2. Founded 1934
The Curse of Frankenstein (1957)
The Abominable Snowman (1957), Dracula
(1958), The Mummy (1959), The Curse of the
Werewolf (1961)
To the Devil… A Daughter (1976)
3. CoF = Very Important
Colour, not black-and-white
Focus on victim, not creature
Frankenstein on quest for knowledge, not a
criminal
Success led to more different films
Hammer Film Productions was founded in 1934. Their first film was The Public Life of Henry the Ninth (1935).After a pause in production during World War II, Hammer’s first horror film was The QuartermassXperiment (1955), and their first colour horror was The Curse of Frankenstein (1957). The success of these films (and others) firmly cemented Hammer’s reputation as ‘Hammer House of Horror’.Hammer then went on to produce many other iconic horror classics based on earlier material, such as The Abominable Snowman (1957), Dracula (1958), The Mummy (1959) and The Curse of the Werewolf (1961). They were adapted from a BBC Documentary, the novel of the same name, some earlier Universal Studios Mummy films, and the novel The Werewolf in Paris respectively.The last Horror from Hammer was To the Devil… A Daughter in 1976, before they halted production of horror films. The reasons behind this were that Horror films were going out of fashion, and the introduction of colour television meant that less people were going to the cinema to watch films.
The Curse of Frankenstein is considered to be one of the most important horror films of all time. It paved the way for a plethora of Gothic horrors from Hammer as well as other film companies.Some of the reasons why the film was so popular in comparison to Universal’s Frankenstein (1931) and is considered so important today are as follows:The film was in colour, rather than black-and-white. Until around 1932, colour films were a rarity and Technicolor technology was exclusive to those companies that could afford it. After ‘32, it was still uncommon, but was beginning to find its way into the film world. By ’57 a lot more films were made in colour, so most would expect a highly popular film to be filmed in this way.The main plot focus was on Baron Victor Frankenstein, rather than the monster. This differed a lot not just from the Universal film, but also the original novel. During the production, the makers didn’t want Universal to sue them for using content that was very similar to their film, so they made a lot of changes to the script. This not only set the film out as new and unique, but it allowed filmmakers to stretch the borders, to think of stories from a different perspective.Victor Frankenstein was assisted by on a quest for knowledge, rather than criminals. Instead of grave robbing, they were genuine scientists. This was an example of merging two characters together to change the script (Frankenstein and Fritz from the 1931 version), but it also put a new light on the Doctor. Instead of him being an evil, mad scientist, he was a reasonably normal person that the audience would feel for.Because of these 3 important changes, audiences everywhere wanted to see what else Hammer could do, so they went on making many other Gothic adaptations of novels and Universal films, as well as a few original horrors.
As previously mentioned, the success of CoF came from the differences in Universal’s take on the film. But this can be applied to many other Hammer films (Dracula and The Mummy for example). So form this we can form a cycle of what happened for Hammer to have made so many successful films.This wheel can also be applied to the novels and other texts that Hammer adapted, from CoF right up until To the Devil… A Daughter.
After 34 years of dormancy, Hammer came back to horror films in 2010 with Let Me In. Not only did Hammer return to horror, but they also returned to Gothic horror with The Woman in Black in 2012. It’s worth noting that these two films are both based on novels, so it’s safe to say that Hammer are back to bring us more literary adaptations, but not so many Universal remakes?
