 1940s Universal Classic Monsters (Numerous Sequels / The Wolf Man debuts) Despite
the success of The Wolf Man, by the 1940s, Universal's monster movie
formula was growing stale, as evidenced by desperate sequels and
ensemble films with multiple monsters. Eventually, the studio resorted
to comedy-horror pairings, like Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein,
which was met with some success.[72] In the 1940s, Universal Pictures
released 17 feature films, all of which were sequels or reboots to their
popular monster movies from the late 20s and 30s. In 1940,
Universal Pictures released three movies. In January, The Invisible Man
Returns, which stars Vincent Price, premiered in theaters to commercial
success despite its production being plagued with problems.[73] The
special effects in the movie received an Oscar nomination in the
category Best Special Effects. In September, The Mummy's Hand was
released. Although it is sometimes claimed by fans as a sequel to The
Mummy (1932), it does not continue that film's storyline, or feature any
of the same characters. The Mummy's Hand was the first of a series of
four films all featuring the mummy named Kharis. The sequels are The
Mummy's Tomb (1942), The Mummy's Ghost, and The Mummy's Curse (both
1944). Tom Tyler played Kharis in the first installment but Lon Chaney,
Jr. took over the role for the three sequels. Upon the film's release,
film critic Bosley Crowther wrote for The New York Times, "It's the
usual mumbo-jumbo of secret tombs in crumbling temples and salacious old
high priests guarding them against the incursions of an archaeological
expedition".[74] In December, The Invisible Woman was released.
It is the third film in the Invisible Man film series. This film was
more of a screwball comedy than the other films in the series. The film
stars Virginia Bruce in the lead role and John Barrymore in a supporting
role. Reviews from critics were mixed. Theodore Strauss of The New York
Times called it "silly, banal and repetitious".[75] Two more films from
the Invisible Man series would be released in the decade. The
propaganda war-horror Invisible Agent (1942), which featured a mad
scientist working in secret to aid the Third Reich, and The Invisible
Man's Revenge (1944). Other notable sequels during this era
include The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942), Son of Dracula (1943), and
She-Wolf of London (1946). In 1941, Universal Pictures released a
reboot to the studio's 1935 werewolf picture Werewolf of London which
starred Henry Hull in a more subtle werewolf makeup. The Wolf Man
(1941), however, was more popular and influential in the genre. The
character of Larry Talbot (aka The Wolf Man) is considered one of the
best classic monsters in the series. The title character has had a great
deal of influence on Hollywood's depictions of the legend of the
werewolf.[76] He was portrayed by Lon Chaney Jr. in the 1941 picture and
in the four sequels, all of which were released in the 1940s, including
Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (1943) and House of Dracula (1945), the
latter of which Larry Talbot and Dracula seek a cure for their
respective afflictions. Other productions in the 1940s In the
1940s, Val Lewton became a well known figure in early B-movie cinema for
making low-budget films for RKO Pictures, including Cat People (1942), I
Walked with a Zombie (1943), The Leopard Man (1943), which was directed
by Jacques Tourneur, and The Body Snatcher (1945). The Body Snatcher
was selected by the United States' National Film Registry as being
"culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". The decade
also saw the continuation of Universal Pictures' consistent releases of
horror, suspense and science fiction films. Lon Chaney Jr. became the
studio's leading monster movie actor in the 1940s. Paramount
Pictures also released horror films in the 1940s, the most popular of
which is The Uninvited (1944). The film has been noted by contemporary
film scholars as being the first film in history to portray ghosts as
legitimate entities, rather than illusions or misunderstandings played
for comedy. It depicts various supernatural phenomena, including
disembodied voices, apparitions, and possession. MGM's best known horror
film of the decade is Albert Lewin's existential horror The Picture of
Dorian Gray (1945), which became popular for its use of color insert to
show Dorian's haunting corrupted portrait. In 1941,
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer released its own version of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,
starring Spencer Tracy, Ingrid Bergman, and Lana Turner. In
1945, Great Britain contributed the anthology horror film Dead of Night.
In the film, house guests tell five supernatural tales, the last of
which being the most remembered. The film's last story, titled The
Ventriloquist's Dummy, features a ventriloquist tormented by a
malevolent puppet. Horror pictures of the 1940s crossed over with
other popular film genres of the decade, including film noir, melodrama
and mystery. Some of these movies include The Spiral Staircase (1946),
which tells the story of a serial killer targeting women with
afflictions, The Seventh Victim (1943), a horror/film noir story of a
woman stumbling upon a Satanic cult while looking for her missing
sister, and John Brahm's The Lodger (1944), where a landlady suspects
her new lodger to be Jack the Ripper. A Finnish film The Green Chamber
of Linnais (1945), directed by Valentin Vaala, presents romance and
horror in an escapist way.[77] The Queen of Spades (1949) is a
fantasy/horror film about an elderly countess who strikes a bargain with
the devil and exchanges her soul for the ability to always win at
cards. Wes Anderson ranked it as the sixth best British film.[78] Martin
Scorsese said that The Queen of Spades is a "stunning film" and one of
"the few true classics of supernatural cinema."[79] And Dennis Schwartz
of Ozus' World Movie Reviews called it "A masterfully filmed surreal
atmospheric supernatural tale".[80] 1950s With advances in
technology, the tone of horror films shifted from Gothic tones to
contemporary concerns. A popular horror subgenre began to emerge: the
Doomsday film.[81] Low-budget productions featured humanity overcoming
threats such as alien invasions and deadly mutations to people, plants,
and insects. Popular films of this genre include Creature from the Black
Lagoon (1954) and The Blob (1958). The science fiction horror
film Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) follows an extraterrestrial
invasion where aliens are capable of reproducing a duplicate replacement
copy of each human. It is considered to be the most popular and most
paranoid film from the golden age of American sci-fi cinema. The Arrival of 3-D In
the 1950s, television had arrived and the theatrical market was
changing. Producers and exhibitors found new, exciting and enticing ways
to keep audiences in theaters. This is how Hollywood directors and
producers found ample opportunity for audience exploitation through
gimmicks. The years 1952 through 1954 are considered the "Golden Era" of
3-D movies. In a three-dimensional stereoscopic film, the audience's
brains are tricked into believing the images projected onto a flat
cinema screen are coming to life in full three-dimensional glory.[82]
Through this way, the audience's fright factor is enhanced. Those who
came to see a 3-D movie inside a theater were given the familiar
disposable cardboard anaglyph 3D glasses to wear which will allow them
to see the images come to life. Vincent Price in House on Haunted Hill In
April 1953, Warner Bros. presented the horror-thriller House of Wax,
the first 3D feature with stereophonic sound. The film, which stars
Vincent Price, tells a story of a disfigured sculptor who repopulates
his destroyed wax museum by murdering people and using their wax-coated
corpses as displays. House of Wax was the film that typecast Price as a
horror icon. A year later, he played a trademark role as a
round-the-bend illusionist bent on revenge in the 3D film noir The Mad
Magician (1954). After the release of that film, Price would be labeled
the "King of 3-D" and would later become the actor to star in the most
3D features. The success of these two films proved that major studios
now had a method of getting film-goers back into theaters and away from
television sets, which were causing a steady decline in attendance. William Castle and Promotional Gimmicks in Theaters Aside
from 3-D technology, different forms of promotional gimmicks were used
to entice film-goers into seeing the films in theaters. One example was
during the screening of The Lost Missile (1958), a science fiction film
in which scientists try to stop a mysterious missile from destroying the
Earth. Audiences who saw the film in theaters were given "shock tags"
to monitor their vitals during the movie. They were promised that anyone
who would get shocked into a comatose state by the film would get a
free ride home in a limousine.[83] The Tingler, 1959: "Can You Take Percepto?" Film
director and producer William Castle is considered the King of the
gimmick. After directing a cavalcade of B-movies for Columbia Pictures
in the 1940s, Castle set out on the independent route. To help sell his
first self-financed film Macabre (1958), he not only hired girls to
stand in as fake nurses outside theater doors in case anyone needed
medical attention, he also passed out a certificate for a $1,000 life
insurance policy to each member of the audience in case anyone would
happen to die of fright from watching his film. This kind of promotional
gimmick would later make him famous.[84] Another gimmick Castle
utilized in his films was EMERGO, which was used during the screening of
his cult classic House on Haunted Hill (1959), which also starred
Vincent Price. Throughout the promotion of this film, Castle explained
that through EMERGO, "ghosts and skeletons leave the screen and wander
throughout the audience, roam around and go back to the screen". Of
course, in actuality, a skeleton with glowing red eyes was attached to
wires above the theater screen in order to swoop in and float above
audience members' heads to parallel the action on the screen.[85]
Another Castle/Price production was The Tingler (1959) which tells the
story of a scientist who discovers a parasite in human beings, called a
"tingler", which feeds on fear. In the film, Price breaks the fourth
wall and warns the audience that the tingler is in the theater, which
then prompts the built-in electric buzzers to scare audiences in their
theater seats. Creature Feature The 1950s is also well known
for creature features or giant monster movies. These are usually
disaster films that focus on a group of characters struggling to survive
attacks by one or more antagonistic monsters, often abnormally large
ones. The monster is often created by a folly of mankind – an experiment
gone wrong, the effects of radiation or the destruction of habitat.
Sometimes the monster is from outer space, has been on Earth for a long
time with no one ever seeing it, or released from a prison of some sort
where it was being held. In monster movies, the monster is usually a
villain, but can be a metaphor of humankind's continuous destruction.
Warner Bros.' The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953) is considered to be
the film which kick-started the 1950s wave of monster movies and the
concept of combining nuclear paranoia with the genre.[86] In the film, a
beast was awakened from its hibernating state in the frozen ice of the
Arctic Circle by an atomic bomb test. It then begins to wreak a path of
destruction as it travels southward, eventually arriving at its ancient
spawning grounds, which includes New York City. The Beast from 20,000
Fathoms was the first ever live-action film to feature a giant monster
awakened, preceding Godzilla (1954) by 16 months. The film is also
remembered for its influential stop motion model animation created by
visual effects creator Ray Harryhausen. Ray Harryhausen created
his own form of stop motion model animation called Dynamation. It
involved photographing a miniature against a rear-projection screen
through a partly masked pane of glass. The masked portion would then be
re-exposed to insert foreground elements from the live footage. The
effect was to make the creature appear to move in the midst of live
action. It could now be seen walking behind a live tree, or be viewed in
the middle distance over the shoulder of a live actor – effects
difficult to achieve before.[87] The first movie to have the Dynamation
label was the fantasy adventure film The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958). In
the movie, a princess is shrunken by an evil wizard. Sinbad must
undertake a quest to an island of monsters to cure her and prevent a
war. It took Harryhausen 11 months to complete the full color,
widescreen stop-motion animation sequences for the movie. The film
features a few creatures including a cyclops, a cobra-woman, a dragon,
and a fighting skeleton. The sword fight scene between Sinbad and the
skeleton proved so popular with audiences that Harryhausen recreated and
expanded the scene five years later, this time having a group of seven
armed skeletons fight the Greek hero Jason and his men in 1963's Jason
and the Argonauts.[88] Harryhausen's innovative style of special
effects inspired numerous filmmakers including future directors Peter
Jackson, Tim Burton, and Guillermo del Toro.[89] In the fantasy film
Jason and the Argonauts (1963), there is an iconic fight scene that
involves skeleton warriors. That scene spurred on numerous homages in
many horror films[90] including A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream
Warriors (1987), Army of Darkness (1992), and a season 4 episode of Game
of Thrones (2014) entitled The Children.[91] Other notable
creature films from the 50s include It Came from Beneath the Sea (1955),
Tarantula (1955), and The Giant Behemoth (1959). Another well-known
movie in this decade was Night of the Demon (1957). Japan's
experience with Hiroshima and Nagasaki bored the well-known Godzilla
(1954) and its many sequels, featuring mutation from the effects of
nuclear radiation. This kickstarted the tokusatsu trend known as Kaiju
films, a Japanese film genre that features giant monsters, usually
attacking major cities and engaging the military and other monsters in
battle. Other films in this genre include Rodan (1956) and The
Mysterians (1957). Besides Kaiju films, Japan was also into ghost
cat/feline ghost movies in the 1950s. These include Ghost-Cat of
Gojusan-Tsugi (1956), and Black Cat Mansion (1958), which tells a story
of a samurai tormented by a cat possessed by the spirits of the people
she killed. Science Fiction and Horror in the 1950s Filmmakers
continued to merge elements of science fiction and horror over the
following decades. The Fly (1958) is an American science fiction horror
film starring Vincent Price, and tells the story of a scientist who is
transformed into a grotesque creature after a house fly enters into a
molecular transporter he is experimenting with, resulting in his atoms
being combined with those of the insect, which produces a human-fly
hybrid. The film was released in CinemaScope with Color by 20th Century
Fox. It was followed by two black-and-white sequels, Return of the Fly
(1959) and Curse of the Fly (1965). The original film was remade in 1986
by director David Cronenberg. Poster art for the 1958 sci-fi horror film Attack of the 50 Foot Woman Considered
a "pulp masterpiece"[92] of the 1950s was The Incredible Shrinking Man
(1957), based on Richard Matheson's existentialist novel. The film tells
the story of a man, who after getting exposed to a radioactive cloud,
gets shrunk in height by several inches. The film conveyed the fears of
living in the Atomic Age and the terror of social alienation. It won the
first Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation and was chosen for the
National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for being "culturally,
historically or aesthetically" significant. An independently
produced sci-fi film Attack of the 50 Foot Woman (1958) tells the story
of a wealthy heiress whose close encounter with an enormous alien causes
her to grow into a giantess, complicating her marriage already troubled
by a philandering husband. The film has become a cult classic and is
often referenced in popular culture. It is also a variation on other
1950s science fiction films that featured size-changing humans,
including The Amazing Colossal Man (1957), and its sequel War of the
Colossal Beast (1958). Hammer Films Christopher Lee starred in
numerous British horror films of the era, produced by Hammer Films.
Shown here is the color remake of Dracula (1958). It was Lee who fixed
the image of the fanged vampire in popular culture.[93][94] The
United Kingdom began to emerge as a major producer of horror films
around this time.[95] The Hammer company focused on the genre for the
first time, enjoying huge international success from films involving
classic horror characters, which were shown in color for the first
time.[96] Drawing on Universal's precedent, many films produced were
Frankenstein and Dracula remakes, followed by many sequels. Christopher
Lee starred in a number of Hammer horror films, including The Curse of
Frankenstein (1957), which Professor Patricia MacCormac called the
"first really gory horror film, showing blood and guts in colour".[97]
His most influential role was as Count Dracula, with the portrayal
becoming the archetypal vampire in popular culture. The academic
Christopher Frayling writes that Lee's film, Dracula (1958), introduced
fangs, red contact lenses, décolletage, ready-prepared wooden stakes and
– in the celebrated credits sequence – blood being spattered from
off-screen over the Count's coffin."[98] Lee also introduced a dark,
brooding sexuality to the character, with Tim Stanley stating, "Lee’s
sensuality was subversive in that it hinted that women might quite like
having their neck chewed on by a stud".[99] Other British companies
contributed to the horror genre in the 1960s and 1970s. Universal Classic Monsters in the 1950s Universal
Pictures released the last of their horror films in the 1950's. They
continued releasing commercially-successful movies with the
horror-comedy parodies starring the comedy duo Abbott and Costello, and a
few monster movies including the classic Creature from the Black
Lagoon. In March 1951, Universal Pictures premiered Abbott and
Costello Meet the Invisible Man. The science fiction comedy depicts the
misadventures of two private detectives investigating the murder of a
boxing promoter. The film was part of a series in which the legendary
comedy duo Bud Abbott and Lou Costello meet classic characters from
Universal's stable, including Frankenstein, the Mummy and the Keystone
Kops. The special effects in the movie, which depicted invisibility and
other optical illusions, were created by Stanley Horsley, son of cinema
pioneer David Horsley. In February 1954, Creature from the Black
Lagoon premiered in theaters in 3-D. The film was so popular, it
generated two sequels: Revenge of the Creature (1955), and The Creature
Walks Among Us (1956). The Creature, also known as the Gill-man, is
usually counted among the classic Universal Monsters. Horror Anthology Series in 1950s Television Horror
has been a mainstay of television programming since the 1950s. The 2013
book TV Horror: Investigating the Dark Side of the Small Screen,
observed that television has helped shape many generations of horror
fans and filmmakers because it provided them their first exposure to
cinematic horror as children cowering behind their sofa or peering out
from under their blanket[100] In the 1950s, multiple anthology series
that feature suspenseful horror stories were broadcast on television.
The Veil (1958) is one notable anthology series that starred Boris
Karloff as the horror host and characters in the episodes. 10 of the 12
episodes begin and end with Karloff standing in front of a roaring
fireplace and inviting viewers to find out what lies "behind the veil".
Hailed by critics as "the greatest television series never seen", The
Veil was not broadcast. Troubles within the studio resulted in
production being cancelled after 10 episodes were produced. The number
of episodes was considered to be too small to justify sale to a network
or to syndication. The ten episodes were released to the public in their
entirety for the first time in the 1990s, and have subsequently been
released on DVD by Something Weird Video.[101] Alfred Hitchcock
Presents (1955–1965) premiered in October 1955, which featured dramas,
thrillers, mysteries, horror and crime. It was created, hosted, and
produced by Alfred Hitchcock, who by 1955 had already directed films for
over three decades. Some of the stories in the show were original,
while others were adaptations of writers like H. G. Wells, and always
had knotty twists and often came to macabre endings, as in the 4
December 1955 episode "The Case of Mr. Pelham," in which a businessman
is stalked by a perfect double who usurps his life and drives him
insane. Time magazine named the series as one of "The 100 Best TV Shows
of All Time".[102] The Twilight Zone (1959–1964) has become a
staple in horror fiction since its premiere in October 1959.[103] Each
episode presents a standalone story in which characters find themselves
dealing with disturbing or unusual events, an experience described as
entering "the Twilight Zone". Although predominantly science-fiction,
the show's paranormal and Kafkaesque events leaned the show towards
fantasy and horror. The phrase "twilight zone," is used today to
describe surreal experiences. An iconic episode which premiered on 20
November 1959 is Time Enough at Last which tells the story of a bank
teller who yearns for more time to read and gets his wish when he
becomes the sole survivor of a nuclear holocaust. In 2009, TV Guide
ranked this episode #11 on its list of the 100 Greatest Episodes. Other
notable horror anthologies in the 50s include The Vampira Show
(1954–1955), which was presented by Maila Nurmi, considered to be
television's first horror host, dressed as her iconic campy Vampira
character, and 13 Demon Street (1959–1960), which was hosted by Lon
Chaney Jr. who, as a condemned criminal, introduces crime stories to
convince viewers that the crimes presented are worse than his. 1960s Roger Corman's Edgar Allan Poe Cycle In
the early 1960s, the production company American International
Pictures, or AIP, gained popularity by combining Roger Corman, Vincent
Price and the stories of Edgar Allan Poe into a series of horror films,
with scripts by Richard Matheson, Charles Beaumont, Ray Russell, R.
