The horror genre emerged in the late 19th century with the earliest silent horror films being created in the 1890s. The 1930s marked the start of horror films becoming a popular genre, adapting many classic horror tales. In the 1950s, the genre shifted towards more science fiction-based horrors as technology advanced. The 1970s and 80s saw the rise of slasher films like Halloween and Friday the 13th. By the 1990s, slasher films began facing reduced success and the genre moved towards psychological horrors and stories focused on children. Into the 21st century, the horror genre has branched out into various subgenres while continuing to produce very scary films with modern special effects.

1. History of the Horror Genre
Cameron Scrimgeour

2. Emergence of horror films
The first silent horror films were created around 1890, more specifically, what is considered to be the first
horror film The Haunted Castle, was made in 1896 and started the horror genre that we know today.
Following this came many the depiction of many famous horror monsters
we know today. Monsters such as Frankenstein, in 1910, and Quasimodo,
who featured in a number of films in the early 20th century.
The 1930s marked the start of
horror films as a popular genre.
Many more classic horror tales were
recreated in film. Most notable of
these was possibly the most famous
depiction of Frankenstein – The
Bride of Frankenstein (1935)

3. 1950s Horror
1950 marked a change in horror, as technology
advanced, we saw a move away from more gothic
and traditional horrors to predominantly science
fiction based horror. The most famous being Godzilla
in 1954.
In the 50s, we saw the first ‘slasher’ film – Peeping
Tom (1960). Shortly followed by the classic Psycho
(1960).

4. 70s and 80s
A rise in slasher films started in the late 70s
and really ignited the sub genre. Halloween
(1978) and Friday the 13th (1980) are the most
distinguished of this era, especially Friday the
13th , which has had many sequels and remakes
since its release.
In an era when younger people were spending
their summer in log cabins, isolated from cities,
the idea of a killer hunting for reckless
teenagers became very real and pushed the
slasher film to success.

5. 1990s
This was a time of varying success for the slasher film. Although there
was releases of sequels for films such as Childs Play and A Nightmare
On Elm Street. People were getting bored of constant slasher films
being released.
This reduction in slasher films pushed the genre more towards
psychological horrors and with the ideology of children coming into the
genre, we also saw more child based horrors emerge.

6. 2000 onwards
Coming into the 21st century, we saw that the
horror genre branched out more into a
mixture of sub genres. We saw the
appearance of some more comedy or spoof
based horrors. Despite this, the horror genre
continued to create very scary films, with the
assistance of modern special effects. Some of
the most popular films of this period include
The Ring (2002), Saw (2004) and coming into
more recent years, Insidious (2011) and The
Cabin In the Woods (2012), which marked a
return for slashers.