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History
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1890s-1920s
The horror genre is nearly as old as film itself. The
first depictions of supernatural events appear in
several of the silent shorts created by film pioneers
such as Georges Méliès in the late 1890s, the most
notable being his 1896 Le Manoir du diable (aka "The
House of the Devil") which is sometimes credited as
being the first horror film.
Another of his horror
projects was 1898's La Caverne maudite (aka "The Cave of
the Demons", literally "the accursed cave"). Japan made
early forays into the horror genre with Bake Jizo and
Shinin no Sosei, both made in 1898.
In 1910, Edison
Studios produced the first film version of Frankenstein,
thought lost for many years, film collector Alois Felix
Dettlaff Sr. found a copy and had a 1993 rerelease. It
can now be viewed on youtube.
The early 20th century brought more milestones for
the horror genre including the first monster to appear
in a full-length horror film, Quasimodo, the hunchback
of Notre-Dame who had appeared in Victor Hugo's book,
"Notre-Dame de Paris" (published in 1831).
Films
featuring Quasimodo included Alice Guy's Esmeralda
(1906), The Hunchback (1909), The Love of a Hunchback
(1910) and Notre-Dame de Paris (1911).
Horror film - History - 1930s & 1940s
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