Get your fright on with classic horror films
Classic horror movies come in all shapes and sizes. But one thing they have in common — other than ruthless killing — is that they inspire countless sequels and spinoffs. Just in time for Halloween, here’s a look at the films that have basically written t
PSYCHO (1960)
Alfred Hitchcock was having difficulty getting his way with the big studios of the time. So he ignored them for this project loosely based on a real-life serial killer case. He hired a modest TV crew and shot the film on a discount budget. He also broke a lot of rules, killing off star Janet Leigh early and aiming the picture squarely at the burgeoning youth market. Despite mixed reviews, the cinematic exercise in shock scored at the box office, introducing the slasher flick concept and making it hard for folks everywhere to take showers. Followups: Psycho (1998), TV’s Bates Motel (2013-present).
NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (1968)
There are zombie apocalypses and there is this spooky George A. Romero yarn about living dead monsters. The ghouls in question feed on folks who should know better than to pay their respects at a grave in the Pennsylvania countryside. Followups: There are too many spinoffs, sequels, homages — and bodies — to count!
THE EXORCIST (1973)
There had been possession pictures before director William Friedkin showed up to reimagine Peter Blatty’s bestselling novel. But Friedkin’s quasi-documentary approach made the images of evil overwhelmingly unnerving for Catholics and non-Catholics alike. The scariest aspect of it just might be that the director claimed he reimagined everything he could verify from an actual exorcism. Followups: Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Exorcist III (1990), Exorcist: The Beginning (2004) and Dominion: Prequel to the Exorcist (2005), TV’s The Exorcist (2016).
THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (1974)
Tobe Hooper has always been under-estimated as a filmmaker of the freaky. After Massacre, he went on to direct Poltergeist for Steven Spielberg. Acclaimed director Ridley Scott has said Alien was influenced by Massacre more than any other sub-genre picture. Indeed, master craftsman Hooper managed a frighteningly edgy mash-up of cannibals, power tools and teenagers dropping by a farmhouse. Followups: Four sequels, a prequel, a 3D version and the upcoming Leatherface.
HALLOWEEN (1978)
Former USC film student John Carpenter had made a few acclaimed shorts, directed a mainstream action flick and had sold a few screenplays. But he was impatient with Hollywood’s rules. What better way to be independent than shoot a cheapie thriller? That’s exactly what he did with this gritty study of a mental patient with a murderous history who escapes and runs amok. It’s not happenstance that Janet Leigh’s daughter Jamie Lee Curtis was the killer’s target. Followups: There are eight Halloween films, plus two series reboots (2007’s Halloween and 2009’s Halloween II).
THE EVIL DEAD (1981)
Before the Spider-Man movies, Sam Raimi made his name with a buckets-of-blood approach to freaking us out. It all started with an isolated cabin and over confident young people who seem to be really asking for some unfortunate demonic events. Raimi’s uncanny ability to present headturning splatter and headliner Bruce Campbell’s charmingly wimpish approach to the carnage around him combined for maniac magic. Followups: The Evil Dead II (1987), Army of Darkness (1992), reboot Evil Dead (2013).
SCREAM (1996)
Former professor Wes Craven knew how to manipulate exemplified by the trip-like terror techniques in A Nightmare on Elm Street. He stepped up his game with this unsettling blend of horror and lampoon. Craven even hired Drew Barrymore as one of the high-profile leads and then killed her off early. In fact, the first 20 minutes of the Barrymore death march are some of the most terrifying moments ever filmed. Followups: Scream 2 (1997), Scream 3 (2000), Scream 4 (2011).
THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT (1999)
Directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez agreed documentaries about paranormal activities tended to be scarier than movies reinventing the incidents. Their found footage conceit was refined from that belief. In a mostly improvised story, we relive the desperate panic of three film students who vanished in a Maryland forest as they tried to film a documentary on the local Blair Witch legend. Followups: Paranormal Activity rode the found-footage wave and there are now six films (20072015), Quarantine (2008), The Visit (2015), The Blair Witch (2016).
SAW (2004)
It’s the birth of torture porn. James Wan appreciated Wes Craven’s notion that horror fans had to understand the storyteller would push past the uneasy edge. Wan also knew it was getting more difficult to scare young people. So this nightmarish concept of a forced fight-to-thedeath confrontation would lead to look-away acts of cruel and unusual punishment new to the big screen. Followups: Seven sequels so far, with an eighth, Saw: Legacy, slated for next Halloween. And perhaps even more to come after that.