Wright Campbell and Robert Towne. The original idea, usually
credited[who?] to Corman and Lou Rusoff, was to take Poe's story "The
Fall of the House of Usher", which had both a high name-recognition
value and the merit of being in the public domain, and thus
royalty-free, and expand it into a feature film. Corman convinced the
studio to give him a larger budget than the typical AIP film so he could
film the movie in widescreen and color, and use it to create lavish
sets as well.[104] The success of House of Usher led AIP to
finance further films based on Poe's stories. The sets and special
effects were often reused in subsequent movies (for example, the burning
roof of the Usher mansion reappears in most of the other films as stock
footage), making the series quite cost-effective. All the films in the
series were directed by Roger Corman, and they all starred Price except
The Premature Burial, which featured Ray Milland in the lead. It was
originally produced for another studio, but AIP acquired the rights to
it.[104] As the series progressed, Corman made attempts to change
the formula. Later films added more humor to the stories, especially
The Raven, which takes Poe's poem as an inspiration and develops it into
an all-out farce starring Price, Boris Karloff and Peter Lorre; Karloff
had starred in a 1935 film with the same title. Corman also adapted H.
P. Lovecraft's short novel The Case of Charles Dexter Ward in an attempt
to get away from Poe, but AIP changed the title to that of an obscure
Poe poem, The Haunted Palace, and marketed it as yet another movie in
the series. The last two films in the series, The Masque of the Red
Death and The Tomb of Ligeia, were filmed in England with an unusually
long schedule for Corman and AIP. Although Corman and Rusoff are
generally credited with coming up with the idea for the Poe series, in
an interview on the Anchor Bay DVD of Mario Bava's Black Sabbath, Mark
Damon claims that he first suggested the idea to Corman. Damon also says
that Corman let him direct The Pit and the Pendulum uncredited.
Corman's commentary for Pit mentions nothing of this and all existing
production stills of the film show Corman directing. List of Corman-Poe films Of eight films, seven feature stories that are actually based on the works of Poe. House of Usher (1960) – based on the short story "The Fall of the House of Usher" The Pit and the Pendulum (1961) – based on the title of the short story of the same name The Premature Burial (1962) – based on the short story of the same name
Tales of Terror (1962) – based on the short stories "Morella", "The
Black Cat", "The Cask of Amontillado" and "The Facts in the Case of M.
Valdemar" The Raven (1963) – based on the poem of the same name
The Haunted Palace (1963) – based on H.P. Lovecraft's novella The Case
of Charles Dexter Ward, using the title from Poe's 1839 poem The
Masque of the Red Death (1964) – based on the short story of the same
name with another Poe short story, "Hop-Frog", used as a subplot The Tomb of Ligeia (1964) – based on the short story "Ligeia" Occasionally,
Corman's 1963 film The Terror (produced immediately after The Raven) is
recognized as being part of the Corman-Poe cycle, although the film's
story and title are not based on any literary work of Poe. Based
in rented office space at the Chaplin Studios, during the early 1960s
AIP concentrated on horror films inspired by the Poe cycle. Other productions in the 1960s Released
in May 1960, the British psychological horror thriller film, Peeping
Tom (1960) by Michael Powell, is a progenitor of the contemporary
"slasher film",[105] though Alfred Hitchcock cemented the subgenre with
Psycho released also in the same year.[106] Hitchcock, considered to be
the "Master of Suspense" didn't set out to frighten fans the way many
other traditional horror filmmakers do. Instead, he helped pioneer the
art of psychological suspense. As a result, he managed to frighten his
viewers by getting to the root of their deepest fears.[107] One of his
most frightening films besides Psycho is The Birds (1963), where a
seemingly idyllic town is overrun by violent birds. France
continued the mad scientist theme with the film Eyes Without a Face
(1960). The story follows Parisian police in search of the culprit
responsible for the deaths of young women whose faces have been
mutilated.[108] In Criterion's description of the film, they say it
include "images of terror, of gore, [and] of inexplicable beauty".[109] Meanwhile,
Italian horror films became internationally notable thanks to Mario
Bava's contributions. His film La Maschera del Demonio (1960), marketed
in English as The Mask of Satan then wound up being known as Black
Sunday in the United States and Revenge of the Vampire in the United
Kingdom. In this film, Bava turned a Russian folk legend into a
beguiling fairly tale about a young doctor who finds himself stranded in
a haunted community and falls for a woman whose body become possessed
by a woman executed for witchcraft. Three years later, Bava went on to
make the horror anthology film Black Sabbath (1963) known in Italy as I
tre volti della paura, literally 'The Three Faces of Fear'. In
the United States, gimmicks continued to be used to entice film-goers
into theaters. William Castle's 1960 horror film 13 Ghosts was shot in
"Illusion-O", where audiences were given a "supernatural viewer" that
they could wear to see hidden ghosts in the film.[110] In 13 Ghosts, a
family searches for fortune inside the mansion of a reclusive doctor who
died. They will need to search the house to find the doctor's fortune,
but along with the property they have also inherited the occultist's
collection of thirteen ghosts. In 1961, Castle made Mr. Sardonicus. It
tells the story of a man whose face becomes frozen in a horrifying grin
while robbing his father's grave to obtain a winning lottery ticket.
During the promotion of the film, Castle introduced the "punishment
poll" where the audiences decide what happens to Mr. Sardonicus in the
film. All they had to do was hold up a "thumbs up" ballot if they wanted
Mr. Sardonicus go free or "thumbs down" if they want to punish him.
Supposedly no audience ever voted for life over death, so the film
continues as if the audience's majority verdict was seriously
counted.[111] Also in the same year, William Castle made Homicidal,
which follows a murderous woman in a small California town. A "fright
break" was featured during the film where the audiences are shown a
timer over the terrifying climax. The audiences who are too frightened
to see the end of the film are given 25 seconds to walk out of the
theater and into the "coward's corner" where they could get a full
refund of their ticket and a free blood pressure test.[85] Francis
Ford Coppola in his feature debut also used gimmicks in the screenings
for his 1963 horror/thriller Dementia 13. Before you could see the film
inside the theaters, you had to pass a 13 question test that included
such questions as "Did you ever do anything seriously wrong for which
you felt little or no guilt?" and "Have you ever been hospitalized in a
locked mental ward... or other facility for treatment of mental
illness?". If audiences failed any of the questions they wouldn't be
allowed inside the theater.[83] In Dementia 13, a scheming widow hatches
a daring plan to get her hands on her late husband's inheritance,
unbeknownst to her that she is targeted by an axe-wielding murderer who
lurks within the family's estate. The American International
Pictures (AIP), in the early 60s, made a series of films based on
stories by Edgar Allan Poe, most of which star Vincent Price, who became
well known for his performances in subsequent horror films of the time.
His success in House of Usher (1960) led him to do other Poe adaptions
like Tales of Terror (1962) and The Masque of the Red Death (1964).
Other popular Vincent Price horror films include House on Haunted Hill
(1959), The Comedy of Terrors (1963), War-Gods of the Deep (1965) and
The Last Man on Earth (1964) where Price becomes a reluctant Vampire
hunter after becoming the last man on earth. The British horror
film The Haunting (1963) was directed and produced by Robert Wise. It is
an adaptation of the 1959 horror novel The Haunting of Hill House by
famed horror writer Shirley Jackson. Robert Wise's The Haunting is
considered by a great many critics, aficionados, and casual fans of the
horror genre to be one of the scariest films of all time. The film is
best known for its brilliant use of canted frames, mirror reflections,
fish-eye lenses and uncanny sound and image editing. Roman
Polanski made his first film in English with Repulsion (1965), which is
considered to be his scariest and most disturbing work. Polanski's
"evocations of sexual panic and masterful use of sound puts the
audiences' imagination to work in numerous ways".[112] This
psychological horror film tells the story of a young withdrawn woman who
finds sexual advances repulsive and who, after she is left alone,
becomes even more isolated and detached from reality. A key point of
dispute between Clayton and screenwriter William Archibald in The
Innocents was whether the children (pictured) were conduits for
malicious spirits, or the phenomena was the invention of the
protagonist's mind Horror films of the 1960s used the
supernatural premise to express the horror of the demonic. Jack
Clayton's The Innocents (1961) tell the story of a governess who fears
that the children she is watching over are possessed by ghosts haunting
the estate they are staying. The story was based on Henry James' 1898
horror novella The Turn of the Screw. A few years later, Roman Polanski
wrote and directed Rosemary's Baby (1968), based on the bestselling
horror novel by Ira Levin. The highly influential film tells the story
of a pregnant woman who suspects that an evil cult wants to take her
baby for use in their rituals. Meanwhile, ghosts were a dominant theme
in Japanese horror, in such films as Kwaidan, Onibaba (both 1964) and
Kuroneko (1968). Zombies in Romero's most influential film, the
groundbreaking 1968 Night of the Living Dead. This was the template for
all future zombie films. Another influential American horror film
of the 60s was George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead (1968).
Produced and directed by Romero on a budget of $114,000, it grossed $30
million internationally. Considered to be the first true zombie movie,
the film began to combine psychological insights with gore. Distancing
the era from earlier gothic trends, late 1960s films brought horror into
everyday life. Low-budget splatter films from the likes of
Herschell Gordon Lewis also gained prominence in the 1960s.[113] It's
the precursor to "torture porn" movies that would become popular in the
following decades. Some of Lewis' notorious works include Two Thousand
Maniacs! (1964) which follows a group of Northern tourists savagely
tortured and murdered during a Confederate celebration of a small
southern community's centennial; and Color Me Blood Red (1965), a story
about a psychotic painter who murders civilians and uses their blood as
red paint. In television, the animated mystery Hanna-Barbera
series Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! was broadcast from 1969 to 1970. The
series centers on a group of teenagers and their dog who go to abandoned
places to solve mysteries involving supposedly supernatural creatures
through a series of antics and missteps. The animated series' simple
formula had a major impact on future slasher films especially of its
portrayal of villains in masks.[114] 1970s–1980s Suzy (Jessica Harper, right) and Sara (Stefania Casini, left) in Suspiria, an Italian supernatural horror film. The
1970s began a new age for horror films with the transition from
"classic" to modern horror. Horror films started to focus more on
aggressiveness and ruthlessness while also focusing more on artistic
qualities and societal themes.[115] This era of horror films has been
regarded as a "golden age" that transformed the genre by having it "grow
up" while showing that horror can be artistic.[116] The 1970s
was an era dominated by American horror films. Unlike the past, which
was influenced heavily by European film-makers, Americans breathed a new
life into the genre. Modern horror films took the expected roles of
characters in the films and changed them.[116] This era changed
the usual setting for horror films, using every-day settings. Along with
this came a change from focusing on defeating evil every time to having
some instances where good fails before succeeding.[116] The critical
and popular success of Rosemary's Baby, led to the release of more films
with occult themes in the 1970s, such as The Omen (1976), wherein a man
realizes that his five-year-old adopted son is the Antichrist.
Invincible to human intervention, demons became villains in many horror
films with a postmodern style and a dystopian worldview. Don't
Look Now (1973), an independent British-Italian film directed by Nicolas
Roeg, was also notable. Its focus on the psychology of grief was
unusually strong for a film featuring a supernatural horror plot.
Another notable film is The Wicker Man (1973), a British mystery horror
film dealing with the practice of ancient pagan rituals in the modern
era. In the 1970s, Italian filmmakers Mario Bava, Riccardo Freda,
Antonio Margheriti, and Dario Argento developed giallo horror films that
became classics and influenced the genre in other countries.
Representative films include: The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, Twitch
of the Death Nerve, and Deep Red. The ideas of the 1960s began to
influence horror films in the 70s, as the youth involved in the
counterculture began exploring the medium. Wes Craven's The Hills Have
Eyes (1977) and The Last House on the Left (1972) along with Tobe
Hooper's The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)[117] recalled the Vietnam
War; while George A. Romero satirized the consumer society in his zombie
sequel, Dawn of the Dead (1978). Meanwhile, the subgenre of comedy
horror re-emerged in the cinema with The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971),
Young Frankenstein (1974), The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975), and An
American Werewolf in London (1981) among others. Also in the
1970s, the works of the horror author Stephen King began to be adapted
for the screen, beginning with Brian De Palma's adaptation of Carrie
(1976), King's first published novel, for which the two female leads
(Sissy Spacek and Piper Laurie) gained Oscar nominations. Next, was his
third published novel, The Shining (1980), directed by Stanley Kubrick,
which was a sleeper at the box office. At first, many critics and
viewers had negative feedback toward The Shining. However, the film is
now considered to be one of the greatest horror films ever made. The
psychological horror film has a variety of themes: "evil children",
alcoholism, telepathy, and insanity. This type of film is an example of
how Hollywood's idea of horror started to evolve. Murder and violence
were no longer the main themes of horror films. In the 1970s and 1980s,
psychological and supernatural horror started to take over cinema.
Another notable Hollywood horror film is Tobe Hooper's Poltergeist
(1982). Poltergeist is ranked the 20th scariest movie ever made by the
Chicago Film Critics Association. Both The Shining and Poltergeist
involve horror being based on real-estate values. The evil and horror
throughout the films come from where the movies are taking
place.[118][119] The Amityville Horror is a 1979 supernatural
horror film directed by Stuart Rosenberg, based on Jay Anson's 1977 book
of the same name. It stars James Brolin and Margot Kidder as a young
couple who purchase a home they come to find haunted by combative
supernatural forces. The Changeling is a 1980 Canadian horror film with
supernatural and psychological elements, and was directed by Peter
Medak. Steven Spielberg's horror film, Jaws (1975), began a new
wave of killer animal stories, such as Orca (1977) and Up from the
Depths (1979). Jaws is often credited as being one of the first films to
use traditional B movie elements such as horror and mild gore in a
big-budget Hollywood film. In 1979, Don Coscarelli's Phantasm was the
first of the Phantasm series. A cycle of slasher films began in
the 1970s and 1980s with the releases of John Carpenter's Halloween
(1978) and Sean S. Cunningham's Friday the 13th (1980). Both films had a
significant influence on the horror industry and have become two of the
quintessential forerunners of commercial horror films. Halloween
grossed $70 Million on a budget of $300,000–325,000, while Friday the
13th took in nearly $60 million on a budget of $500,000.[120] Both
films' influence and inspiration can still be seen in films today. The
character of Jason Voorhees (villain in the Friday the 13th film series)
is also one of the most recognized images in pop culture. Another
notable slasher film from the 70s is Bob Clark's Black Christmas
(1974), which inspired Halloween. Sleepaway Camp (1983) is known for its
twist ending, which is considered by some to be one of the most
shocking endings among horror films. Another popular slasher film from
this era is My Bloody Valentine (1981), which is infamous for having
over nine minutes of violence and gore cut by the MPAA for its
theatrical release. Popular filmmaker Quentin Tarantino has acknowledged
that My Bloody Valentine is his favorite slasher film of all-time. The
boom in slasher films provided enough material for numerous comedic
spoofs of the genre including Saturday the 14th (1981), Student Bodies
(1981), National Lampoon's Class Reunion (1982), and Hysterical (1983). This
subgenre would be mined by dozens of increasingly violent movies
throughout the subsequent decades. Other notable examples include the
critical and commercially successful A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984),
directed by Wes Craven, and Hellraiser (1987), directed by Clive Barker. Some
films explored urban legends such as "The babysitter and the man
upstairs". A significant example is When a Stranger Calls (1979), an
American psychological horror film directed by Fred Walton, and starring
Carol Kane and Charles Durning. Alien (1979), a British-American
science-fiction horror film, directed by Ridley Scott, was both a
critical and commercial success. John Carpenter's movie The Thing (1982)
was also a mix of horror and sci-fi. Although it was a critical and
commercial failure upon release, it soon became a cult classic, and has
since received reappraisal from film critics, particularly for its
ahead-of-its-time special effects and claustrophobic setting. The
80s saw a wave of gory "B movie" horror films. Although most of them
were poorly received by critics, many have since become cult classics
and saw later success with critics. A significant example is Sam Raimi's
The Evil Dead (1981), which was a low-budget gorefest but had an
original plotline, which was later praised by critics. In the
Philippines, the first Shake, Rattle & Roll (1984) was released. The
horror anthology film spawned a series of films in the country over the
subsequent decades. Day of the Dead (1985) is an American horror
film written and directed by George A. Romero and the third film in
Romero's Night of the Living Dead series. Vampire horror was also
popular in the 1980s, including cult classics such as Fright Night
(1985), its sequel Fright Night Part 2 (1988), The Lost Boys (1987), and
Near Dark (also 1987). Joe Dante's seminal comedy horror film Gremlins
(1984), became a hit with critics and audiences, and inspired a trend of
"little monster" films such as Critters (1986), Ghoulies (1985), and
Leprechaun (1993).[121] David Cronenberg's films such as Shivers
(1975), Rabid (1977), The Brood (1979), The Dead Zone (1983), and The
Fly (1986) dealt with "body horror" and "mad scientist" themes.[122] Several
science fiction action horror movies were released in the 1980s,
notably Aliens (1986) and Predator (1987). Notable comedy horror films
of the 1980s include Re-Animator (1985), and Night of the Creeps (1986). Henry:
Portrait of a Serial Killer is a 1986 psychological horror crime film
directed and co-written by John McNaughton about the random crime spree
of a serial killer who seemingly operates with impunity. Pumpkinhead
(1988) is a dark fantasy horror film, which is the directorial debut of
special effects artist Stan Winston. 1990s In the late 1980s,
the horror genre suffered in the television market. Viewers began
turning to safer material,[123] such as soap operas, sitcoms, and
fictional tellings of real-life events, and any horror content that did
air on television suffered from network censorship, commercial breaks,
lower budgets, and "cheesy execution."[124] However, ABC's 1990 two-part
telefilm version of Stephen King's It garnered ratings incredibly rare
for a television horror program of its time to receive.[123] It was the
biggest success of 1990 for ABC, raking in thirty million viewers in its
November sweeps month run.[125] Most of its cast included stars not
popular in horror, including Pennywise actor Tim Curry;[124] and the
Broadcast Standards and Practices' restrictions on showing graphic
content influenced It to be very focused on character
development[126][127][128] and psychological horror over blood and
gore.[129] Curry's rendition of Pennywise has been called by several
publications and scholars one of the most terrifying clown characters in
film and television,[130][131][132] set the standard for the evil clown
trope,[130] and made the character a horror icon.[133][134] In
the first half of the 1990s, the genre retained many themes that
originated in the 1980s. Popular slasher films A Nightmare on Elm
Street, Friday the 13th, Halloween, and Child's Play all saw sequels in
the 1990s, most of which saw varying amounts of success at the box
office, but received a very negative reception from critics and
audiences, with an exception being Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994),
and the hugely successful, The Silence of the Lambs (1991). The latter,
which stars Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins, is considered one of the
greatest horror films ever made.[135] Misery (1990) received critical
acclaim for Kathy Bates's performance as the psychopathic Annie Wilkes. A
mini-movement of self-reflexive or metafictional horror films included
Seven (1995), starring Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman and Kevin Spacey, New
Nightmare, In the Mouth of Madness (1995), The Dark Half (1993), and
Candyman (1992). Each film touched upon the relationship between
fictional horror and real-world horror. Candyman, for example, examined
the link between an urban legend and the real horror of the racism that
produced its villain. In the Mouth of Madness took a more literal
approach, as its protagonist actually hopped from the real world into a
novel created by the madman he was hired to track down. This reflective
style became more overt and ironic with the arrival of Scream (1996). In
Interview with the Vampire (1994), the "Theatre de Vampires" (and the
film itself, to some degree) invoked the Grand Guignol style, perhaps to
further remove the undead performers from humanity, morality and class.
