The history and context of horror

1890's-1920's

The firsts pictures of supernatural events firstly appear in several silent short films created by pioneers such as Georges Méliès in the late 1890s, the most popular being his 1896 Le Manoir du diable (aka "The House of the Devil") which is sometimes credited as being the first ever horror film. Edison Studios produced the first film version of Frankenstein; thought lost for many years, film collector Alois Felix Dettlaff Sr. found a copy and had a 1993 rerelease. The early 20th century brought more major films for the horror genre including the first monster to appear in a full-length horror film, Quasimodo, the hunchback of Notre-Dame who had appeared in Victor Hugo's novel, "Notre-Dame de Paris" (published in 1831). Many of the early feature length 'horror films' were mainly created by German film makers in the 1910s and 1920s. Many of these films would significantly influence later Hollywood films. Paul Wegener's The Golem (1915) was seminal; in 1920 Robert Wiene's The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, with its Expressionist style, would influence film-makers from Orson Welles to Tim Burton and many more for decades. This era also produced the first vampire-themed horror film, F. W. Murnau's Nosferatu (1922), an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula. Early Hollywood dramas dabbled in horror themes, including versions of The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) and The Monster (1925) both starring Lon Chaney, Sr., the first American horror movie star. His most famous role, however, was in The Phantom of the Opera (1925), perhaps the true predecessor of Universal's famous horror series.

1930's-1940's

In the 1930's American film companies made horror films very popular, the most famous was Universal Pictures Co. Inc. They made specific horror films we still know to this day like: Dracula and Frankenstein both were released in 1931. some of which blended science fiction films with Gothic horror, such as James Whale's The Invisible Man (1933). Tod Browning, director of Dracula, also made the extremely controversial Freaks based on Spurs by Ted Robbins. Some actors began to build entire careers in such films, most notably Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. The iconic make-up designs were then created by Universal Studios,Jack Pierce.