Cinesthasia

So a while back a friend i was borrowing DVDs from asked what horror he might need to have a somewhat complete collection. I told him I’d pen him a list sooner or later. Only just now remembering this. And, yeah, two disclaimers before I even start here: 1) I’m surely forgetting as many as I’m remembering, and 2) my tastes of course kind of dictate what I remember, what I don’t. And I love slashers. Too, I started out trying to have just ten movies per decade, but, really, any deeper than 1970 and my record gets more than spotty (again, taste: Nosferatu and The Golem and Caligari and White Zombie and all those were neat and important and pretty much shaped everything to come, but still, I’d rather watch all the stuff they influenced). So I lumped the fifties and sixties together, still barely made ten there. But then the seventies and eighties, I was having to leave so much out. Anyway, no, I haven’t checked all these dates. Just kind of dartboarding them where looks good. And yeah, I’d guess I’ll go back in, edit this a bit. But of course post any obvious misses as comments; I’ll try to float them up into the main thing. And, yeah, I could make this complete just by cracking DEMON THEORY open, but I’m trying hard not to even look at it until it’s real–until it shows up leaning against my storm door. Anyway, what I came up with during what few commercials THE COLBERT REPORT had:

1950s – 1960s

• Night of the Hunter
• House on Haunted Hill
• Haunting of Hill House
• Psycho
• Peeping Tom
• Carnival of Souls
• Rosemary’s Baby
• Night of the Living Dead
• Bloodfeast
• Cape Fear
• [ I’m sure I’m missing some vital giallo here. Bird with the Crystal Plumage or something ]

1970s

• Bay of Blood
• Last House on the Left
• Silent Night, Bloody Night
• Frightmare
• Black Christmas
• Texas Chainsaw Massacre
• Exorcist
• Jaws
• The Sentinel
• The Omen
• Carrie
• Suspiria
• The Hills Have Eyes
• The Shining
• Halloween
• Alien
• When a Stranger Calls

1980s

• Friday the 13th
• Maniac
• The Burning
• Near Dark
• Tenebrae
• Just Before Dawn
• Night School
• American Werewolf in London
• The Hitcher
• Poltergeist
• The Thing
• New York Ripper
• Valentine’s Day
• Driller Killer
• The Howling
• Sleepaway Camp
• Nightmare on Elm Street
• The Terminator
• Return to Horror High
• [ maybe Slaughter High, though then you have to include all the sorority-stuff, and pretty soon you’re just including everything… ]
• and, reluctantly, under some sense of compulsion, Child’s Play

1990s

• Silence of the Lambs
• Interview with the Vampire
• Misery (this was the nineties, yes?)
• Prophecy
• The Lord of Illusions
• Candyman
• Pet Semetery
• Misery
• Exorcist III
• Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (?)
• The Crow (not sure I’d count this as straight horror, though; or, if this counts, then let’s pull The Relic in as well, and Mimic)
• Event Horizon
• Scream
• I Know What You Did Last Summer
• The Sixth Sense
• The Blair Witch Project
• [ Stigmata, Lost Souls–were these 99 too? ]

As for the 2000s, they’re not all that done yet, I guess. The easy answer. I am looking forward to Pulse and Stay Alive and the next two Nightwatch installments, though, and have liked where we’ve been since 2000. A lot. A rush of horror, from White Noise to Deadbirds to Hostel to Wolf Creek to Cherry Falls (was that really post-2000?) to Tamara. Good times.