In the 1985 novel, The Vampire Lestat, by the author Anne Rice (who
penned Interview with the Vampire's screenplay and the 1976 novel of the
same name) suggests that its antihero Lestat inspired and nurtured the
Grand Guignol style and theatre. Two main problems pushed horror
backward during this period: firstly, the horror genre wore itself out
with the proliferation of nonstop slasher and gore films in the
eighties. Secondly, the adolescent audience which feasted on the blood
and morbidity of the previous decade grew up, and the replacement
audience for films of an imaginative nature were being captured instead
by the explosion of science-fiction and fantasy films, courtesy of
advances made in computer-generated imagery.[136] Examples of these
CGI-driven films include Species (1995), Anaconda (1997), Mimic (1997),
Blade (1998), Deep Rising (1998), House on Haunted Hill (1999), Sleepy
Hollow (1999), and The Haunting (1999). To re-connect with its
audience, horror became more self-mockingly ironic and outright parodic,
especially in the latter half of the 1990s. Peter Jackson's Braindead
(1992) (known as Dead Alive in the United States) took the splatter film
to ridiculous excesses for comic effect. Wes Craven's Scream (written
by Kevin Williamson) movies, starting in 1996, featured teenagers who
were fully aware of, and often made reference to, the history of horror
movies, and mixed ironic humour with the shocks. Along with I Know What
You Did Last Summer (1997), also written by Williamson, and Urban Legend
(1998), they re-ignited the dormant slasher film genre. Event
Horizon (1997) is a British-American science fiction horror film
directed by Paul W. S. Anderson. The Sixth Sense (1999) is a
supernatural horror film written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan,
which tells the story of Cole Sear (Haley Joel Osment), a troubled,
isolated boy who is able to see and talk to the dead, and an equally
troubled child psychologist named Malcolm Crowe (Bruce Willis) who tries
to help him. House on Haunted Hill is a 1999 horror film
directed by William Malone which follows a group of strangers who are
invited to a party at an abandoned asylum, where they are offered $1
million each by an amusement park mogul if they are able to survive the
night. It is a remake of the 1959 film of the same title. Other horror
films of the late 1990s include Cube (1997), The Faculty (1998),
Disturbing Behavior (1998), Stir of Echoes (1999), Stigmata (1999), and
Existenz (1999). Monster horror was quite popular in the 1990s.
Tremors (1990) is the first installment of the Tremors series. Lake
Placid (1999) is another monster horror film, written by David E. Kelley
and directed by Steve Miner. Another successful horror film is
Ring, a 1998 Japanese supernatural psychological horror film about a
cursed video tape (after the person watches it, the phone rings, and
someone tells them that they will die in seven days), and directed by
Hideo Nakata. Around this period, Japanese horror started becoming
popular in English speaking countries. In South Korea, the
success of supernatural horror film Whispering Corridors (1998) by Park
Ki-hyung, sparked the explosion of Korean horror. The film The
Last Broadcast (1998) served as inspiration for the highly successful
The Blair Witch Project (1999), which popularized the found footage
horror subgenre. The theme of witchcraft was also addressed in The
Witches (1990), starring Anjelica Huston, and The Craft (1996), a
supernatural horror film directed by Andrew Fleming. Wolf is a 1994
romantic horror film following the transformation of a man (Jack
Nicholson) into a werewolf. Ravenous (1999) starring Guy Pearce
and directed by Antonia Bird is a "quirky"[137] and gruesome movie based
on the real life horror story of the Donner party that got stranded in
the Sierra Nevada mountains in 1847 due to snow.[138] 2000s The
decade started with American Psycho (2000) directed by Mary Harron
starring Christian Bale as a charismatic serial killer and Manhattan
business mogul. The movie was highly controversial when released and
remains a cult classic today.[139] Scary Movie (2000), a comedy horror
directed by Keenen Ivory Wayans parodied of the horror, slasher, and
mystery genres. The film received mixed reviews from critics. By
contrast, Valentine (2001) was a conventional horror film. It had some
success at the box office, but was derided by critics for being
formulaic and relying on foregone horror film conventions. The Others
(2001) was hugely successful, winning and being further nominated for
many awards. It is a 2001 English-language Spanish gothic supernatural
psychological horror film. It was written, directed, and scored by
Alejandro Amenábar. It stars Nicole Kidman and Fionnula Flanagan. Sequels,
such as Jason X (2001) and Freddy vs. Jason (2003) also made a stand in
theaters. Final Destination (2000) marked a successful revival of
teen-centered horror and spawned five installments. Jeepers Creepers
series was also successful. Films such as Hollow Man (2000), Cabin Fever
(2002), House of 1000 Corpses (2003) (the latter an exploitation horror
film written, co-scored and directed by Rob Zombie in his directorial
debut) and the previous mentions helped bring the genre back to
Restricted ratings in theaters. Van Helsing (2004) and Underworld series
had huge box office success, despite mostly negative reviews by
critics. Ginger Snaps (2000) is a Canadian film dealing with the tragic
transformation of a teenage girl who is bitten by a werewolf. Signs
(2002) revived the science fiction alien theme. 28 Days Later (2002) is a
British post-apocalyptic horror film directed by Danny Boyle and
written by Alex Garland, it's about a highly contagious virus that
devastated Great Britain, four survivors are going for a safe haven in
Manchester, a critical and commercial success, the film helped
revitalize the zombie horror subgenre and introduced the new concept of
fast zombies.The Descent, a 2005 British adventure horror film written
and directed by Neil Marshall was also successful. Another notable film
is Drag Me to Hell, a 2009 American supernatural horror film co-written
and directed by Sam Raimi. The Strangers (2008) deals with unprovoked
stranger-on-stranger violence. The House of the Devil (2009) is inspired
by the "satanic panic" of the 1980s. Trick 'r Treat is a 2007 anthology
horror film written and directed by Michael Dougherty and produced by
Bryan Singer. Black Water (2007) is a British-Australian natural horror
film. Another natural adventure horror film is The Ruins (2008), which
is based on the novel of the same name by Scott Smith. 30 Days of Night
(2007) is based on the comic book miniseries of the same name. The story
focuses on an Alaskan town beset by vampires as it enters into a 30-day
long polar night. Comic book adaptations like the Blade series,
Constantine (2005), and Hellboy (2004) also became box office successes.
The Resident Evil video games were adapted into a film released in
March 2002, and several sequels followed. Other video game adaptations
like Doom (2005) and Silent Hill (2006) also had moderate box office
success. Some pronounced trends have marked horror films. Films
from non-English language countries have become successful. The Devil's
Backbone (2001) is such an example. It is a 2001 Spanish-Mexican gothic
horror film directed by Guillermo del Toro, and written by del Toro,
David Muñoz, and Antonio Trashorras. A French horror film Brotherhood of
the Wolf (2001) became the second-highest-grossing French language film
in the United States in the last two decades. The Swedish film Let the
Right One In (2008) was also successful. REC is a 2007 Spanish zombie
horror film, co-written and directed by Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza.
Martyrs (2008), a French-Canadian horror film, was controversial upon
its release, receiving polarizing reviews. Another notable film is The
Orphanage (2007), a Spanish horror film and the debut feature of Spanish
filmmaker J. A. Bayona. A Tale of Two Sisters is a 2003 South Korean
psychological drama horror film written and directed by Kim Jee-woon.
Shutter (2004) is a Thai horror film which focuses on mysterious images
seen in developed pictures. Cold Prey is a 2006 Norwegian slasher film
directed by Roar Uthaug. Another trend is the emergence of
psychology to scare audiences, rather than gore. The Others (2001)
proved to be a successful example of a psychological horror film. A
minimalist approach which was equal parts Val Lewton's theory of "less
is more", usually employing the low-budget techniques utilized on The
Blair Witch Project (1999), has been evident, particularly in the
emergence of Asian horror movies which have been remade into successful
Americanized versions, such as The Ring (2002), The Grudge (2004), Dark
Water (2005), and Pulse (2006). In March 2008, China banned the movies
from its market.[140] Credo (2008) and Triangle (2009) are two British
psychological horror films. What Lies Beneath (2000) is a supernatural
horror film directed by Robert Zemeckis, starring Harrison Ford and
Michelle Pfeiffer as a couple who experience a strange haunting of their
home. The psychological horror film, 1408 was released in 2007, it is
based on Stephen King's 1999 short story of the same name. Two
Australian horror films that deal with teenagers are Lake Mungo (2008)
and The Loved Ones (2009). The films I Am Legend (2007),
Quarantine (2008), Zombieland (2009), and 28 Days Later (2002) featured
an update of the apocalyptic and aggressive zombie genre. The latter
film spawned a sequel: 28 Weeks Later (2007). An updated remake of Dawn
of the Dead (2004) soon appeared as well as the zombie comedy Shaun of
the Dead (2004) and Spanish -Cuban comedy zombie film Juan of the Dead
(2012). This resurgence led George A. Romero to return to his Living
Dead series with Land of the Dead (2005), Diary of the Dead (2007), and
Survival of the Dead (2009).[141] Cannibals were present in horror films
such as Dahmer (2002), Wrong Turn (2003), Tooth and Nail (2007), and
Dying Breed (2008). Jennifer's Body (2009) starring Megan Fox and Amanda
Seyfried, written by Diablo Cody and directly by Karyn Kusama brings a
succubus into a suburban American high school. The Australian
film Wolf Creek (2005) written, co-produced, and directed by Greg McLean
revolves around three backpackers who find themselves taken captive and
after a brief escape, hunted down by Mick Taylor in the Australian
outback. The film was marketed as being "based on true events", the plot
bore elements reminiscent of the real-life murders of tourists by Ivan
Milat in the 1990s, and Bradley Murdoch in 2001, and contained more
extreme violence. An extension of this trend was the emergence of a type
of horror with emphasis on depictions of torture, suffering, and
violent deaths, (variously referred to as "horror porn", "torture porn",
"splatterporn", and "gore-nography") with films such as Ghost Ship
(2002), The Collector (2009), Saw (2004), Hostel (2005), and their
respective sequels, frequently singled out as examples of emergence of
this subgenre.[142] In 2010 the Saw film series held the Guinness World
Record of the highest-grossing horror series in history.[143] Finally,
with the arrival of Paranormal Activity (2007), which was well received
by critics and had an excellent reception at the box office, minimalist
horror approach started by The Blair Witch Project was reaffirmed.
Cloverfield (2008) is another found footage horror film. The Mist (2007)
is a science-fiction horror film based on the 1980 novella of the same
name by Stephen King. Antichrist (2009) is an English-language Danish
experimental horror film written and directed by Lars von Trier, and
starring Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg. The Exorcism of Emily
Rose is a 2005 legal drama horror film directed by Scott Derrickson,
loosely based on the story of Anneliese Michel. The Children (2008) is
British horror film focusing on the mayhem created by several children.
Another 2008 British horror film is Eden Lake. Remakes of earlier
horror films became routine in the 2000s. In addition to the remake of
Dawn of the Dead (2004), as well as the remake of both Herschell Gordon
Lewis' cult classic, 2001 Maniacs (2003), and the remake of Tobe
Hooper's classic, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003), there was also the
2007 Rob Zombie-written and -directed remake of John Carpenter's
Halloween.[144] The film focused more on Michael's backstory than the
original did, devoting the first half of the film to Michael's
childhood. It was negatively reviewed by most critics,[145][146] but was
a success in its theatrical run, spurring its own sequel. This film
helped to start a "reimagining" riot in horror filmmakers. Among the
many remakes or "reimaginings" of other horror films are films such as
Thirteen Ghosts (2001), The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003), The Hills
Have Eyes (2006), Friday the 13th (2009),[147] Children of the Corn
(2009),[148] Halloween (2007), Prom Night (2008), The Omen (2006),
Carrie (2002), The Wicker Man (2006), Day of the Dead (2008), Night of
the Demons (2009), My Bloody Valentine (2009), Willard (2003), Black
Christmas (2006), The Amityville Horror (2005), April Fool's Day (2008),
The Fog (2005), The Hitcher (2007), It's Alive (2009), When a Stranger
Calls (2006), and The Last House on the Left (2009). 2010s Swedish
director and screenwriter Johannes Nyholm (right) presenting his horror
film Koko-di Koko-da at Buenos Aires International Festival of
Independent Cinema 2019. Remakes remain popular, with films such
as A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010),[149] The Crazies (2010), I Spit on
Your Grave (2010), Don't Be Afraid of the Dark (2010), Fright Night
(2011), Maniac (2012), Poltergeist (2015), and Suspiria (2018). The 1976
film, Carrie, saw its second remake in 2013, which is the third film
adaptation of Stephen King's 1974 novel of the same name. Child's Play
saw a sequel with Curse of Chucky (2013), while Hellraiser: Judgment
(2018) become the tenth installment in the Hellraiser film series.
Halloween is a 2018 slasher film which is the eleventh installment in
the Halloween film series, and a direct sequel to the 1978 film of the
same name, while effecting a retcon of all previous sequels. The 2013
Evil Dead is the fourth installment in the Evil Dead series, and serves
as a soft reboot of the original 1981 film, and as a continuation to the
original film trilogy. Serialized, found footage style web
videos featuring Slender Man became popular on YouTube in the beginning
of the decade. Such series included TribeTwelve, EverymanHybrid, and
Marble Hornets, the latter of which has been adapted into a feature
film. Slender Man (2018) is supernatural horror film, based on the
character of the same name. The character as well as the multiple series
is credited with reinvigorating interest in found footage as well as
urban folklore. Horror has become prominent on television with The
Walking Dead, American Horror Story, and The Strain, and on online
streaming services like Netflix's Stranger Things and Haunting of Hill
House. Also, many popular horror films have had successful television
series made: Psycho spawned Bates Motel, The Silence of the Lambs
spawned Hannibal, and both Scream and Friday the 13th had TV series in
development.[150][151] You're Next (2011) and The Cabin in the
Woods (2012) led to a return to the slasher genre. The latter was
intended also as a critical satire of torture porn.[152] Terrifier
(2016) is another slasher film, which follows the actions of a homicidal
clown named Art, who terrorizes and kills victims in a decrepit
apartment building on Halloween night. Hell Fest (2018) and Haunt (2019)
are also slashers set on Halloween night. Scary Stories to Tell in the
Dark (2019) is based on the children's book series of the same name by
Alvin Schwartz, and is set in 1968, in the small town of Mill Valley,
Pennsylvania, starting on Halloween night. The Green Inferno
(2015) pays homage to the controversial horror film, Cannibal Holocaust
(1980). The Australian psychological horror film, The Babadook (2014)
directed by Jennifer Kent received critical acclaim and won many awards.
It Follows (2014) subverted traditional horror tropes of sexuality and
slasher films and enjoyed commercial and critical success. The
Conjuring Universe is a series of horror films which deal with the
paranormal. The series includes The Conjuring (2013), Annabelle (2014),
The Conjuring 2 (2016), Annabelle: Creation (2017), The Nun (2018), The
Curse of La Llorona (2019) and Annabelle Comes Home (2019). Sinister
(2012) is a British-American supernatural horror film directed by Scott
Derrickson and written by Derrickson and C. Robert Cargill. Insidious is
another series of supernatural horror films and includes Insidious
(2010), Insidious: Chapter 2 (2013), Insidious: Chapter 3 (2015), and
Insidious: The Last Key (2018). The Witch (2015) is a historical
period supernatural horror film written and directed by Robert Eggers in
his directorial debut, which follows a Puritan family encountering
forces of evil in the woods beyond their New England farm. Get Out
(2017) received universal acclaim from critics and audiences alike. Its
plot follows a black man who uncovers a disturbing secret when he meets
the family of his white girlfriend. 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.[153] Gerald's Game (2017) is a psychological horror film based
on Stephen King's novel of the same name. Other horror films include
Frozen (2010), Black Swan (2010), Devil (2010), The Innkeepers (2011),
Oculus (2013), Under the Skin (2013), Mama (2013), Green Room (2015),
The Invitation (2015), Hush (2016), Lights Out (2016), Don't Breathe
(2016), The Endless, Revenge (2017 film), Mother! (2017), It Comes at
Night (2017), and Unsane (2018), Upgrade (2018), Overlord (2018 film),
Mandy (2018), Apostle (2018), CAM (2018), Ghost Stories (2017),
Pyewacket (2017), The Strangers: Prey at Night (2018), Lowlife (2017),
Marrowbone (2017), Downrange(2017). A Quiet Place (2018) is a
critically acclaimed post-apocalyptic science-fiction horror film with a
plot that follows a family who must live life in silence while hiding
from extraterrestrial creatures that arrived on earth on fragments from
their exploded home planet, and which hunt exclusively by sound.
Annihilation (2018) is another successful science-fiction horror film.
Hereditary (2018) follows a family haunted after the death of their
secretive grandmother. Midsommar (2019), also by Ari Aster (who directed
Hereditary), is a folk horror film which follows a group of friends who
travel to Sweden for a festival that occurs once every 90 years, only
to find themselves in the clutches of a pagan cult. Assassination Nation
(2018) follows a group of teenage girls who are targeted in a social
media witch hunt that spills the darkest secrets of the entire town's
residents, leading to mass riots and violent killings among the
citizens. The film is a socio-political horror thriller that attempted
to address issues such as toxic masculinity, trigger warnings,
slut-shaming, sexism, violence against women and transphobia.[154] Films
such as Brightburn (2019), The Prodigy (2019), Freaks (2018), Eli
(2019), Wildling (2018), are centered on children with uncharacteristic
powers or traits. Art and creation are explored in Bliss (2019) and
Velvet Buzzsaw (2019). Survival horror is present in films such as
Sweetheart (2019), Crawl (2019), 47 Meters Down (2017), and its squeal,
47 Meters Down: Uncaged (2019). 2018 and 2019 saw the rise of
Jordan Peele as a director of allegorical horror-thriller films. Get Out
addresses modern racism and the concept of slavery by following an
African-American man as he makes a chilling discovery regarding his
white girlfriend's upper-class family. Get Out received four Oscar
nominations (Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Original
Screenplay) at the 90th Academy Awards, of which Peele won the Academy
Award for Best Original Screenplay. Peele's sophomore film, Us,
addresses social class and privilege as it follows a family terrorized
by their murderous doppelgängers. Lupita Nyong'o was nominated for the
SAG Award for Best Actress for her role in the film. Several
notable found footage horror films were produced, including The Last
Exorcism (2010), V/H/S (2012), Unfriended (2014), The Taking of Deborah
Logan (2014), and The Visit (2015). Various themes were addressed in the
horror of this period. Horror films which deal with troubled teens
include Excision (2012) and Split (2016). The Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016)
depicts coroners who experience supernatural phenomena while examining
the body of an unidentified woman. The Purge is an action horror film
series, consisting of four films and a television series, which are
based on a future dystopian United States, where all crime is made legal
once a year. Contracted (2013), Starry Eyes (2014), and American Mary
(2012) deal with body horror. Kill List (2011) is a British crime drama
psychological horror film which deals with contract killers. The Hallow
(2015) follows a family who go to a remote rural place in Ireland and
have to deal with demonic creatures living in the woods. Prometheus
(2012) and Alien: Covenant (2017) address extraterrestrial themes.
