A History of Horror - Frankenstein goes to Hollywood.

Over the past 3 weeks, the BBC have aired a programme titled 'A history of horror with Mark Gatiss' which includes three hour-long shows. We thought it would be silly to let a documentary like this pass us by without looking further into it, so we did just that!

Writer and actor, Mark Gatiss records his three favourite periods of horror cinema throughout the episodes and below is an account of all the most crucial and interesting parts of episode one- 'Frankenstein goes to Hollywood'

"The cinema was made for horror movies. It is a place where we come to share a collective dream, and horror films are the most dreamlike of all, perhaps because they engage with our nightmares" says Gatiss.

He believes horror cinema came into it's own during the 'Hollywood Horror' era which started with the 1925 silent horror, Phantom of the Opera, where the audience is given a taste pf one of the first great reveals. The female lead is told by the phantom to never remove his mask, yet she does. This is the idea behind the horror genre - Knowing that you shouldn't look, but you want to, and eventually do, and maybe getting more than you bargained for.

One of the early make up masters was Lon Chaney, who created a model of his own face to practice his work on. He created the phantom's horrific features in an extremely simple way. For example, he created the strung back nose look by using a wire attached to his face which pulls it back.

In 1929, the infamous Wall Street crash signalled the start of the Great Depression, and major player Universal had to scale down it's productions due to financial problems. This in turn paved the way for Brian Stoker's Dracula which was the first horror picture with sound! However, see how different it is to horror films created now- the audience do not see a drop of blood, or even a glimpse of a fang throughout the entire picture. It was suggested that Dracula was the first modern horror film, but it lacked something...

The creation of Frankenstein - Boris Karloff, a leading actor of the time, spent two weeks working with hollywood make up artist Jack Pierce, who also previously spent six months researching into potential monster ideas.

The 1931 production of Frankenstein shot the first truly controversial scene in Horror cinema. Maria, the young child who befriended the monster was killed by Frankenstein, who was shown throwing the young child into a lake. Many tried to ban the scene from being shown, and eventually it was, not to return to a production of the film for another 50 years. However, the scene reached horror cinema and audiences were inevitably shocked by the scene.  In relation to our teaser trailer, we are looking into using children to shock the audience too, so it is important to look into this historical event.

Also in 1931, Paramount's Dr Jekyl and Mr Hyde filmed the first single shot transformation on screen. The secret behind the masterpiece, which helped win the actor an oscar, was a rotating filter on the camera lens which revealed different coloured layers of make up! We are also looking into possible ways to film a realistic transformation from man into wolf, and are currently looking more into silhouettes and shadows which were also used a lot in early horror cinema.

It is also important to note director James Whale who was known to really take control of his films, something that not many directors today, do as well as he did. Whale pushed the horror genre as far as he wanted to take it and Frankenstein's Bride would be his last film.

In 1932, Tod Browning, director of Dracula, shocked audiences through his film 'Freaks' which merged fantasy and reality. His use of REAL people frightened audiences. At first, he portrayed them sympathetically, but by the end of the film they are shown crawling through the mud on all fours chasing one of the main characters.

Another memorable moment of the time was when Universal tried to secure actor Bela Lagosi at a knock down price for their production of Frankenstein's son because they found out he was having economical difficulties. However, fellow actors Karloff and Rathbone discovered this and stood up against the studio to ensure Lagosi received a fair pay. It is important to note the change in Frankenstein in this film. He is sent to kidnap a young boy by evil Igor but refuses to hurt him!

Productions of Frankenstein films were then ceased for a long time because directors and the actor, Karloff felt that the film and the role had gone as far as it could and should go without the creature becoming the front of bad scripts and jokes. Lakoff could see a downward trend and didn't want to take his friend (frankenstein) down that path.

In 1942, the film 'Cat People' brought forward the idea of being stalked. Monsters didn't have to be seen, just suggested. Val Lewton felt that a good shock or jump did not have to be caused by something explicit, or even by something intrinsically frightening. This technique of building long yet slow periods of suspense followed by a sudden, unthreatening jolt has since been named a 'Lewton bus'  

More recently, legendary director John Carpenter (who we also looked at for last years AS film opening) does not appreciate Lewton's techniques as much as many others.

"If you have a good monster, then why not show it? A jurassic park done by Lewton would be rubbish!" says Carpenter.

As horror entered the late 1940's, another controversial scene surfaced of a woman being thrown out of a window and killed. Bela Lagosi sought to re-invent Dracula as a play in England but his plan didn't succeed. 5 years later he died, and was buried in his dracula cape, symbolic of a role he could never escape.

The question was now being asked, after years of loving horror films, why were audiences now laughing at it?

By the end of the 1950's, horror cinema was dead... and turned to science fiction to ressurect itself...