The State of Horror

[che2000]

What's everyone's opinion of the state of horror these days?

It seems to me that, as a literary genre, horror has virtually vanished (certainly in terms of the major publishers, although there are many fine independent publishers out there flying the flag) and that, in cinematic terms, the endless round of remakes/re-imaginings is dragging the horror movie to a slow and agonizing death (after all there are only so many remakes that can be done).

Grim times, I reckon. What do you think?

[carolinec]

On this subject, I remember my shock a few years ago when I saw the state of the horror shelves in major bookstores - basically nothing on them except King, Herbert and Hutson. Back when I was a youngster, I remember going into my local WH Smiths (there weren't many places to buy books in my home town - Smiths and Woolies were the only ones) and having a huge choice of horror anthologies in particular - the Pans, the Fontanas, collections of old horror and supernatural "classics", etc. Those were the days! But, nowadays, the major book chains have all but killed off horror as a literary genre.

The small presses, however, have kept it alive. And, in a strange way, I think that's probably a good thing. The kind of works that get published in the small presses are often the kinds which wouldn't stand a chance with mainstream publishers as they're simply not "marketable" enough.

So, whilst I do mourn the days of my youth when I could pop into Smiths or Woolies and pick up something superb at almost any time, I still enjoy trawling the internet for some fantastic small press offerings. I don't think horror's dead, it's just gone a little quiet!

As for film, yes, I agree, the endless attempts to do remakes (which are invariably far worse than the original), and the prominence of formulaic (spelling? ) "stalk and slash" type films nowadays is annoying. Occasionally, something which breaks the mould comes along - I'm thinking films like "The Last Broadcast" (which pre-dated "The Blair Witch Project" but was similar but without the hype), the old-fashioned style supernatural film "The Others", and the amazing "Donnie Darko" (love that film) - these have all been worthwhile for me. There might have been other more recent ones worth watching - I don't watch new films all that often. Give me a Boris Karloff or Bela Lugosi film from the 30s/40s/50s, or a Hammer Horror or Amicus portmanteau film any day!