Friend Request (2016) and The Den (2013) are examples of cyber horror.
The Neon Demon (2016) follows an aspiring model in Los Angeles whose
beauty and youth generate intense fascination and jealousy within the
industry. #Horror (2015) depicts a group of wealthy 7th grade girls who
face a night of terror together after a social network game spirals out
of control. The Other Side of the Door (2016) deals with a mother who
attempts to use a ritual to meet her dead son for a last time to say
goodbye, but misuses the ritual. Truth or Dare (2018) follows a group of
college students who play a game of truth or dare? while on vacation in
Mexico, only to realize it has deadly consequences if they don't follow
through on their tasks. Ouija: Origin of Evil (2016) focuses on a widow
and her family adding a Ouija board to their phony seance business
where, unbeknownst to them, they invite a spirit that possesses the
youngest daughter. The Blackcoat's Daughter (also known as February) is a
2015 American-Canadian supernatural psychological horror film which
follows two Catholic schoolgirls who get left behind at their boarding
school over winter break, where the nuns are rumored to be satanists.
The Hole in the Ground is a 2019 supernatural horror film that follows
the story of a young woman who begins to suspect that her son's
disturbing behavior is linked to a mysterious sinkhole. The
success of non-English language films continued with the Swedish film,
Marianne (2011), while Let the Right One In (2008) was the subject of a
Hollywood remake, Let Me In (2010). South Korean horror produced I Saw
the Devil (2010) and Train to Busan (2016). Raw is a 2016 French-Belgian
horror drama written and directed by Julia Ducournau, and starring
Garance Marillier. Goodnight Mommy (2014) (German: Ich seh, Ich seh) is
an Austrian horror film. Verónica is a 2017 Spanish horror film loosely
based on real events. A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014) directed
by Ana Lily Amirpour is vampire film in Persian that transcends simple
vampire and horror categorization.[155] Untamed (2016) directed by Amat
Escalante is a unique psychological-sexual thriller.[156] Gonjiam:
Haunted Asylum is a 2018 South Korean found footage horror film directed
by Jung Bum-shik, based on a real-life psychiatric hospital of the same
name The 2017 slasher film, Happy Death Day follows a college
student who is murdered on her birthday and begins reliving the day
repeatedly, at which point she sets out to find the killer and stop her
death. It grossed $125 million worldwide on a $4.8 million budget and
received generally positive reviews, with critics deeming the film
entertaining while acknowledging the familiar premise,[157] and
describing it as "Groundhog Day meets Scream".[158] A sequel, Happy
Death Day 2U, was released in February 2019. In late 2018,
Netflix premiered the post-apocalyptic thriller film Bird Box which
became an internet sensation even well into January 2019. The film
follows a woman, played by Sandra Bullock, who, along with a pair of
children, must make it through a forest and river. They must do so
blindfolded, to avoid supernatural entities that seemingly cause people
who look at them to die by suicide. The hashtag #BirdBox trended for
weeks. People shared memes in regards to the movie, even inspiring the
"Bird Box blindfold challenge" in which participants wear blindfolds
while trying to do day-to-day activities.[159] By the late 2010s,
horror became the most lucrative genre for independent films in the US.
Changes in distribution strategies, such as the shrinking American home
video market, hit other genres harder than horror, and breakout
successes proved theatrical distribution to be viable. Although hardcore
horror films remained a niche, crossover films appealed to both horror
and arthouse crowds, driven by positive critical reviews and
word-of-mouth.[160] At the same time, video on demand became a
potentially profitable market for low-budget and no-budget horror films.
Films with a novelty concept can capitalize on viral media coverage to
receive enough views on ad-based sites that it covers their costs even
if viewers only watch to the first commercial.[161] 2020s Lists of horror films Bollywood horror films Cannibalism in popular culture Chinese horror List of disaster films Fangoria German underground horror Japanese horror Horror and terror Horror fiction List of ghost films List of horror film villains List of natural horror films Misogyny in horror films Monsters in fiction Monster movie Social thriller Survival horror games Universal monsters Urban Gothic Vampire film Werewolf fiction Types of horror Body horror Body
horror intentionally showcases graphic or psychologically disturbing
violations of the human body. These violations may manifest through
aberrant sex, mutations, mutilation, zombification, gratuitous violence,
disease, or unnatural movements of the body.[162] It has roots in
Gothic literature and has expanded to include other media.[163] Famous
body horror films include The Thing (1982), Videodrome (1983), The Fly
(1986), and Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989).[164][165] Comedy horror Comedy
horror combines elements of comedy and horror film. The comedy horror
genre often crosses over with the black comedy genre. It occasionally
includes horror films with lower ratings that are aimed at a family
audience. The short story The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington
Irving is cited as "the first great comedy-horror story".[166] Folk horror Folk
horror typically includes a rural setting and themes of isolation,
religion, the power of nature, and the potential darkness of rural
landscapes.[167][168] Frequently cited examples are The White Reindeer
(1952), Witchfinder General (1968), The Blood on Satan's Claw (1971),
The Wicker Man (1973), The Witch (2015) and Midsommar (2019). 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.[169] Examples of
first-person horror include Nightcall, The Blair Witch Project (1999),
Noroi: The Curse (2005), Paranormal Activity (2007), Cloverfield (2008),
and Devil's Due (2014).[170] Gothic horror Gothic horror incorporates elements of Gothic literature, including romance, dread, and the supernatural.[171] Natural horror Natural
horror is a subgenre of horror films "featuring nature running amok in
the form of mutated beasts, carnivorous insects, and normally harmless
animals or plants turned into cold-blooded killers."[172] Frequently
cited examples are Them! (1954), Piranha (1978), Prophecy (1979),
Alligator (1980) and Cujo (1983). Slasher horror Slasher
horror is a horror subgenre, which involving a killer murdering a group
of people (usually teenagers), usually by use of bladed tools.[173] Some
of the most notable slasher films include The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
(1974), Halloween (1978), Friday the 13th (1980), Sleepaway Camp (1983),
A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), Scream (1996), and I Know What You
Did Last Summer (1997). 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. It
was most popular in 1964 and 1965.[174] Psychological effects of horror films Neurocinematics – the subconscious effect of horror films on the audience This
section does not cite any sources. Please help improve this section by
adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be
challenged and removed. (November 2019) (Learn how and when to remove
this template message) 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.[citation
needed] In another study done by Glenn Sparks, it was found that
the audience tends to experience the excitation transfer process (ETP)
which causes a physiological arousal in audience members. The ETP refers
to the feelings experienced immediately after watching a horror film,
specifically in which audience members' heart rate, blood pressure and
respiration all increase. 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.[citation needed] 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 PTSD if the environment reminds
them of particular scenes.[citation needed] Different techniques employed by horror films on the audience In
a study by Jacob Shelton, the many ways that audience members are
manipulated through horror films was investigated in detail.[175]
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.[175] In an ideal horror
film, there is a perfect balance of negative and positive space.[175]
Another method is a subversion of classic horror tropes – the jump
scare.[175] In classic horror films, the jump scare is right after an
individual closes the bathroom mirror with their reflection shown or
other such situations.[175] Alternatively, it is when there is no jump
scare that causes the audience to feel more unease and discomfort
because they do not know when it will happen, only that it is
anticipated.[175] The meaning of mirrors in horror films is that
they create visual depth that builds tension.[175] Audience members have
ingrained the fear of mirrors due to the use of them in classic horror
films.[175] Even if there is no jump scare succeeding a mirror scene,
individuals are still trained to fear the mirror no matter what.[175]
Mirrors illustrate the characters' duality and "real" version of
themselves.[175] In any case, mirrors altogether make the audience
anxious, while patiently waiting for a jump scare that may or may not
occur.[175] Tight framing is another technique used, where an
entire scene can be created with a close-up.[175] Tight framing can be
terrifying as they induce anxiety by not allowing the viewer to see
what's directly around the protagonist.[175] The suspense of not knowing
builds on the unknown and tension of the audience.[175] Physical effects of horror films on the audience 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).[176] Another study by Baliatsas et al. observed that
there is a correlation between exposure to infrasound and low-frequency
noises and sleep-related problems.[177] Though most horror films keep
the audio around 20–30 Hz, the noise can still be unsettling in long
durations.[175] 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.[178] Dissonance is the clashing of unpleasant or harsh
sounds.[179] 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.[180] There is a stronger preference
for consonance; this difference is noticeable even in early stages of
life.[180] Previous musical experience also can influence a dislike for
dissonance.[180] Skin conductance responses (SCRs), heart rate
(HR), and electromyographic (EMG) responses vary in response to
emotional stimuli, showing higher for negative emotions in what is known
as the "negative bias."[181] 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.[181] 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).[181] 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.[175] Influences Influences on society Horror
films' evolution throughout the years has given society a new approach
to resourcefully utilize their benefits. The horror film style has
changed over time, but, in 1996, Scream set off a "chain of copycats",
leading to a new variety of teenage, horror movies.[182] This new
approach to horror films began to gradually earn more and more revenue
as seen in the progress of Scream movies; the first movie earned $6
million and the third movie earned $101 million.[182] The importance
that horror films have gained in the public and producers' eyes is one
obvious effect on our society. Horror films' income expansion is
only the first sign of the influences of horror flicks. The role of
women and how women see themselves in the movie industry has been
altered by the horror genre. Early horror films such as My Bloody
Valentine (1981), Halloween (1978), and Friday the 13th (1980) were
produced mostly for male audiences in order to "feed the fantasies of
young men".[183] This idea is no longer prevalent in horror films, as
women have become not only the main audience and fans of horror films
but also the main protagonists of contemporary horror films.[184] Movie
makers have also begun to integrate topics more broadly associated with
other genres into their films in order to grow audience appeal.[183] Many
early horror films created great social and legal controversy. 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 MPAA film rating system)
offered more freedom to the movie industry. Nevertheless, controversy
continued to surround horror movies, and many continued to face
censorship issues around the world. For example, 1978's I Spit on Your
Grave, an American rape-and-revenge exploitation horror film written,
co-produced, directed, and edited by Meir Zarchi, was received
negatively by critics, but it attracted a great deal of national and
international attention due to its explicit scenes of rape, murder and
prolonged nudity, which led to bans in countries such as Ireland,
Norway, Iceland, and West Germany. Many of these countries later removed
the ban, but the film remains prohibited in Ireland.[185] Influences internationally While
horror is only one genre of film, the influence it presents to the
international community is large. Horror movies tend to be a vessel for
showing eras of audiences issues across the globe visually and in the
most effective manner. 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.[186] The use of horror films to help
audiences understand international prior historical events occurs, for
example, to depict the horrors of the Vietnam War, the Holocaust and the
worldwide AIDS epidemic.[187] However, horror movies do not always
present positive endings. In fact, 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.[188] 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 cultural components from Japan were slowly
"siphoned away" to make the film more relatable to a western
audience.[189] 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.[188] 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."" (wikipedia.org) "The
distinction between horror and terror is a standard literary and
psychological concept applied especially to Gothic and horror
fiction.[1] Terror is usually described as the feeling of dread and
anticipation that precedes the horrifying experience. By contrast,
horror is the feeling of revulsion that usually follows a frightening
sight, sound, or otherwise experience. Horror has also been defined by Noel Carroll as a combination of terror and revulsion.... Literary Gothic Figure
20 from Charles Darwin's The Expression of the Emotions in Man and
Animals (1872). Caption reads "FIG. 20.—Terror, from a photograph by Dr.
Duchenne." The distinction between terror and horror was first
characterized by the Gothic writer Ann Radcliffe (1764–1823), horror
being more related to being shocked or scared (being horrified) at an
awful realization or a deeply unpleasant occurrence, while terror is
more related to being anxious or fearful.[3] Radcliffe considered that
terror is characterized by "obscurity" or indeterminacy in its treatment
of potentially horrible events, something which leads to the sublime.
She says in an essay published posthumously in 1826, 'On the
Supernatural in Poetry', that terror "expands the soul and awakens the
faculties to a high degree of life". Horror, in contrast, "freezes and
nearly annihilates them" with its unambiguous displays of atrocity. She
goes on: "I apprehend that neither Shakespeare nor Milton by their
fictions, nor Mr Burke by his reasoning, anywhere looked to positive
horror as a source of the sublime, though they all agree that terror is a
very high one; and where lies the great difference between horror and
terror, but in uncertainty and obscurity, that accompany the first,
respecting the dreader evil."[4] According to Devendra Varma in The Gothic Flame (1966):
The difference between Terror and Horror is the difference between
awful apprehension and sickening realization: between the smell of death
and stumbling against a corpse. Horror fiction Horror is
also a genre of film and fiction that relies on horrifying images or
situations to tell stories and prompt reactions or jump scares to put
their audiences on edge. In these films the moment of horrifying
revelation is usually preceded by a terrifying build up, often using the
medium of scary music.[5] In his non-fiction book Danse Macabre,
Stephen King stressed how horror tales normally chart the outbreak of
madness/the terrible within an everyday setting.[6] He also elaborated
on the twin themes of terror and horror, adding a third element which he
referred to as "revulsion". He describes terror as "the finest element"
of the three, and the one he strives hardest to maintain in his own
writing. Citing many examples, he defines "terror" as the suspenseful
moment in horror before the actual monster is revealed. "Horror," King
writes, is that moment at which one sees the creature/aberration that
causes the terror or suspense, a "shock value". King finally compares
"revulsion" with the gag-reflex, a bottom-level, cheap gimmick which he
admits he often resorts to in his own fiction if necessary, confessing:
I recognize terror as the finest emotion and so I will try to terrorize
the reader. But if I find that I cannot terrify, I will try to horrify,
and if I find that I cannot horrify, I'll go for the gross-out. I'm not
proud.[7] Psychoanalytic views Freud likened the experience of horror to that of the uncanny.[8] In
his wake, Georges Bataille saw horror as akin to ecstasy in its
transcendence of the everyday;[9] as opening a way to go beyond rational
social consciousness.[10] Julia Kristeva in turn considered horror as
evoking experience of the primitive, the infantile, and the demoniacal
aspects of unmediated femininity.[11] Horror, helplessness and trauma The
paradox of pleasure experienced through horror films/books can be
explained partly as stemming from relief from real-life horror in the
experience of horror in play, partly as a safe way to return in adult
life to the paralysing feelings of infantile helplessness.[12] Helplessness
is also a factor in the overwhelming experience of real horror in
psychological trauma.[13] Playing at re-experiencing the trauma may be a
helpful way of overcoming it." (wikipedia.org) "An
earring is a piece of jewelry attached to the ear via a piercing in the
earlobe or another external part of the ear (except in the case of clip
earrings, which clip onto the lobe). Earrings have been worn by people
in different civilizations and historic periods, often with cultural
significance. Locations for piercings other than the earlobe
include the rook, tragus, and across the helix (see image at right). The
simple term "ear piercing" usually refers to an earlobe piercing,
whereas piercings in the upper part of the external ear are often
referred to as "cartilage piercings". Cartilage piercings are more
complex to perform than earlobe piercings and take longer to heal.[1] Earring
components may be made of any number of materials, including metal,
plastic, glass, precious stone, beads, wood, bone, and other materials.
Designs range from small loops and studs to large plates and dangling
items. The size is ultimately limited by the physical capacity of the
earlobe to hold the earring without tearing. However, heavy earrings
worn over extended periods of time may lead to stretching of the earlobe
and the piercing.... History Golden Indian earrings Brass earrings of Ainu. Ancient Egyptian earrings Silla-period Korean earrings (6th century) A fresco depicting an elegantly dressed woman with hoop earrings from Akrotiri, Thera (Cyclades) Greece, c. 1650-1625 BCE.[2] Ear
piercing is one of the oldest known forms of body modification, with
artistic and written references from cultures around the world dating
back to early history. Gold earrings, along with other jewelry made of
gold, lapis lazuli, and carnelian were found in the ancient sites in
Lothal, India,[3] and Sumerian Royal Cemetery at Ur from the Early
Dynastic period.[4][5][6] Gold, silver and bronze hoop earrings were
prevalent in the Minoan Civilization (2000–1600 BCE) and examples can be
seen on frescoes on the Aegean island of Santorini, Greece. During the
late Minoan and early Mycenaean periods of Bronze Age Greece hoop
earrings with conical pendants were fashionable.[7] Early evidence of
earrings worn by men can be seen in archeological evidence from
Persepolis in ancient Persia. The carved images of soldiers of the
Persian Empire, displayed on some of the surviving walls of the palace,
show them wearing an earring. Howard Carter writes in his
description of Tutankhamun's tomb that the Pharaoh's earlobes were
perforated, but no earrings were inside the wrappings, although the tomb
contained some. The burial mask's ears were perforated as well, but the
holes were covered with golden discs. That implies that at the time,
earrings were only worn in Egypt by children, much like in Egypt of
Carter's times.[8] King George III of Imereti depicted wearing earring. A portrait drawn by Teramo Castelli in 1630s. Other
early evidence of earring-wearing is evident in the Biblical record. In
Exodus 32:1–4, it is written that while Moses was up on Mount Sinai,
the Israelites demanded that Aaron make a god for them. It is written
that he commanded them to bring their sons' and daughters' earrings (and
other pieces of jewelry) to him in order that he might comply with
their demand (c. 1500 BCE). By the classical period, including in the
Middle East, as a general rule, they were considered exclusively female
ornaments. In Greece and Rome also, earrings were worn mainly by women,
and the wearing of them by a man was often spoken of as distinctively
oriental.[9] The practice of wearing earrings was a tradition for
Ainu men and women,[10] but the Government of Meiji Japan forbade Ainu
men to wear earrings in the late-19th century.[11] Earrings were also
commonplace among nomadic Turkic tribes. Lavish ear ornaments have
remained popular in India from ancient times to the present day. In
Western Europe, earrings became fashionable among English courtiers and
gentlemen in the 1590s during the English Renaissance. A document
published in 1577 by clergyman William Harrison, Description of England,
states "Some lusty courtiers and gentlemen of courage do wear either
rings of gold, stones or pearls in their ears."[citation needed] Among
sailors, a pierced earlobe was a symbol that the wearer had sailed
around the world or had crossed the equator.[12] Detail from Chandos portrait (1660s) of William Shakespeare; earrings were emblematic of poets at the time.[13] By
the late 1950s or early 1960s, the practice re-emerged in the Western
world. Teenage girls were known to hold ear piercing parties, where they
performed the procedure on one another. By the mid-1960s, some
physicians offered ear piercing as a service.[citation needed]
Simultaneously, Manhattan jewelry stores were some of the earliest
commercial, non-medical locations for getting an ear piercing.[citation
needed] In the late 1960s, ear piercing began to make inroads
among men through the hippie and gay communities, although they had been
popular among sailors for decades (or longer).[14] Traditionally, a
right-side piercing identified a man as gay as part of LGBT "culture and
code" to secretly identify oneself to the community.[15] The left-side
is widely accepted as heterosexual or straight while dual piercings
indicate homosexuality or other varied expressions of sexuality. There
has begun to be some challenging of these norms in recent years, though
the standard view remains.[citation needed] An ear cuff A lobe and industrial piercing By
the early 1970s, ear piercing was common among women, thus creating a
broader market for the procedure. Department stores throughout the
country would hold ear piercing events, sponsored by earring
manufacturers. At these events, a nurse or other trained person would
perform the procedure, either pushing a sharpened and sterilized starter
earring through the earlobe by hand, or using an ear-piercing
instrument modified from the design used by physicians.[citation needed] In
the late 1970s, amateur piercings, sometimes with safety pins or
multiple piercings, became popular in the punk rock community. By the
1980s, the trend for male popular music performers to have pierced ears
helped establish a fashion trend for men. This was later adopted by many
professional athletes. British men started piercing both ears in the
1980s; George Michael of Wham! was a prominent example. During wham! He
frequently wore small gold hoop earrings. When he then went on the
become a solo artist with his iconic debut album "Faith" he wore a cross
earring on his left ear. As of now, it is widely acceptable for teenage
and pre-teen boys to have both ears pierced as well simply as a fashion
statement. Newborn baby girl with triple ear piercings – Costa Rica 2012. Multiple
piercings in one or both ears first emerged in mainstream America in
the 1970s. Initially, the trend was for women to wear a second set of
earrings in the earlobes, or for men to double-pierce a single earlobe.
