Author: Tom Weaver
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 400
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Book Description
Poverty row horror films were usually inexpensively (some would say cheaply) produced with writing that ranged from bad to atrocious. Yet these movies with their all-star horror casts (Carradine, Lugosi, Karloff, et al.) and their ape men, mad monsters, devil bats and white zombies still have a loyal audience 50 years after their release.Essays contain full filmographic data on the 31 horror chillers made by the three studios from 1940 through 1946 and are arranged by year of release. Each entry includes the date of release, length, production credits, cast credits, interview quotes, and a plot synopsis with critical commentary. Filmographies for prominent horror actors and actresses, from John Abbott to George Zucco, are provided in the appendices.
Author: George Eugene Turner
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 224
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Book Description
Author: Michael R. Pitts
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 1476610363
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 543
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Book Description
From the beginning of the sound era until the end of the 1930s, independent movie-making thrived. Many of the independent studios were headquartered in a section of Hollywood called "Poverty Row." Here the independents made movies on the cheap, usually at rented facilities where shooting was limited to only a few days. From Allied Pictures Corporation to Willis Kent Production, 55 Poverty Row Studios are given histories in this book. Some of the studios, such as Diversion Pictures and Cresent Pictures, came into existence for the sole purpose of releasing movies by established stars. Others, for example J.D. Kendis, were early exploitation filmmakers under the guise of sex education. The histories include critical commentary on the studio's output and a filmography of all titles released from 1929 through 1940.
Author: Mario DeGiglio-Bellemare
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 1498503802
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 379
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Book Description
The 1940s is a lost decade in horror cinema, undervalued and written out of most horror scholarship. This collection revises, reframes, and deconstructs persistent critical binaries that have been put in place by scholarly discourse to label 1940s horror as somehow inferior to a “classical” period or “canonical” mode of horror in the 1930s, especially as represented by the monster films of Universal Studios. The book's four sections re-evaluate the historical, political, economic, and cultural factors informing 1940s horror cinema to introduce new theoretical frameworks and to open up space for scholarly discussion of 1940s horror genre hybridity, periodization, and aesthetics. Chapters focused on Gothic and Grand Guignol traditions operating in forties horror cinema, 1940s proto-slasher films, the independent horrors of the Poverty Row studios, and critical reevaluations of neglected hybrid films such as The Vampire’s Ghost (1945) and “slippery” auteurs such as Robert Siodmak and Sam Neufield, work to recover a decade of horror that has been framed as having fallen victim to repetition, exhaustion, and decline.
Author: H. Marshall Leicester
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 1476689792
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 278
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Book Description
Using the Hollywood studio system (1931-1960) as a historical center, this book performs close readings of classic horror films (such as Frankenstein and Cat People) while asking the following three questions: What about this movie is weird? What does this movie think ought to scare you? If there weren't monsters in this movie, what would be wrong with these people's lives? These questions guide readers toward the uniqueness of horror films in relation to the way they are classified and the feeling of "horror" that they offer. The horror genre is a collection of culturally-shared elements--words, images, or themes used to signify or evoke horror, because they have been used that way before. Instead of treating movies as examples of the horror genre through how they evoke feelings from viewers, this book locates the meaning of horror within individual films and shows how movies make their own genealogies and complicate their own scares in an evolution of the genre. It argues that classic horror movies are forms of reception of--and resistance to--the ideas of horror that were current in their historical period. Working historically, the author traces movies' interactions with their precursors and co-conspirators to show how they are the agents of historical changes in the genre and in what we take to be horror.
Author: Ken Gelder
Publisher: Psychology Press
ISBN: 9780415213554
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 444
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Book Description
The Horror Reader brings together 29 key articles to explore the enduring resonance of horror in popular culture.
