About The Horror Genre

The first illustrations of supernatural events appeared in a few of the silent shorts back in the late 1890's. They were recorded by film pioneer Georges Melies.

Edison Studios produced the first film version of the famous Frankenstein back in 1910, which followed the 1908 novel Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. The morbid and chilling nature of the resources used in the making of this film are reflections of the horror film genre.





Although the word 'horror' wasnt actaully used until the 1930's. This was due to Universal Picture releasing 'Dracula' in 1931. Early films like this were often identified as dark melodramas due to the heavy plots and use of stock characters that manage to build up suspense and violence.



The horror film genre seeks to create an undesirable emotional state that is caused by playing on the audience's primitive fears. Horror films have been inspired by literature and authors such as Mary Shelly, Edgar Allan Poe and Bram Stoker. Horror films theirself often face the viewers fears, nightmares and deal with aspects of the unknown. A horror film can have a narrative that is centred around elements such as, monsters, an evil force, vampires, torture, zombies, serial killers, psychopaths, ghosts, werewolves and demons, ect.

Horror films are categorised into subgenres such as, action, comedy, body, drama, psychological, science fiction, slasher, supernatural, gothic, natural and zombie, ect. It's impotant to note that a horror film can fall into more than one sub catergory.