Asymmetric styles with more and more piercings became popular,
eventually leading to the cartilage piercing trend. Double ear piercing
in newborn babies is a phenomenon in Central America, in particular in
Costa Rica. A variety of specialized cartilage piercings have
since become popular. These include the tragus piercing, antitragus
piercing, rook piercing, industrial piercing, helix piercing, orbital
piercing, daith piercing, and conch piercing. In addition, earlobe
stretching, while common in indigenous cultures for thousands of years,
began to appear in Western society in the 1990s, and is now a fairly
common sight. However, these forms of ear piercing are still infrequent
compared to standard ear piercing. Religious According to
Hindu dharmic tradition, most girls and some boys (especially the
"twice-born") get their ears pierced as part of a Dharmic rite known as
Karnavedha before they are about five years old. Infants may get their
ears pierced as early as several days after their birth. Similar
customs are practiced in other Asian countries, including Nepal, Sri
Lanka, and Laos, although traditionally most males wait to get their
ears pierced until they have reached young adulthood. Ear
piercing is mentioned in the Bible in several contexts. The most
familiar refers to a Hebrew slave who was to be freed in the seventh
year of servitude but wishes to continue serving his master and refuses
to go free: "…his master shall take him before God. He shall be brought
to the door or the doorpost, and his master shall pierce his ear with an
awl, and he shall then remain his slave for life" (Exodus 21:6). Types of earrings Modern standard pierced earrings This
section does not cite any sources. Please help improve this section by
adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be
challenged and removed. (November 2007) (Learn how and when to remove
this template message) Statement earrings Statement earrings
can be defined as "earrings which invite attention from others by
demonstrating bold, original, and unique designs with innovative
construction and material combinations". They include one or more of the
following design features: Pair of starter stud earrings. Dangles Tassels Sparkles Bold or striking colours Hoops Stud/minimal earrings The
main characteristic of stud earrings is the appearance of floating on
the ear or earlobe without a visible (from the front) point of
connection. Studs are invariably constructed on the end of a post, which
penetrates straight through the ear or earlobe. The post is held in
place by a removable friction back or clutch (also known as a butterfly
scroll). A stud earring features a gemstone or other ornament mounted on
a narrow post that passes through a piercing in the ear or earlobe, and
is held in place by a fixture on the other side. Studs commonly come in
the form of solitaire diamonds. Some stud earrings are constructed so
that the post is threaded, allowing a screw back to hold the earring in
place securely, which is useful in preventing the loss of expensive
earrings containing precious stones, or made of precious metals. Hoop earrings Hoop
earrings are circular or semi-circular in design and look very similar
to a ring. Hoop earrings generally come in the form of a hoop of metal
that can be opened to pass through the ear piercing. They are often
constructed of metal tubing, with a thin wire attachment penetrating the
ear. The hollow tubing is permanently attached to the wire at the front
of the ear, and slips into the tube at the back. The entire device is
held together by tension between the wire and the tube. Other hoop
designs do not complete the circle, but penetrate through the ear in a
post, using the same attachment techniques that apply to stud earrings. A
variation is the continuous hoop earring. In this design, the earring
is constructed of a continuous piece of solid metal, which penetrates
through the ear and can be rotated almost 360°. One of the ends is
permanently attached to a small piece of metallic tubing or a hollow
metallic bead. The other end is inserted into the tubing or bead, and is
held in place by tension. One special type of hoop earring is the
sleeper earring, a circular wire normally made of gold, with a diameter
of approximately one centimeter. Hinged sleepers, which were common in
Britain in the 1960s and 1970s, comprise two semi-circular gold wires
connected via a tiny hinge at one end, and fastened via a small clasp at
the other, to form a continuous hoop whose fastening mechanism is
effectively invisible to the naked eye. Because their small size makes
them unobtrusive and comfortable, and because they are normally
otherwise unadorned, sleepers are so-called because they were intended
to be worn at night to keep a pierced ear from closing, and were often
the choice for the first set of earrings immediately following the ear
piercing in the decades before ear-piercing guns using studs became
commonplace, but are often a fashion choice in themselves because of
their attractive simplicity and because they subtly call attention to
the fact that the ear is pierced. A drop earring attaches to the
earlobe and features a gemstone or ornament that dangles down from a
chain, hoop, or similar object. The length of these ornaments vary from
the very short to the extravagantly long. Such earrings are occasionally
known as droplet earrings, dangle earrings, or pendant earrings. They
also include chandelier earrings, which branch out into elaborate,
multi-level pendants. Dangle earrings Traditional earrings Dangle
earrings (also known as drop earrings) are designed to suspend from the
bottoms of the earlobes. Their lengths vary from a centimeter or two,
all the way to brushing the wearer's shoulders. A pierced dangle earring
is generally attached to the ear with a thin wire passing through the
earlobe . It may connect to itself with a small hook at the back, or in
the French hook design, the wire passes through the earlobe piercing
without closure, although small plastic or silicone retainers are
sometimes used on ends. Rarely, dangle earrings use the post attachment
design. There are also variants that attach without piercing. Barbell earrings Barbell
earrings get their name from their resemblance to a barbell, generally
coming in the form of a metal bar with an orb on either end. One of
these orbs is affixed in place, while the other can be detached to allow
the barbell to be inserted into a piercing. Several variations on this
basic design exist, including barbells with curves or angles in the bar
of the earring. Huggy earrings Commonly, stones are channel set in huggy earrings. Ear thread Or
earthreader, ear string, threader, a chain that is thin enough to slip
into the ear hole, and come back out, dangles. Sometimes, people add
beads or other materials onto the chain, so the chain dangles with beads
below the ear. Jhumka Earrings A type of dangling bell-shaped traditional earrings mostly worn by women of Indian Subcontinent. Body piercing jewelry used as earrings This
section does not cite any sources. Please help improve this section by
adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be
challenged and removed. (November 2007) (Learn how and when to remove
this template message) A navel curve used as an earring with a green gemmed ear stud above it Body
piercing jewelry is often used for ear piercings, and is selected for a
variety of reasons including the availability of larger gauges, better
piercing techniques, and a disdain for mainstream jewelry.
Captive bead rings – Captive bead rings, often abbreviated as CBRs and
sometimes called ball closure rings, are a style of body piercing
jewelry that is an almost 360° ring with a small gap for insertion
through the ear. The gap is closed with a small bead that is held in
place by the ring's tension. Larger gauge ball closure rings exhibit
considerable tension, and may require ring expanding pliers for
insertion and removal of the bead. Barbells – Barbells are
composed of a thin, straight metal rod with a bead permanently fixed to
one end. The other end is threaded, either externally or tapped with an
internal thread, and the other bead is screwed into place after the
barbell is inserted through the ear. Since the threads on externally
threaded barbells tend to irritate the piercing, internal threads have
become the most common variety. Another variation are threadless
barbells or press-fit jewelry, with a hollow post, a fixed back disk and
a front end that is attached with a slightly bend pin that is inserted
into the post.[16] Circular barbells – Circular Barbells are
similar to ball-closure rings, except that they have a larger gap, and
have a permanently attached bead at one end, and a threaded bead at the
other, like barbells. This allows for much easier insertion and removal
than with ball closure rings, but at the loss of a continuous look.
Plugs – Earplugs are short cylindrical pieces of jewelry. Some plugs
have flared ends to hold them in place, others require small elastic
rubber rings (O-rings) to keep them from falling out. They are usually
used in large-gauge piercings. Flesh tunnels – Flesh tunnels,
also known as eyelets or Bullet Holes, are similar to plugs; however,
they are hollow in the middle. Flesh tunnels are most commonly used in
larger gauge piercings either because weight is a concern to the wearer
or for aesthetic reasons. Stretched ear piercing without jewelry 16 mm flesh tunnel Gauges and other measuring systems For an explanation of how earring sizes are denoted, see the article Body jewelry sizes. Clip-on and other non-pierced earrings Modern lobe earring screwed onto the lobe. This
section does not cite any sources. Please help improve this section by
adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be
challenged and removed. (November 2007) (Learn how and when to remove
this template message) Several varieties of non-pierced earrings exist.
Clip-on earrings – Clip-on earrings have existed longer than any other
variety of non-pierced earrings. The clip itself is a two-part piece
attached to the back of an earring. The two pieces closed around the
earlobe, using mechanical pressure to hold the earring in place.
Magnetic earrings – Magnetic earrings simulate the look of a (pierced)
stud earring by attaching to the earlobe with a magnetic back that hold
the earring in place on by magnetic force. Stick-on earrings –
Stick-on earrings are adhesive-backed items which stick to the skin of
the earlobe and simulate the look of a (pierced) stud earring. They are
considered a novelty item. Spring hoop earrings – Spring hoops
are almost indistinguishable from standard hoop earrings and stay in
place by means of spring force. An alternative which is often
used is bending a wire or even just using the ring portion of a CBR to
put on the earlobe, which stays on by pinching the ear Ear hook earrings – A large hook like the fish hook that is big enough to hook and hang over the whole ear and dangles.
The hoop – A hoop threads over the ear and hangs from just inside the
ear, above where ears are pierced. Mobiles or other dangles can be hung
from the hoop to create a variety of styles. Ear screws – Screwed onto the lobe, allow for exact adjustment—an alternative for those who find clips too painful. Ear cuffs – Wrap around the outer cartilage (similar to a conch piercing) and may be chained to a lobe piercing. Permanent earrings Where
most earrings worn in the western world are designed to be removed
easily to be changed at will, earrings can also be permanent
(non-removable). They were once used as a mark of slavery or ownership
(e.g., see Ex.21:2–6, Deut.15:16–17). They appear today in the form of
larger gauge rings which are difficult or impossible for a person to
remove without assistance. Occasionally, hoop earrings are permanently
installed by the use of solder,[17] though this poses some risks due to
toxicity of metals used in soldering and the risk of burns from the heat
involved. Besides permanent installations, locking earrings are
occasionally worn due to their personal symbolism or erotic value. Ear piercing Pierced
ears are earlobes or the cartilage portion of the external ears which
have had one or more holes created in them for the wearing of earrings.
The holes may be permanent or temporary. The holes become permanent when
a fistula is created by scar tissue forming around the initial earring. Piercing techniques A
variety of techniques are used to pierce ears, ranging from "do it
yourself" methods using household items to medically sterile methods
using specialized equipment. A long-standing home method involves
using ice as a local anesthetic, a sewing needle as a puncture
instrument, a burning match and rubbing alcohol for disinfection, and a
semi-soft object, such as a potato, cork, bar of soap or rubber eraser,
as a push point. Sewing thread may be drawn through the piercing and
tied, as a device for keeping the piercing open during the healing
process. Alternatively, a gold stud or wire earring may be directly
inserted into the fresh piercing as the initial retaining device. Home
methods are often unsafe and risky due to issues of improper
sterilization or placement. Another method for piercing ears,
first made popular in the 1960s, was the use of sharpened spring-loaded
earrings known as self-piercers, trainers, or sleepers, which gradually
pushed through the earlobe. However, these could slip from their initial
placement position, often resulting in more discomfort, and many times
would not go all the way through the earlobe without additional pressure
being applied. This method has fallen into disuse due to the popularity
of faster and more successful piercing techniques. An ear being pierced with an ear piercing instrument Pierced ear with traditional starter stud Ear piercing types Ear
piercing instruments, sometimes called ear-piercing guns, were
originally developed for physician use but with modifications became
available in retail settings.[18] Today more and more people in the
Western world have their ears pierced with an ear piercing instrument in
specialty jewellery or accessory stores, or at home using disposable
ear piercing instruments. An earlobe piercing performed with an ear
piercing instrument is often described as feeling similar to being
pinched, or being snapped by a rubber band. Piercing with this method,
especially for cartilage piercings, is not recommended by many piercing
professionals and physicians, as it can cause blunt force trauma to the
skin, and takes far longer to heal than needle piercing. In addition,
the vast majority of ear piercing instruments are made of plastic, which
means they can never be truly sterilized by use of an Autoclave,
increasing chance of infection exponentially. In the case of cartilage
piercing, doing it with an ear piercing instrument can shatter the ear
cartilage and lead to serious complications. An alternative which
is growing in practice is the use of a hollow piercing needle, as is
done in body piercing. The piercer disinfects the earlobe with alcohol
and puts a mark on the lobe with a pen. It gives the opportunity to the
client to check whether the position is correct or not. Then, the
piercer uses a clamp with flat ends and holes at the end to hold the
earlobe, with the dot in the middle of the holes. This device will
support the skin during the piercing process. A cork can be placed
behind the earlobe to stop the movement of the needle after the piercing
process, and protect the tip of the needle for the client's comfort.
Then, the piercer places the hollow needle perpendicular to the skin's
surface and check the position of the needle, to pierce at the desired
place and the right angle. The piercing process consists of pushing the
needle through the earlobe, until it gets out in the other side. The
client has to remain still during all the process. Then, the clamp can
be put off. After that, the piercer puts the jewel in the hollow needle
and pushes the needle through until the jewel enters into the lobe.
Then, the needle is removed and disposed properly. The jewel is attached
to the lobe and the piercer disinfects the lobe again. In tribal
cultures and among some neo-primitive body piercing enthusiasts, the
piercing is made using other tools, such as animal or plant organics. Initial
healing time for an earlobe piercing performed with an ear piercing
instrument is typically six to eight weeks. After that time, earrings
can be changed, but if the hole is left unfilled for an extended period
of time, there is some risk of the piercing closing. Piercing
professionals recommend wearing earrings in the newly pierced ears for
at least six months, and sometimes even a full year. Cartilage piercing
will usually require more healing time than earlobe piercing, sometimes
two to three times as long. After healing, earlobe piercings will shrink
to smaller gauges in the prolonged absence of earrings, and in most
cases will completely disappear. Health risks The health risks
with conventional earlobe piercing are common but tend to be minor,
particularly if proper technique and hygienic procedures are followed.
One study found that up to 35 percent of persons with pierced ears had
one or more complications, including minor infection (77 percent of
pierced ear sites with complications), allergic reaction (43 percent),
keloids (2.5 percent), and traumatic tearing (2.5 percent).[19] Pierced
ears are a significant risk factor for contact allergies to the nickel
in jewelry.[20] Earlobe tearing, during the healing period or after
healing is complete, can be minimized by not wearing earrings,
especially wire-based dangle earrings, during activities in which they
are likely to become snagged, such as while playing sports. Also, larger
gauge jewellery will lessen the chance of the earring being torn
out.[citation needed] With cartilage piercing, the blunt force of
an ear piercing instrument will traumatize the cartilage, and therefore
make healing more difficult. Also, because there is substantially less
blood flow in ear cartilage than in the earlobe, infection is a much
more serious issue. There have been several documented cases of severe
infections of the upper ear following piercing with an ear piercing
instrument, which required courses of antibiotics to clear up. There are
many ways that an infection can occur: the most common way is when the
person that got pierced decides to take out the piercing too early.
According to the A.M.A,[21][failed verification] the proper waiting
period to change or take out a piercing with substantially less risk of
infection would be three weeks. For all ear piercings, the use of
a sterilized hollow piercing needle tends to minimize the trauma to the
tissue and minimize the chances of contracting a bacterial infection
during the procedure. As with any invasive procedure, there is always a
risk of infection from blood borne pathogens such as hepatitis and HIV.