Author: Brad Weismann
Publisher: Epic Ink
ISBN: 0760376794
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 239
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Book Description
From the silent-film era to the blockbusters of today, Horror Unmasked is a fun-filled, highly illustrated dive into the past influences and present popularity of the horror film genre. The horror film’s pop-culture importance is undeniable, from its early influences to today’s most significant and exciting developments in the genre. Since 1990, the production of horror films has risen exponentially worldwide, and in 2021, horror films earned an estimated $580 million in ticket sales, not to mention how the genre has expanded into books, fashion, music, and other media throughout the world. Horror has long been the most popular film genre, and more horror movies have been made than any other kind. We need them. We need to be scared, to test ourselves, laugh inappropriately, scream, and flinch. We need to get through them and come out, blinking, still in one piece. This comprehensive guide features: A thorough discussion on monster movies and B-movies (The Thing; It Came from Outer Space; The Blob) The destruction of the American censorship system (Blood Feast; The Night of the Living Dead; The Texas Chainsaw Massacre) International horror, zombies, horror comedies, and horror in the new millennium (Matango; Suspiria; Ghostbusters) A dissection of the critical reception of modern horror (Neon Demon; Pan’s Labyrinth; Funny Games) Stunning movie posters and film stills, plus fan-made tributes to some of the most lauded horror franchises in the world (Aliens; the Evil Dead; The Hills Have Eyes; Scream) A perfect reference and informational book for horror fans and those interested in its cultural influence worldwide, Horror Unmasked provides a general introduction to the genre, serves as a guidebook to its film highlights, and celebrates its practitioners, trends, and stories.
Author: Gregory William Mank
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 1476609551
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 406
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Book Description
They had more in common than just a scream, whether they faced Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster, the Mummy, Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde, King Kong, the Wolf Man, or any of the other legendary Hollywood monsters. Some were even monsters themselves, such as Elsa Lanchester as the Bride, and Gloria Holden as Dracula's Daughter. And while evading the Strangler of the Swamp, former Miss America Rosemary La Planche is allowed to rescue her leading man. This book provides details about the lives and careers of 21 of these cinematic leading ladies, femmes fatales, monsters, and misfits, putting into perspective their contributions to the films and folklore of Hollywood terror--and also the sexual harassment, exploitation, and genuine danger they faced on the job. Veteran actress Virginia Christine recalls Universal burying her alive in a backlot swamp in full "mummy" makeup for the resurrection scene in The Mummy's Curse--and how the studio saved that scene for the last day in case she suffocated. Filled with anecdotes and recollections, many of the entries are based on original interviews, and there are numerous old photographs and movie stills.
Author: Mark A. Nobles
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781536958263
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 60
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Book Description
Forbidden Horrors is a Southern Gothic/Fantasy set during the golden age of local television that utilizes poverty row horror and exploitation films from the 30's, 40's and 50's as life lessons for the characters in a sleepy little Texas town. "When the night falls... when the shadows become deep and black... the silent pall of evil settles on the earth. Who dares to search... who dares to see what walks in the night? If you dare...welcome to NIGHTMARE." Thus began the frightful Kronos's weekly midnight ramble inviting the brave and foolhardy for a stroll through the vaults of long forgotten and forbidden horrors classics. An introduction young Nick Root knows by heart. When Nick decides to run away from home he runs to the place he knows and loves best, the television studios of KFJZ where Nightmare is filmed. But on this night, the horror is especially gruesome and unknown, even to Kronos, for tonight the dreadfulness begins with a visit from the bowdlerizer Willimena Breen, a sharp tongued, iron fisted enforcer of the Motion Picture Production Code. The date is July 13th, a Friday, 1962 and the time is midnight and Nightmare is about to air live to less than 50,000 people in a mid sized city in America's heartland. Kronos's only purpose is to show 1934's Maniac, give the viewers a good, campy scare and go home. However, the tag line for the film, "He menaced women with his weird desires!" is enough to send Breen into a fit of self-righteous rage. Storming onto the live set Breen shrieks objections directly quoted from the MPPC. Kronos and the entire Nightmare crew stop down, frozen by the commands of the termagant. Only one can save them and let the film be screened. Edgar Ulmer, stalwart independent film maker, film historian and lone voice of reason.
Author: Bartłomiej Paszylk
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786453273
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 245
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Book Description
The horror genre harbors a number of films too bold or bizarre to succeed with mainstream audiences, but offering unique, startling and often groundbreaking qualities that have won them an enduring following. Beginning with Victor Sjostrom's The Phantom Carriage in 1921, this book tracks the evolution and influence of underground cult horror over the ensuing decades, closing with William Winckler's Frankenstein vs. the Creature from Blood Cove in 2005. It discusses the features that define a cult film, trends and recurring symbols, and changing iconography within the genre through insightful analysis of 88 movies. Included are works by popular directors who got their start with cult horror films, including Oliver Stone, David Cronenberg and Peter Jackson.
