Gothic Horror

I recently watched Sleepy Hollow, one of several movies I've watched over the past week. I seem to be on a bit of a movie marathon of late. I don't like horror movies as a rule, it's not that I'm scared to watch them, I've watched plenty of them in my time, I simply don't find them to be entertaining. Except for gothic horror. I love gothic horror... wait make that I love GOOD gothic horror, because bad gothic horror is just awful.

So what makes good gothic horror? For one, things should never look quite right, even in daylight (and there should be precious little of that), the shadows cast by it should look slightly off. At night mist is pooled about on the ground, buildings should have sharp angles in their construction, and even though the film is in colour, the world should be bleak with an abundance of black, white and grey. It should not be without colour though, some set pieces should a riot of colour, if only to make the dreariness of the rest of the film that much darker by comparison... and the blood should be a vivid shade of red!

I'm not a fan of black and white movies at all, so while there are plenty of gothic horror movies that are shot in that style, I'm not that fond of them. Also a lot of them, while greatly hyped as being masterpieces, really don't stand up that well to repeat viewing. Examples include the original Frankenstein and Dracula movies. I think part of it is that the world isn't black and white, and so I have a hard time watching such films because they are not remotely believeable, they don't draw me in.

Similarly a lot of the early colour gothic horror movies are pretty bad, especially the majority of Hammer Horror movies, though credit goes to Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing, the main stars of the studio, who while often starring in dubiously plotted movies, were never less than entertaining, and often superb in them.

Modern gothic horror is really quite sparse, with very few films made in that style these days, and even fewer good ones. Recent films that I have seen and liked though include: Sleepy Hollow, Interview with the Vampire, From Hell, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and for examples set in the present day see Dog Soldiers, The Howling and An American Werewolf In London. For less serious examples of the genre, that incorporate some aspects but also pander to the blockbuster audiences, see The Mummy, The Mummy Returns and Van Helsing.

Part of the reason for the lack of these movies today is that while they look great, they rarely bring in the big bucks at the Box Office, and Hollywood is all about the money. For a slightly different take on gothic horror see the animated films The Nightmare Before Christmas and The Corpse Bride, both by Tim Burton (who I would love to see do a version of Dracula, Jekyll & Hyde or one of the other classics on the genre, the Invisible Man perhaps).