However, modern piercing techniques make this risk extremely small (the
risk being greater to the piercer than to the pierced due to the
potential splash-back of blood). There has never been a documented case
of HIV transmission due to ear/body piercing or tattooing, although
there have been instances of the Hepatitis B virus being transmitted
through these practices." (wikipedia.org) "Jewellery
or jewelry consists of decorative items worn for personal adornment,
such as brooches, rings, necklaces, earrings, pendants, bracelets, and
cufflinks. Jewellery may be attached to the body or the clothes. From a
western perspective, the term is restricted to durable ornaments,
excluding flowers for example. For many centuries metal such as gold
used in different carats from 21, 18, 12, 9 or even lower, often
combined with gemstones, has been the normal material for jewellery, but
other materials such as shells and other plant materials may be used. Jewellery
is one of the oldest types of archaeological artefact – with
100,000-year-old beads made from Nassarius shells thought to be the
oldest known jewellery.[1] The basic forms of jewellery vary between
cultures but are often extremely long-lived; in European cultures the
most common forms of jewellery listed above have persisted since ancient
times, while other forms such as adornments for the nose or ankle,
important in other cultures, are much less common. Jewellery may
be made from a wide range of materials. Gemstones and similar materials
such as amber and coral, precious metals, beads, and shells have been
widely used, and enamel has often been important. In most cultures
jewellery can be understood as a status symbol, for its material
properties, its patterns, or for meaningful symbols. Jewellery has been
made to adorn nearly every body part, from hairpins to toe rings, and
even genital jewellery. In modern European culture the amount worn by
adult males is relatively low compared with other cultures and other
periods in European culture. The word jewellery itself is derived
from the word jewel, which was anglicised from the Old French
"jouel",[2] and beyond that, to the Latin word "jocale", meaning
plaything. In British English, Indian English, New Zealand English,
Hiberno-English, Australian English, and South African English it is
spelled jewellery, while the spelling is jewelry in American English.[3]
Both are used in Canadian English, though jewelry prevails by a two to
one margin. In French and a few other European languages the equivalent
term, joaillerie, may also cover decorated metalwork in precious metal
such as objets d'art and church items, not just objects worn on the
person.... Form and function Humans have used jewellery for a number of different reasons: functional, generally to fix clothing or hair in place as a marker of social status and personal status, as with a wedding ring as a signifier of some form of affiliation, whether ethnic, religious or social to provide talismanic protection (in the form of amulets)[4] as an artistic display as a carrier or symbol of personal meaning – such as love, mourning, a personal milestone or even luck superstition[5] Most[quantify]
cultures at some point have had a practice of keeping large amounts of
wealth stored in the form of jewellery. Numerous cultures store wedding
dowries in the form of jewellery or make jewellery as a means to store
or display coins. Alternatively, jewellery has been used[by whom?] as a
currency or trade good;[6] an example being the use of slave beads.[7] Many
items of jewellery, such as brooches and buckles, originated as purely
functional items, but evolved into decorative items as their functional
requirement diminished.[8] Jewellery can symbolise group
membership (as in the case, of the Christian crucifix or the Jewish Star
of David) or status (as in the case of chains of office, or the Western
practice of married people wearing wedding rings). Wearing of
amulets and devotional medals to provide protection or to ward off evil
is common in some cultures. These may take the form of symbols (such as
the ankh), stones, plants, animals, body parts (such as the Khamsa), or
glyphs (such as stylised versions of the Throne Verse in Islamic
art).[9] Materials and methods Hair ornament, an Art Nouveau masterpiece; by René Lalique; circa 1902; gold, emeralds and diamonds; Musée d'Orsay (Paris) In
creating jewellery, gemstones, coins, or other precious items are often
used, and they are typically set into precious metals. Platinum alloys
range from 900 (90% pure) to 950 (95.0% pure). The silver used in
jewellery is usually sterling silver, or 92.5% fine silver. In costume
jewellery, stainless steel findings are sometimes used. Other
commonly used materials include glass, such as fused-glass or enamel;
wood, often carved or turned; shells and other natural animal substances
such as bone and ivory; natural clay; polymer clay; Hemp and other
twines have been used as well to create jewellery that has more of a
natural feel. However, any inclusion of lead or lead solder will give a
British Assay office (the body which gives U.K. jewellery its stamp of
approval, the Hallmark) the right to destroy the piece, however it is
very rare for the assay office to do so. Beads are frequently
used in jewellery. These may be made of glass, gemstones, metal, wood,
shells, clay and polymer clay. Beaded jewellery commonly encompasses
necklaces, bracelets, earrings, belts and rings. Beads may be large or
small; the smallest type of beads used are known as seed beads, these
are the beads used for the "woven" style of beaded jewellery. Seed beads
are also used in an embroidery technique where they are sewn onto
fabric backings to create broad collar neck pieces and beaded bracelets.
Bead embroidery, a popular type of handwork during the Victorian era,
is enjoying a renaissance in modern jewellery making. Beading, or
beadwork, is also very popular in many African and indigenous North
American cultures. Silversmiths, goldsmiths, and lapidaries use
methods including forging, casting, soldering or welding, cutting,
carving and "cold-joining" (using adhesives, staples and rivets to
assemble parts)." (wikipedia.org) "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.[1] Although the term "slasher" may
occasionally be used informally as a generic term for any horror film
involving murder, film analysts cite an established set of
characteristics which set slasher films apart from other horror
subgenres, such as monster movies, splatter films, supernatural and
psychological horror films.[2] Critics cite the Italian giallo
films and psychological horror films such as Peeping Tom (1960) and
Psycho (1960) as early influences.[3][4] The genre hit its peak between
1978 and 1984 in an era referred to as the "Golden Age" of slasher
films. Notable slasher films include The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
(1974), Black Christmas (1974), Halloween (1978), Friday the 13th
(1980), A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), Child's Play (1988), Candyman
(1992), Scream (1996) and I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997). Many
slasher films released decades ago continue to attract cult
followings.[5] The slasher canon can be divided into three eras: the
classical (1974–1993), the self-referential (1994–2000) and the
neoslasher cycle (2001–2013).[6] Definition Slasher films
typically adhere to a specific formula: a past wrongful action causes
severe trauma that is reinforced by a commemoration or anniversary that
reactivates or re-inspires the killer.[7][8] Built around
stalk-and-murder sequences, the films draw upon the audience's feelings
of catharsis, recreation, and displacement, as related to sexual
pleasure.[9] Paste magazine's definition notes that, "slasher villains
are human beings, or were human beings at some point ... Slasher
villains are human killers whose actions are objectively evil, because
they’re meant to be bound by human morality. That’s part of the fear
that the genre is meant to prey upon, the idea that killers walk among
us."[10] Films with similar structures that have non-human antagonists
lacking a conscience, such as Alien or The Terminator, are not
traditionally considered slasher films.[11] Common tropes The
final girl trope is discussed in film studies as being a young woman
(occasionally a young man) left alone to face the killer's advances in
the movie's end.[7] Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), the heroine in
Halloween, is an example of a typical final girl.[8] Final girls are
often, like Laurie Strode, virgins among sexually active teens.[12] Several
slasher film villains grew to take on villain protagonist
characteristics, with the series following the continued efforts of a
villain, rather than the killer's victims (for example, Michael Myers,
Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, Chucky and Leatherface).[13] The Scream
film series is a rarity that follows its heroine Sidney Prescott (Neve
Campbell) rather than masked killer Ghostface, whose identity changes
from film to film, and is only revealed in each entry's finale.[14] Origins A scene from the Grand Guignol, a format some critics have cited as an influence on the slasher film The
appeal of watching people inflict violence upon each other dates back
thousands of years to Ancient Rome,[15] though fictionalized accounts
became marketable with late 19th century horror plays produced at the
Grand Guignol.[16] Maurice Tourneur's The Lunatics (1912) used visceral
violence to attract the Guignol's audience. In the United States, public
outcry over films like this eventually led to the passage of the Hays
Code in 1930.[17] The Hays Code is one of the entertainment industry's
earliest set of guidelines restricting sexuality and violence deemed
unacceptable.[17][18] Crime writer Mary Roberts Rinehart
influenced horror literature with her novel The Circular Staircase
(1908),[19] adapted into the silent film The Bat (1926), about guests in
a remote mansion menaced by a killer in a grotesque mask.[20] Its
success led to a series of "old dark house" films including The Cat and
the Canary (1927), based on John Willard's 1922 stage play, and
Universal Pictures' The Old Dark House (1932), based on the novel by
J.B. Priestley.[20] In both films, the town dwellers are pitted against
strange country folk, a recurring theme in later horror films. Along
with the "madman on the loose" plotline, these films employed several
influences upon the slasher genre, such as lengthy point of view shots
and a "sins of the father" catalyst to propel the plot's mayhem.[21] Early film influences Dorothy McGuire in The Spiral Staircase (1946) George
Archainbaud's Thirteen Women (1932) tells the story of a sorority whose
former members are set against one another by a vengeful peer who
crosses out their yearbook photos, a device used in subsequent films
Prom Night (1980) and Graduation Day (1981).[22] Early examples include a
maniac seeking revenge in The Terror (1928), based on the play by Edgar
Wallace. B-movie mogul Val Lewton produced The Leopard Man
(1943), about a murderer framing his crimes against women on an escaped
show leopard.[23] Basil Rathbone's The Scarlet Claw (1944) sees Sherlock
Holmes investigate murders committed with a five-pronged garden weeder
that the killer would raise in the air and bring down on the victim
repeatedly, an editing technique that became familiar in the genre.[24]
Robert Siodmak's The Spiral Staircase (1946), based on Ethel White's
novel Some Must Watch, stars Ethel Barrymore as a sympathetic woman
trying to survive black-gloved killers. The Spiral Staircase also
features an early use of jump scares.[25] British writer Agatha
Christie's particularly influential 1939 novel Ten Little Indians
(adapted in 1945 as And Then There Were None), centers on a group of
people with secret pasts who are killed one-by-one on an isolated
island. Each of the murders mirrors a verse from a nursery rhyme,
merging the themes of childhood innocence and vengeful
murder.[26][27][28] House of Wax (1953), The Bad Seed (1956), Screaming
Mimi (1958), Jack the Ripper (1959), and Cover Girl Killer (1959) all
incorporated Christie's literary themes.[29] 1960s horror-thrillers Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960) was a huge success on release, and a critical influence on the slasher genre Alfred
Hitchcock's Psycho (1960) used visuals that had been deemed
unacceptable by movie studios, including scenes of violence, sexuality,
and even the shot of a toilet flushing. The film featured an iconic
score by Bernard Herrmann that has been frequently imitated in slasher
and horror films.[30] That same year, Michael Powell released Peeping
Tom, showing the killer's perspective as he murders women to photograph
their dying expressions.[3][31] Psycho was nominated for four
Academy Awards, including Best Supporting Actress for Janet Leigh and
Anthony Perkins garnering universal acclaim for his role as Norman
Bates.[32][30] This notice drew bankable movie stars to horror
films.[33] Joan Crawford starred in William Castle's Strait-Jacket
(1964)[34] and in Jim O'Connolly's Berserk! (1967),[35] while Albert
Finney starred in MGM's Night Must Fall (1964) (a remake of the 1937
British film)[36] and Peter Cushing starred in Corruption (1968).[37] Hammer
Studios, a London-based company, followed Psycho's success with Taste
of Fear (1961), Maniac (1963), Paranoiac (1963), Nightmare (1964),
Fanatic (1965), The Nanny (1965), and Hysteria (1965).[38][39] Hammer's
rival Amicus had Robert Bloch, author of 1959 Psycho novel, write the
script for Psychopath (1968).[40] Francis Ford Coppola's debut,
Dementia 13 (1963), takes place in an Irish castle where relatives
gather to commemorate a family death but are murdered one-by-one.[24]
William Castle's Homicidal (1961) features gore in its murder scenes,
something both Psycho and Peeping Tom had edited out.[41][42] Richard
Hillard's Violent Midnight (1963) showed a black-gloved killer's point
of view as they pull down a branch to watch a victim and also featured a
skinny-dipping scene.[43] Crown International's Terrified (1963)
features a masked killer.[44] Spain's The House That Screamed (1969)
features violent murders and preempted later campus-based slashers.[45] Splatter, Krimi and giallo films See also: Splatter film, Krimi, and Giallo Subgenres that influenced slasher films include splatter films, Krimi films, and giallo films.[24][46] Splatter
films focus on gratuitous gore. Herschell Gordon Lewis's Blood Feast
(1963) was a hit at drive-in theaters and is often considered the first
splatter film.[47] Lewis followed with gory films Two-Thousand Maniacs!
(1964), Color Me Blood Red (1965), The Gruesome Twosome (1967) and The
Wizard of Gore (1971). This grotesque style translated to Andy
Milligan's The Ghastly Ones (1969), Twisted Nerve (1968), Night After
Night After Night (1969) as well as The Haunted House of Horror
(1969).[48] Post-World War II Germany adapted British writer
Edgar Wallace's crime novels into a subgenre of their own called Krimi
films.[49] The Krimi films were released in the late 1950s through the
early 1970s and featured villains in bold costumes accompanied by jazz
scores from composers such as Martin Böttcher and Peter Thomas.[24][50]
Fellowship of the Frog (1959), about a murderer terrorizing London, was
successful in America, leading to similar adaptations like The Green
Archer (1961) and Dead Eyes of London (1961). The Rialto Studio produced
32 Krimi films between 1959 and 1970.[51] The masked killer in Mario Bava's giallo film, Blood and Black Lace (1964) Italy's
giallo thrillers are crime procedurals or murder mysteries interlaced
with eroticism and psychological horror.[46] Giallo films feature
unidentified killers murdering in grand fashions.[46] Unlike most
American slasher films the protagonists of gialli are frequently (but
not always) jet-setting adults sporting the most stylish Milan
fashions.[24] These protagonists are often outsiders reluctantly brought
into the mystery through extenuating circumstances, like witnessing a
murder or being suspected of the crimes themselves.[52] Much like Krimi
films, gialli plots tended to be outlandish and improbable, occasionally
employing supernatural elements.[24][46] Sergio Martino's Torso (1973)
featured a masked killer preying upon beautiful and promiscuous co-eds
in retribution for a past misdeed. Torso's edge-of-your-seat climax
finds a "final girl" facing off with the killer in an isolated
villa.[53][54] Mario Bava's A Bay of Blood (1971) is a whodunit
depicting creative death sequences on a lakeside setting, and greatly
inspired Friday the 13th (1980) and its 1981 sequel.[55] Gialli were
popular in American cinemas and drive-in theaters. Thriller Assault
(1971) and Spanish mystery A Dragonfly for Each Corpse (1974) share many
traits with Italian gialli.[56] Death Steps in the Dark (1977) spoofed
the familiar conventions found in giallo films.[57] Despite successes
from Deep Red (1975) and The Blood-Stained Shadow (1978), giallo films
gradually fell out of fashion by the mid-1970s as diminishing returns
forced budget cuts.[46] Films such as Play Motel (1979) and Giallo a
Venezia (1979) exploited their low-budgets with shocking hardcore
pornography.[58] Exploitation films Main article: Exploitation film The
early 1970s saw an increase in exploitation films that lured audiences
to grindhouses and drive-ins by advertising of sex and violence. Robert
Fuest's And Soon the Darkness (1970) set off the '70s exploitation wave
by maximizing its small budget and taking place in daylight. The Jekyll
and Hyde Portfolio (1971) follows an insane killer who stalks and
murders victims at a nursing academy.[59][60] Hands of the Ripper (1971)
depicts the psychological trauma suffered by Jack the Ripper's
daughter, who continues the murderous reign of her father.[61] Fright
(1971) is based on the "babysitter and the man upstairs" urban legend
while Tower of Evil (1972) features careless partying teens murdered in a
remote island lighthouse.[62] Pete Walker broke taboos by advertising
his films' negative reviews to attract viewers looking for the depraved,
using a "no press is bad press" mantra with The Flesh and Blood Show
(1972), Frightmare (1974), House of Mortal Sin (1976), Schizo (1976) and
The Comeback (1978).[63] Other filmmakers followed Walker's lead, as
posters dubbed Blood and Lace (1971) as "sickest PG-rated movie ever
made!", while Scream Bloody Murder (1973) called itself as
"gore-nography."[64] By 1974 the exploitation film battled
political correctness and their popularity waned, and while films like
The Love Butcher (1975) and The Redeemer: Son of Satan (1976) were
accused of promoting bigotry, the low-budget independent film The Texas
Chain Saw Massacre (1974) became a major hit and the most commercially
successful horror film since The Exorcist. The story concerns a violent
clash of cultures and ideals between the counter-culture and traditional
conservative values, with the film's squealing antagonist Leatherface
carrying a chainsaw and wearing the faces of victims he and his family
eat. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre spawned imitators and its false "based
on a true story" advertisements gave way to reenactments of true crime.
The Town That Dreaded Sundown (1976), based on the Phantom Killer case,
and Another Son of Sam (1977), based on the Son of Sam slayings,
cashed-in on headlines and public fascination. Wes Craven modernized the
Sawney Bean legend in The Hills Have Eyes (1977) by building upon
themes presented in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. The Hills Have Eyes
was another huge financial success, relaunching Craven's career after it
had been damaged by controversy surrounding his previous film, The Last
House on the Left (1972).[65] Following holiday-themed
exploitation films Home for the Holidays (1972), All Through the House
(1972) and Silent Night, Bloody Night (1973), Black Christmas (1974)
uses horror as a board to debate social topics of its time, including
feminism, abortion, and alcoholism. Using the "killer calling from
inside the house" gimmick, Black Christmas is visually and thematically a
precursor to John Carpenter's Halloween (1978), as young women are
terrorized in a previously safe environment during an iconic holiday.
Like Halloween, Clark's film opens with a lengthy point-of-view, but it
differs in the treatment of the killer's identity. Despite making
$4,053,000 on a $620,000 budget, Black Christmas was initially
criticized, with Variety complaining that it was a "bloody, senseless
kill-for-kicks" flick that exploited unnecessary violence. Despite its
modest initial box office run, the film has garnered critical
reappraisal, with film historians noting its importance in the horror
film genre and some even citing it as the original slasher film.[66] Golden Age (1978–1984) Jumpstarted
by the massive success of John Carpenter's Halloween (1978), the era
commonly cited as the Golden Age of slasher films is 1978–1984, with
some scholars citing over 100 similar films released over the six-year
period.[24][9] Despite most films receiving negative reviews, many
Golden Age slasher films were extremely profitable and have established
cult followings.[5] Many films reused Halloween's template of a
murderous figure stalking teens, though they escalated the gore and
nudity from Carpenter's restrained film. Golden Age slasher films
exploited dangers lurking in American institutions such as high schools,
colleges, summer camps, and hospitals.[67] 1978 Cashing in on
the drive-in success of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), The
Toolbox Murders was quickly and cheaply shot but did not generate the
interest of the former films. Exploitative Killer's Delight is a San
Francisco-set serial killer story claiming to take inspiration from Ted
Bundy and the Zodiac Killer.[68] Leading up to Halloween's October
release were August's gialli-inspired Eyes of Laura Mars (written by
John Carpenter) and September's "babysitter in peril" TV Movie Are You
in the House Alone? Of them, The Eyes of Laura Mars grossed $20 million
against a $7 million budget.[69] Influenced by the French New
Wave's Eyes Without a Face (1960), science fiction thriller Westworld
(1973) and Black Christmas (1974), Halloween was directed, composed and
co-written by Carpenter, who co-wrote it with his then-girlfriend and
producing partner Debra Hill on a budget of $300,000 provided by
Syrian-American producer Moustapha Akkad. To minimize costs, locations
were reduced and time took place over a brief period.[70] Jamie Lee
Curtis, daughter of Janet Leigh, was cast as the heroine Laurie Strode
while veteran actor Donald Pleasence was cast as Dr. Sam Loomis, an
homage to John Gavin's character in Psycho.[70] Halloween's opening
tracks a six-year-old's point-of-view as he kills his older sister, a
scene emulated in numerous films such as Blow Out (1981) and The
Funhouse (1981). Carpenter denies writing sexually active teens to be
victims in favor of a virginal "final girl" survivor, though subsequent
filmmakers copied what appeared to be a "sex-equals-death" mantra. When
shown an early cut of Halloween without a musical score, all major
American studios declined to distribute it, one executive even remarking
that it was not scary. Carpenter added music himself, and the film was
distributed locally in four Kansas City theaters through Akkad's Compass
International Pictures in October 1978. Word-of-mouth made the movie a
sleeper hit that was selected to screen at the November 1978 Chicago
Film Festival, where the country's major critics acclaimed it. Halloween
grew into a major box office success, grossing over $70 million
worldwide and selling over 20 million tickets in North America, becoming
the most profitable independent film until being surpassed by Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990).[70] 1979 Though the
telekinesis-themed slasher Tourist Trap was initially unsuccessful, it
has undergone a reappraisal by fans. 1979's most successful slasher was
Fred Walton's When a Stranger Calls, which sold 8.5 million tickets in
North America. Its success has largely been credited to its opening
scene, in which a babysitter (Carol Kane) is taunted by a caller who
repeatedly asks, "Have you checked the children?"[71] Less successful
were Ray Dennis Steckler's burlesque slasher The Hollywood Strangler
Meets the Skid Row Slasher and Abel Ferrara's The Driller Killer, both
of which featured gratuitous on-screen violence against vagrant people. 1980 The
election of Ronald Reagan as the 40th president of the United States
drew in a new age of conservatism that ushered concern of rising
violence on film.[1][24] The slasher film, at the height of its
commercial power, also became the center of a political and cultural
maelstrom. Sean S. Cunningham's sleeper hit Friday the 13th was the
year's most commercially successful slasher film, grossing more than
$59.7 million and selling nearly 15 million tickets in North
America.[72] Despite a financial success, distributor Paramount Pictures
was criticized for "lowering" itself to release a violent exploitation
film, with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert famously despising the film.
Siskel, in his Chicago Tribune review, revealed the identity and fate of
the film's killer in an attempt to hurt its box office, and provided
the address of the chairman of Paramount Pictures for viewers to
complain.[73] The MPAA was criticized for allowing Friday the 13th an R
rating, but its violence would inspire gorier films to follow, as it set
a new bar for acceptable levels of on-screen violence. The criticisms
that began with Friday the 13th would lead to the genre's eventual
decline in subsequent years.[74] The small-budget thrillers
Silent Scream and Prom Night were box office hits with $7.9 and $14.8
million, respectively.[75] Jamie Lee Curtis starred in the independent
Prom Night, as well studio films Terror Train and The Fog to earn her
"scream queen" title.[8] MGM's the Halloween-clone He Knows You're Alone
sold nearly 2 million tickets, though Paramount Pictures John
Huston-directed Phobia only sold an estimated 22,000 tickets.[75] Two
high-profile slasher-thrillers were met with protest, William Friedkin's
Cruising and Gordon Willis' Windows, both of which equate homosexuality
with psychosis. Cruising drew protests from gay rights groups, and
though it pre-dates the AIDS crisis, the film's portrayal of the gay
community fueled subsequent backlash once the virus became an
epidemic.[24][76] Low budget exploitative films New Year's Evil,
Don't Go in the House and Don't Answer the Phone! were called-out for
misogyny that dwelled on the suffering of females exclusively.[7]
Acclaimed filmmaker Brian De Palma's Psycho-homage Dressed to Kill drew a
wave of protest from the National Organization for Women (NOW), who
picketed the film's screening on the University of Iowa campus.[77] The
year's most controversial slashers was William Lustig's Maniac, about a
schizophrenic serial killer in New York. Maniac was maligned by critics.
Vincent Canby of The New York Times said that watching the film was
like "watching someone else throw up."[78] Lustig released the film
unrated on American screens, sidestepping the MPAA to still bring in $6
million at the box office.[79][75] Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho's
influence was felt two decades later in Funeral Home[80] and The
Unseen.[81] Joe D'Amato's gruesome Italian horror film Antropophagus and
the Australian slasher Nightmares showed that the genre was spreading
internationally.[82] 1981 Slasher films reached a saturation
point in 1981, as heavily promoted movies like My Bloody Valentine and
The Burning were box office failures.[24][9][75] After the success of
Friday the 13th, Paramount Pictures picked up My Bloody Valentine with
hopes to achieve similar success. The film became the subject of intense
scrutiny in the wake of John Lennon's murder, and was released heavily
edited; lacking the draw of gore, My Bloody Valentine barely sold 2
million tickets in North America, much less than the 15 million sold by
Friday the 13th the year beforehand.[75] Thematically similar to My
Bloody Valentine, The Prowler hoped to lure an audience with gore
effects by Friday the 13th's Tom Savini but large MPAA edits contributed
to its failure to find a nationwide distributor.[24] Suffering similar
censorship was The Burning, which also employed Savini's special
effects, though it does mark the feature film debuts of Brad Grey, Holly
Hunter, Jason Alexander, Fisher Stevens, Bob Weinstein and Harvey
Weinstein. Profits of Halloween and Friday the 13th drew studio
interest, to varying success. Warner Bros.'s Eyes of a Stranger ($1.1
million) and Night School ($1.2 million), Paramount Pictures' The Fan
($3 million), Universal Pictures' The Funhouse ($8 million), and
Columbia Pictures' Happy Birthday to Me ($10 million).[75] CBS' TV
movie, Dark Night of the Scarecrow brought the genre to the small
screen.[24] Two sequels had bigger body counts and more gore than their
predecessors, but not higher box office intakes. Friday the 13th Part 2
sold 7.8 million tickets and Halloween II sold 9.2 million. Both sequels
sold around half of their original film's tickets, though they were
still very popular (Halloween II was the second highest-grossing horror
film of the year behind An American Werewolf in London).[75] Independent
companies churned out slasher films Final Exam, Bloody Birthday, Hell
Night, Don't Go in the Woods... Alone!, Wes Craven's Deadly Blessing and
Graduation Day.[75] Fantasy and sci-fi genres continued to blend with
the slasher film in Strange Behavior, Ghostkeeper and Evilspeak. The
international market found Italy's Absurd and Madhouse and Germany's
Bloody Moon. 1982 Straight-to-video productions cut costs to
maximize profit. The independent horror film Madman opened in New York
City's top 10, according to Variety, but soon fell out of theaters for a
much healthier life on home video.[24] The Dorm That Dripped Blood and
Honeymoon Horror, each made for between $50–90,000, became successful in
the early days of VHS.[75] Because of this change, independent
productions began having difficulties finding theatrical distribution.
Girls Nite Out had a very limited release in 1982 but was re-released in
1983 in more theaters until finally finding a home on VHS. Paul Lynch's
Humongous was released through AVCO Embassy Pictures, but a change in
management severely limited the film's theatrical release. Films such as
Hospital massacre and Night Warning enjoyed strong home rentals from
video stores, though Dark Sanity, The Forest, Unhinged, Trick or Treats,
and Island of Blood fell into obscurity with little theatrical releases
and only sub-par video transfers.[83] Supernatural slasher films
continued to build in popularity with The Slayer, The Incubus, Blood
Song, Don't Go to Sleep and Superstition (the supernatural-themed
Halloween III: Season of the Witch, though part of the Halloween
franchise, does not adhere to the slasher film formula). Alone in the
Dark was New Line Cinema's first feature film, released to little
revenue and initially dismissed by critics, though the film has gained
critical reappraisal. Director Amy Holden Jones and writer Rita Mae
Brown gender-swapped to showcase exploitative violence against men in
The Slumber Party Massacre,[83] while Visiting Hours pitted liberal
feminism against macho right-wing bigotry with exploitative results. Friday
the 13th Part III, the first slasher trilogy, was an enormous success,
selling 12 million tickets and dethroning E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial
from the top of the box office.[75] The film's iconic hockey mask has
grown to pop-culture iconography. Universal Pictures had a tiny release
for Death Valley, while Columbia Pictures found modest success with
Silent Rage. Independent distributor Embassy Pictures released The
Seduction to a surprising $11 million, an erotic slasher-thriller that
predates blockbusters Fatal Attraction (1987) and Basic Instinct (1992)
by several years.[75] Internationally, Australia released Next of
Kin while Puerto Rico's Pieces was filmed in Boston and Madrid by an
Italian-American producer with a Spanish director. Italian gialli saw
slasher film influences in their releases for Sergio Martino's The
Scorpion with Two Tails, Lucio Fulci's The New York Ripper and Dario
Argento's Tenebrae.[83] 1983 Traditional slasher films saw
less frequent output. The House on Sorority Row followed the same
general plot as Prom Night (1980) with guilty teens stalked and punished
for a terrible secret. The Final Terror borrows visual and thematic
elements from Just Before Dawn (1981), as Sweet Sixteen borrows from
Happy Birthday to Me (1981). The most successful slasher of the year was
Psycho II, which grossed over $34 million at the box office. The film
also reunited original Psycho (1960) cast members Anthony Perkins and
Vera Miles.[84] 10 to Midnight, inspired by the real-life crimes of
Richard Speck, promoted star Charles Bronson's justice-for-all character
above its horror themes.[84] Robert Hiltzik's Sleepaway Camp was a home
video hit, being unique for its pubescent victims and themes of
paedophilia and transvestism. Sleepaway Camp featured homosexual scenes,
which were taboo at the time.[84][85] In Canada, whodunit
Curtains had a brief theatrical life before finding new life on VHS,
while criticism toward American Nightmare's portrayal of prostitutes,
drug addicts, and pornography addicts hurt its video rentals.[84]
Sledgehammer was shot-on-video for just $40,000, with a gender-reversal
climax showing Playgirl model Ted Prior as a "final guy."[24][75] Other
home video slashers from the year include Blood Beat, Double Exposure,
and Scalps, the latter claiming to be one of the most censored films in
history.[84] Releases began to distance from the genre. The poster for
Mortuary features a hand is bursting from the grave, though the undead
have nothing to do with the film. Distributors were aware of fading box
office profits, and they were attempting to hoodwink audiences into
thinking long-shelved releases like Mortuary were different. 1984 The
public had largely lost interest in theatrical released slashers,
drawing a close to the Golden Age.[1][12] Production rates plummeted and
major studios all but abandoned the genre that, only a few years
earlier, had been very profitable. Many 1984 slasher films with brief
theatrical runs found varying degrees of success on home video, such as
Splatter University, Satan's Blade, Blood Theatre, Rocktober Blood and
Fatal Games. Movies like The Prey and Evil Judgement were filmed years
prior and finally were given small theatrical releases. Silent Madness
used 3D to ride the success of Friday the 13th Part III (1982), though
the effect did not translate to the VHS format.[24] Friday the
13th: The Final Chapter brought the saga of Jason Voorhees to a close,
with his demise the main marketing tool. It worked, with The Final
Chapter selling 10 million tickets in North America, hinting the series
would continue even if Jason's demise marked a shift in the genre.[75]
This shift was emphasized by the controversy from Silent Night, Deadly
Night (1984): Protesters picketed theaters playing the film with
placards reading, "Deck the hall with holly – not bodies!" Despite other
Christmas-themed horror films, including the same year's Don't Open
till Christmas, promotional material for Silent Night, Deadly Night
featured a killer Santa with the tagline: "He knows when you've been
naughty!" Released in November 1984 by TriStar Pictures, persistent
carol-singers forced one Bronx cinema to pull Silent Night, Deadly Night
a week into its run. Soon widespread outrage led to the film's removal,
with only 741,500 tickets sold.[86][75] As interest in the
Golden Age slasher waned, Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street
revitalized the genre by mixing fantasy and the supernatural in a
cost-effective way. Craven had toyed with slasher films before in Deadly
Blessing (1981), though he was frustrated that the genre he had helped
create with The Last House on the Left (1972) and The Hills Have Eyes
(1977) had not benefited him financially. Developing A Nightmare on Elm
Street since 1981, Craven recognized time running out due to declining
revenues from theatrical slasher film releases.[87] A Nightmare on Elm
Street and especially its villain Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) became
cultural phenomenons.[88] On a budget of just $1.8 million, the film
was a commercial success, grossing more than $25.5 million in North
America and launched one of the most successful film series in
history.[75][88] A Nightmare on Elm Street provided the success that New
Line Cinema needed to become a major Hollywood company. To this day,
New Line is referred to as "The House That Freddy Built".[89] The final
slasher film released during the Golden Age, The Initiation, was greatly
overshadowed by A Nightmare on Elm Street (though both films feature
dreams as plot points and a horribly burned "nightmare man").[24] The
success of A Nightmare on Elm Street welcomed in a new wave of horror
films that relied on special effects, almost completely silencing the
smaller low-budget Golden Age features.[1][90] Direct-to-video and series "The Silver Age" (1985–1995) Despite
A Nightmare on Elm Street's success, fatigue hit the slasher genre, and
its popularity had declined substantially. The home video revolution,
fueled by the popularity of VHS, provided a new outlet for low-budget
filmmaking. Without major studio backing for theatrical release, slasher
films became second only to pornography in the home video market. The
drop in budgets to accommodate a more economic approach was usually met
with a decline in quality. Holdovers filmed during the Golden Age such
as Too Scared to Scream (1985), The Mutilator (1985), Blood Rage (1987),
Killer Party (1986) and Mountaintop Motel Massacre (1986) found video
distribution. Mirroring the punk rock movement, novice filmmakers proved
anyone could make a movie on home video, resulting in shot-on-video
slashers Blood Cult (1985), The Ripper (1985), Spine (1986), Truth or
Dare? (1986), Killer Workout (1987), and Death Spa (1989).[91]
Lesser-known horror properties Sleepaway Camp, The Slumber Party
Massacre and Silent Night, Deadly Night became series on home video. The
Hills Have Eyes Part 2 (1985) and Friday the 13th: A New Beginning
(1985) were theatrically released but neither film was embraced like A
Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy's Revenge (1985), a sequel rushed
into production. Distinguished by overtly homoerotic undertones,
Freddy's Revenge became the highest grossing horror film of 1985 and
inspired "dream" slashes Dreamaniac (1986), Bad Dreams (1988), Deadly
Dreams (1988), and Dream Demon (1988). Paramount Pictures
released the parody April Fool's Day (1986) with hopes to start a sister
series to its Friday the 13th property, though the film's modest box
office run never led to a series. Three other spoofs, Evil Laugh (1986),
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986) and Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason
Lives (1986), were box office disappointments; Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
sold just 2 million tickets while Jason Lives sold 5.2 million, both
significantly down from their predecessors.[92] Trying to cater the
public of adult action thrillers that were popular in the 1980s,
Sylvester Stallone's cop-thriller Cobra (1986) is a thinly-veiled
slasher film advertised as an action movie, and sold 13.2 million
tickets. The home video market made stars out of character actors such
as Terry O'Quinn and Bruce Campbell, whose respective independent
horror-thrillers The Stepfather (1987) and Maniac Cop (1988) found more
support on home video than in theaters. Quinn returned for Stepfather II
(1989) but chose not to reprise his role in Stepfather III (1992),
Destroyer (1988), while Campbell followed a similar route with a cameo
in Maniac Cop 2 (1990) and no participation in Maniac Cop III: Badge of
Silence (1993). The Nightmare on Elm Street series dominated the
late 1980s horror wave, with A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors
(1987) selling 11.5 million tickets in North America, and A Nightmare
on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (1988) following another 12 million
tickets. By comparison, Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood (1988)
and Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988) sold approximately
4.5 million tickets each, less than half of the Elm Street films. The
personality-driven appeal of Freddy Krueger was not lost on filmmakers,
as characters like Chucky and Candyman were given ample dialogue and
placed in urban settings that had largely been ignored by the Golden
Age. Chucky's Child's Play (1988) and its 1990 sequel sold over 14.7
million tickets combined, while Candyman (1992) sold a healthy 6.2
million. Both series fell out rather quickly, when Child's Play 3 (1991)
selling only 3.5 million tickets in North America and Candyman:
Farewell to the Flesh (1995) selling only 3.2 million.[93] Internationally,
the slasher film remained profitable. Mexico released Zombie Apocalypse
(1985), Don't Panic (1988), Grave Robbers (1990) and Hell's Trap
(1990). Europe saw releases from Sweden's Blood Tracks (1985), The
United Kingdom's Lucifer (1987), Spain's Anguish (1987) and Italy's
StageFright (1987) and BodyCount (1987). In the Pacific, Australia
released Symphony of Evil (1987), Houseboat Horror (1989), and Bloodmoon
(1990), while Japan released Evil Dead Trap (1988).[94] By 1989
the major series had faded from public interest, resulting in box office
failures from Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989), A
Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child (1989) and Halloween 5: The
Revenge of Michael Myers (1989).[13] The Dream Child's 5.6 million
tickets were a sharp decline, while Jason Takes Manhattan and The
Revenge of Michael Myers each sold only about 3 million tickets. Due to
the declining ticket sales, rights to the Friday the 13th and Halloween
series were sold to New Line Cinema and Miramax Films, respectively. Now
owning both the Jason Voorhees and Freddy Krueger characters, New Line
would look into a series-crossover event film. Freddy's Dead: The Final
Nightmare (1991) and Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993) began
this crossover series, but profit losses from both films stalled the
project for a decade. Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995) was
released under Miramax's Dimension Films banner to negative fan reaction
and a weak box office." (wikipedia.org) "Freddy
Krueger (/ˈkruːɡər/) is a fictional character and the primary
antagonist in the A Nightmare on Elm Street film series. He was created
by Wes Craven and made his debut in Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street
(1984) as the malevolent spirit of a child killer who had been burned to
death by his victims' parents after evading prison.[2] Krueger goes on
to murder his victims in their dreams, causing their deaths in the real
world as well. In the dream world, he is a powerful force and seemingly
invulnerable. However, whenever Freddy is pulled back into the real
world, he has normal human vulnerabilities and can be destroyed.[3] He
is commonly identified by his burned, disfigured face, dirty
red-and-green-striped sweater and brown fedora, and trademark
metal-clawed, brown leather, right hand glove. This glove was the
product of Krueger's own imagination, having welded the blades himself
before using it to murder many of his victims, both in the real and
dream worlds. Over the course of the film series, Freddy has battled
several reoccurring survivors including Nancy Thompson and Alice
Johnson.[4] The character was consistently portrayed by Robert Englund
in the original film series as well as in the television spin-off
Freddy's Nightmares. Englund has stated that he feels the character
represents neglect, particularly that suffered by children. The
character also more broadly represents subconscious fears. The
character quickly became a pop culture icon[5] going on to appear in toy
lines,[6] comic books,[7] books,[8] sneakers,[9] costumes,[10] and
video games[11][12] since his debut. In 2003, Krueger appeared alongside
fellow horror icon Jason Voorhees in Freddy vs. Jason. In 2010, a
reboot of the film, starring Jackie Earle Haley, was released. Wizard
magazine rated Freddy the 14th-greatest villain of all time;[13] the
British television channel Sky2 listed him 8th,[14] and the American
Film Institute ranked him 40th on its "AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes
& Villains" list.[15] In 2010, Freddy was nominated for the award
for Best Villain (formerly Most Vile Villain) at the Scream Awards. Appearances Film In
A Nightmare on Elm Street, Freddy is introduced as a serial child
killer from the fictitious town of Springwood, Ohio, who kills his
victims with a bladed leather glove he crafted in a boiler room where he
used to take his 20 victims. He is captured, but is set free on a
technicality when it is discovered that the search warrant was not
signed in the right place. He is hunted down by a mob made up of the
town's vengeful parents and cornered in the boiler room. The mob douses
the building with gasoline and sets it on fire by throwing Molotov
cocktails, burning him alive. While his body dies, his spirit lives on
within the dreams of a group of teenagers and pre-adolescents living on
Elm Street, whom he preys on by entering their dreams and killing them,
fueled by the town's memories and fear of him and empowered by a trio of
'dream demons' to be their willing instrument of evil. He is apparently
destroyed at the end of the film by protagonist Nancy Thompson (Heather
Langenkamp), but the last scene reveals that he has survived. He goes
on to antagonize the teenage protagonists of the film's sequels,
including Jesse Walsh (Mark Patton), Kristen Parker (Patricia Arquette),
Alice Johnson (Lisa Wilcox), and Lori Campbell (Monica Keena). In
A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, more of Freddy's backstory
is revealed by the mysterious nun who repeatedly appears to Dr. Neil
Gordon (Craig Wasson). Freddy's mother, Amanda Krueger (Nan Martin), was
a nurse at the asylum featured in the film. At the time she worked
there, a largely abandoned, run-down wing of the asylum was used to lock
up entire hordes of the most insane criminals all at once. When Amanda
was young, she was accidentally locked into the room with the criminals
over a holiday weekend. They managed to keep her hidden for days, raping
her repeatedly. When she was finally discovered, she was barely alive
and pregnant, with the result that Krueger was regarded as "the bastard
son of a hundred maniacs" due to it being impossible to determine which
of the rapists was his biological father. However, in A Nightmare on Elm
Street 5: The Dream Child, it is implied that Freddy had identified
which one of them was his birth father (also portrayed by Englund in a
dream sequence) and hates his mother for rejecting him. Later, in
Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare, it is revealed that he was adopted
by an alcoholic named Mr. Underwood (Alice Cooper), who abused him
throughout his childhood until Freddy finally murdered him as a
teenager. Freddy tortures animals and engages in self-mutilation, and
becomes a serial killer by murdering the children of people who had
bullied him when he was a child. Prior to his murder, he is married to a
woman named Loretta (Lindsey Fields), whom he eventually also murders.
He also has a daughter, Katherine (Lisa Zane), who seeks to end her
father's horrific legacy once and for all, killing him at the end of the
movie. After a hiatus following the release of The Final
Nightmare, Krueger was brought back in Wes Craven's New Nightmare by Wes
Craven, who had not worked on the film series since the third film,
Dream Warriors. New Nightmare coincides with the approaching anniversary
of the release of the first film. Robert Englund, who portrayed Krueger
throughout the film series and its television spin-off, also took the
role as a fictional version of himself in New Nightmare; it is implied
that Englund was stalked by his character, who is an ancient demonic
entity that took on the form of Wes Craven's creation and has come to
life from the film franchise's fictitious world. Having been in various
manifestations throughout the ages due to the entity can be captured
through storytelling, it is hinted that it was once in the form of the
old witch from Brothers Grimm's fairy tale Hansel and Gretel when it was
held prisoner in this allegory. Englund describes to his former co-star
and friend Heather Langenkamp that this embodiment of Freddy is darker
and more evil than as portrayed by him in the films; he struggles to
keep his sanity intact from Krueger's torments and goes into hiding with
his family. Krueger aims to stop another film of the franchise from
being made, eliminating the films' crew members, including Langenkamp's
husband, Chase Porter (David Newsom), after stealing a prototype bladed
glove from him, and causes nightmares and makes threatening phone calls
to producer Robert Shaye. The entity also haunts Wes Craven's dreams, to
the point that he sees future events related to Krueger's actions and
then writes them down as a movie script. Krueger sees Langenkamp as his
primary foe because her character Nancy Thompson was the first to defeat
him. Krueger's attempts to cross over to reality cause a series of
earthquakes throughout Los Angeles County, including the 1994 Northridge
earthquake. Langenkamp, with help from her son Dylan (Miko Hughes),
succeeds in defeating the entity and apparently destroys him; however,
Krueger's creator reveals that it is again imprisoned in the fictitious
world, indicated by the character's later appearances in films and other
medias. In 2003, Freddy battled fellow horror icon Jason
Voorhees (Ken Kirzinger) from the Friday the 13th film series in the
theatrical release Freddy vs. Jason, a film which officially resurrected
both characters from their respective deaths and subsequently sent them
to Hell. As the film begins, Krueger is frustrated at his current
inability to kill as knowledge of him has been hidden in Springwood,
prompting him to manipulate Jason into killing in his place in the hope
that the resulting fear will remind others of him so that he can resume
his own murder spree. However, Freddy's plan proves too effective when
Jason starts killing people before Freddy can do it, culminating in a
group of teens learning the truth and drawing Freddy and Jason to Camp
Crystal Lake in the hope that they can draw Freddy into the real world
so that Jason will kill him and remain "home." The ending of the film is
left ambiguous as to whether or not Freddy is actually dead; despite
being decapitated, when Jason emerges from the lake carrying his head he
looks and winks at the audience. A sequel featuring Ash Williams (Bruce
Campbell) from the Evil Dead franchise was planned, but never
materialized onscreen. It was later turned into Dynamite Entertainment's
comic book series Freddy vs. Jason vs. Ash. In the 2010 remake
of the original film, Freddy's backstory is that he was a groundskeeper
at Springfield Badham Preschool who tortured and sexually abused the
teenage protagonists of the film when they were children. When their
parents found out, they trapped him in a boiler room at an industrial
park and set it on fire with a Molotov cocktail made out of a gasoline
canister, killing him. As a spirit, he takes his revenge on the
teenagers by haunting their dreams; he is particularly obsessed with
Nancy Holbrook (Rooney Mara), who had been his “favorite” when she was a
child. Krueger's power comes from his prey's memories and emotions upon
remembering the abuse they suffered at his hands. His bladed glove is
made out of discarded pieces of his gardening tools. Nancy destroys him
at the end of the film by pulling his spirit into the physical world and
cutting his throat; the final scene reveals that Freddy's spirit has
survived, however. Television Englund continued to portray
Krueger in the 1988 television anthology series, Freddy's Nightmares.
The show was hosted by Freddy, who did not take direct part in most of
the episodes, but he did show up occasionally to influence the plot of
particular episodes. Further, a consistent theme in each episode was
characters having disturbing dreams. The series ran for 44 episodes over
two seasons, ending on March 10, 1990.[16] Although a bulk of the
episodes did not feature Freddy taking a major role in the plot, the
pilot episode, "No More, Mr. Nice Guy", depicts the events of his trial,
and his subsequent death at the hands of the parents of Elm Street
after his acquittal. In "No More, Mr. Nice Guy", though Freddy's case
seems open and shut, a mistrial is declared based on the arresting
officer, Lt. Tim Blocker (Ian Patrick Williams), not reading Krueger his
Miranda rights, which is different from the original Nightmare, which
stated he was released because someone forgot to sign the search warrant
in the right place. The episode also reveals that Krueger used an ice
cream van to lure children close enough so that he could kidnap and kill
them. After the town's parents burn Freddy to death he returns to haunt
Blocker in his dreams. Freddy gets his revenge when Blocker is put
under anesthesia at the dentist's office, and Freddy shows up and kills
him.[17] The episode "Sister's Keeper" was a "sequel" to this episode,
even though it was the seventh episode of the series.[18] The episode
follows Krueger as he terrorizes Blocker's identical twin daughters and
frames one sister for the other's murder.[17] Season two's "It's My
Party And You'll Die If I Want You To" featured Freddy attacking a high
school prom date who stood him up 20 years earlier. He gets his revenge
with his desire being fulfilled in the process.[19] Characterization Wes
Craven said his inspiration for the basis of Freddy Krueger's power
stemmed from several stories in the Los Angeles Times about a series of
mysterious deaths: All the victims had reported recurring nightmares and
died in their sleep.[20] Additionally, Craven's original script
characterized Freddy as a child molester, which Craven said was the
"worst thing" he could think of. The decision was made to instead make
him a child murderer in order to avoid being accused of exploiting the
spate of highly publicized child molestation cases in California around
the time A Nightmare on Elm Street went into production.[21] Craven's
inspirations for the character included a bully from his school during
his youth, a disfigured homeless man who had frightened him when he was
12, and the 1970s pop song "Dream Weaver" by Gary Wright. In an
interview, he said of the disfigured stranger, "When I looked down there
was a man very much like Freddy walking along the sidewalk. He must
have sensed that someone was looking at him and stopped and looked right
into my face. He scared the living daylights out of me, so I jumped
back into the shadows. I waited and waited to hear him walk away.
Finally I thought he must have gone, so I stepped back to the window.
The guy was not only still looking at me but he thrust his head forward
as if to say, 'Yes, I'm still looking at you.' The man walked towards
the apartment building's entrance. I ran through the apartment to our
front door as he was walking into our building on the lower floor. I
heard him starting up the stairs. My brother, who is ten years older
than me, got a baseball bat and went out to the corridor but he was
gone."[22] Throughout the series, Freddy's potential victims
often experience dreams of young children, jumping rope and chanting a
rhyme to the tune of "One, Two, Buckle My Shoe" with the lyrics changed
to "One, Two, Freddy's coming for you", often as an omen to Freddy's
presence or a precursor to his attacks. The children are often heavily
implied to be the spirits of his past victims prior to his death. More
of Freddy's backstory is shown in A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream
Warriors, revealing him to have been an unwanted child of rape, being
the son of Sister Amanda Krueger, a nun who was violently raped by
dozens of inmates from a mental asylum, eventually dubbed and constantly
mocked as the "bastard son of a hundred maniacs". In Freddy's Dead: The
Final Nightmare, it's shown that since a young age, Freddy displayed
murderous tendencies and a penchant for self-harm, even displaying
masochistic traits as he was beat as a teenager by his guardian Mr.
Underwood. Robert Englund has stated that the character represents the
neglect of children and the damaging results it can produce. In
Wes Craven's New Nightmare, Freddy is characterized as a symbol of
something powerful and ancient and is given more stature and
muscles.[23] Unlike the six movies before it, New Nightmare shows Freddy
as closer to what Wes Craven originally intended, toning down his
comedic side while strengthening the more menacing aspects of his
character. In the 2010 remake, Krueger is depicted as a sadistic
pedophile (as per Craven's original vision), who worked as a gardener at
a local preschool. Unlike in the original series where he was a known
child-killer who evaded conviction on a technicality, there was actually
ambiguity about Krueger's guilt or innocence apart from the testimony
of his victims. His guilt is confirmed once the grown survivors find the
room where Krueger molested them. Appearance This section
needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this
article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may
be challenged and removed. (October 2019) (Learn how and when to remove
this template message) Freddy Krueger sweatshirt from A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master, the fourth film in the series According
to Robert Englund, Freddy's look was based on Klaus Kinski's portrayal
of Count Dracula in Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) and some of the works
of Lon Chaney, while he based Freddy's poise and gait on the "Cagney
stance" originated by actor James Cagney. Freddy's characteristic of
keeping his gloved arm lower than the other was incidental due to the
knives being heavy to wear for Englund and forcing him to carry himself
as such while playing the role.[24] Freddy's physical appearance has
stayed largely consistent throughout the film series, although small
changes were made in subsequent films. He wears a striped red-and-green
sweater (solid red sleeves in the original film), a dark brown fedora,
his bladed glove, loose black trousers (brown in the original film), and
worn work boots, in keeping with his blue collar background. His skin
is scarred and burned as a result of being burned alive by the parents
of Springwood, and he has no hair at all on his head as it presumably
all burned off. In the original film, only Freddy's face was burned,
while the scars have spread to the rest of his body from the second film
onwards. His blood is occasionally a dark, oily color, or greenish in
hue when he is in the Dreamworld. In the original film, Freddy remains
in the shadows and under lower light much longer than he does in the
later pictures. In the second film, there are some scenes where Freddy
is shown without his bladed glove, and instead with the blades
protruding from the tips of his fingers. As the films began to emphasize
the comedic, wise-cracking aspect of the character, he began to don
various costumes and take on other forms, such as dressing as a waiter
or wearing a Superman-inspired version of his sweater with a cape (The
Dream Child), appearing as a video game sprite (Freddy's Dead), a giant
snake-like creature (Dream Warriors), and a hookah-smoking caterpillar
(Freddy vs. Jason). In New Nightmare, Freddy's appearance is
updated considerably, giving him a green fedora that matches his sweater
stripes, skin-tight leather pants, knee-high black boots, a turtleneck
version of his trademark sweater, a blue-black trench coat, and a fifth
claw on his glove, which also has a far more organic appearance,
resembling the exposed muscle tissue of an actual hand. Freddy also has
fewer burns on his face, though these are more severe, with his muscle
tissue exposed in numerous places. Compared to his other incarnations,
these Freddy's injuries are more like those of an actual burn victim.
For the 2010 remake, Freddy is returned to his iconic attire, but the
burns on his face are intensified with further bleaching of the skin and
exposed facial tissue on the left cheek, more reminiscent of actual
third-degree burns than in the original series. Bladed glove Freddy Krueger "Freddy's Dead secondary hero" glove used in the sixth installment of A Nightmare on Elm Street Wes
Craven stated that part of the inspiration for Freddy's infamous bladed
glove was from his cat, as he watched it claw the side of his couch one
night.[25] In an interview he said, "Part of it was an objective
goal to make the character memorable, since it seems that every
character that has been successful has had some kind of unique weapon,
whether it be a chain saw or a machete, etc. I was also looking for a
primal fear which is embedded in the subconscious of people of all
cultures. One of those is the fear of teeth being broken, which I used
in my first film. Another is the claw of an animal, like a saber-toothed
tiger reaching with its tremendous hooks. I transposed this into a
human hand. The original script had the blades being fishing
knives."[26] When Jim Doyle, the creator of Freddy's claw, asked
Craven what he wanted, Craven responded, "It's kind of like really long
fingernails, I want the glove to look like something that someone could
make who has the skills of a boilermaker."[25] Doyle explained, "Then we
hunted around for knives. We picked out this bizarre-looking steak
knife, we thought that this looked really cool, we thought it would look
even cooler if we turned it over and used it upside down. We had to
remove the back edge and put another edge on it, because we were
actually using the knife upside down." Later Doyle had three duplicates
of the glove made, two of which were used as stunt gloves in long
shots.[25] For New Nightmare, Lou Carlucci, the effects
coordinator, remodeled Freddy's glove for a more "organic look". He
says, "I did the original glove on the first Nightmare and we
deliberately made that rough and primitive looking, like something that
would be constructed in somebody's home workshop. Since this is supposed
to be a new look for Freddy, Craven and everybody involved decided that
the glove should be different. This hand has more muscle and bone
texture to it, the blades are shinier and in one case, are retractable.
Everything about this glove has a much cleaner look to it, it's more a
natural part of his hand than a glove." The new glove has five
claws.[citation needed] In the 2010 remake, the glove is
redesigned as a metal gauntlet with four finger bars, but it is
patterned after its original design. Owing to this iteration of the
character's origin as a groundskeeper, from the outset it was a
gardener's glove modified as an instrument of torture, and in film its
blades was based on a garden fork. Freddy's glove appeared in the
1987 horror-comedy Evil Dead II above the door on the inside of a
toolshed. This was Sam Raimi's response to Wes Craven showing footage of
The Evil Dead in A Nightmare on Elm Street, which was a response to
Raimi putting a poster of Craven's 1977 film The Hills Have Eyes in The
Evil Dead. This, in turn, was a response to a ripped-up Jaws poster in
The Hills Have Eyes.[27] The glove also appears in the 1998
horror-comedy Bride of Chucky in an evidence locker room that also
contains the remains of the film's villain Chucky, the chainsaw of
Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and the masks of Michael
Myers from Halloween and Jason Voorhees from Friday the 13th. At
the end of the film Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday, the mask of
the title character, Jason Voorhees, played by Kane Hodder, is dragged
under the earth by Freddy's gloved hand. Freddy's gloved hand, in the
ending, was played by Hodder.[28] In popular culture Amusement parks At
Six Flags St. Louis' Fright Fest event (then known as Fright Nights),
Krueger was the main character for the event's first year in 1988. He
reappeared in his own haunted house, Freddy's Nightmare: The Haunted
House on Elm Street, for the following two years. Freddy Krueger
appeared alongside Jason Voorhees and Leatherface as minor icons during
Halloween Horror Nights 17 and again with Jason during Halloween Horror
Nights 25 at Universal Orlando Resort and Universal Studios Hollywood.
In 2016, Freddy Krueger returned to Halloween Horror Nights, along with
Jason, in Hollywood. Miscellaneous Freddy Krueger made
different appearances in Robot Chicken voiced by Seth Green. In the
episode "That Hurts Me", Freddy appears as a housemate of "Horror Movie
Big Brother", alongside other famous slasher movie killers such as
Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees, Leatherface, Pinhead and Ghostface.[29]
In the Treehouse of Horror VI segment "A Nightmare on Evergreen
Terrace", Groundskeeper Willie played the Freddy Krueger role, with his
backstory being toned down to him accidentally setting himself on fire
thanks to Homer turning up the boiler and burning to death due to the
parents ignoring his pleas for help, deciding to avenge himself by
targeting their kids for their callously letting him burn to death.
Krueger ultimately was stopped by Maggie plugging his bagpipe spider
form, causing him to uncontrollably inflate and detonate within the
dream world, though it is implied in the ending this resulted in him
being restored to life in reality, albeit significantly less
threatening.[30] Freddy's first video game appearance was in the
1989 NES game A Nightmare on Elm Street.[31] The game was published by
LJN Toys and developed by Rare. Freddy Krueger appeared as a
downloadable playable character for Mortal Kombat (2011), with Robert
Englund reprising his role.[32][33] He has become the second non-Mortal
Kombat character to appear in the game. The game depicts Krueger as a
malevolent spirit inhabiting the Dream Realm who attacks Shao Kahn for
"stealing" the souls of his potential victims. During the fight, he is
pulled into the game's fictional depiction of the real world. The
injured Krueger arms himself with two razor claws to continue to battle
Kahn. Upon defeating him, Krueger is sent back to the Dream Realm by
Nightwolf, where he continues to haunt the dreams of his human prey.[34]
In an interview with PlayStation.Blog, Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon
cited the character's violent nature and iconic status as reasoning for
the inclusion in the game, "Over the years, we've certainly had a
number of conversations about guest characters. At one point, we had a
conversation about having a group—imagine Freddy, Jason, Michael Myers,
Leatherface from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. We never got a grip on
how we would do it, whether they'd be DLC characters or what. We also
wanted to introduce a character who was unexpected. This DLC thing opens
the doors to realising these ideas."[35] Krueger went on to become
playable in the mobile edition of the game's sequel, Mortal Kombat X,
alongside Jason from Friday the 13th.[36] In October 2017, the
Jackie Earle Haley incarnation of Krueger was released as a downloadable
playable character in the seventh chapter of the asymmetric survival
horror game Dead by Daylight, alongside Quentin Smith.[37] The events of
the chapter are set immediately following Nancy Holbrook's escape from
Krueger, after which he targets Quentin Smith as revenge for aiding her.
Invading Smith's dreams, he forces him to go to the Badham Preschool,
where the two are unwittingly taken to the universe of Dead by Daylight
by an unseen force.[38] The character returned to television in
an episode of The Goldbergs titled "Mister Knifey-Hands" with Englund
reprising his role in a cameo.[39] Freddy Krueger appears as an OASIS
avatar in Ready Player One.[40] He is among the avatars seen on the PVP
location Planet Doom where he is shot by Aech.[citation needed] The
frog species Lepidobatrachus laevis had been given multiple nicknames,
one of which is the "Freddy Krueger frog" for its aggressive nature."
(wikipedia.org)
Condition:New with tags
Shape:Rectangle
Closure:Hook
Occasion:Halloween
Color:Multi-Color
Material:Enamel, Metal
Metal:Alloy
Ear Area:Lobe
Brand:SG@NYC
Type:Earrings
Era:Undated
Style:Dangle/Drop, Drop/Dangle
Theme:Art, Cartoon, TV & Movie Characters, Fairytale & Fantasy, Halloween, Letters, Numbers & Words, Signs & Symbols, TV & Movies
Country/Region of Manufacture:China
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