News

Horror cinema has a strange habit of resurrecting itself from time to time. The Universal monsters of the 1930s enjoyed a technicolor reincarnation in the Hammer films of the late 1950s; slasher films bled out by the mid-'80s, but Scream brought them back with a vengeance; and the walking dead just keep coming back for more. Today's zombie fans can easily see why this trope never dies with this list of terrifying 20th-century cult classics and hidden gems.

Everyone knows that George Romero is the reigning champion of zombie cinema, but the tradition he established has begotten a horde of powerful and innovative followers whose films still stand up today. This horror history lesson will show fans of modern hits like The Walking Dead and the 28 Days Later franchise that their faves come from a grand tradition that refuses to stay dead.

This Early Zombie Film Is Still...

The horror films produced by Val Lewton for Rko Studios throughout the 1940s all share DNA, though the third and fourth films in the cycle, Jacques Tournier’s I Walked with a Zombie and Mark Robson’s The Seventh Victim, seem to be especially connected. Both were released in 1943 and concern protagonists who enter hidden worlds beyond their understanding, worlds that allude to rot existing in conventional society should one care to acknowledge it. The protagonists’ growing awareness parallels our own, though in each case the viewer is left with little hope for reform or closure. They have glimpsed nightmare realms and are humbled by what they discover about their societies as well as themselves.

Notions of reform are particularly relevant to I Walked with a Zombie, which offers an unusually nuanced portrait of the legacy of colonialism. Betsy Connell (Frances Dee), a nurse from snowy Ottawa, is hired to...

Val Lewton, Russian émigré turned horror master, was a reporter, pulp novelist and MGM publicity writer before moving into film. He spent the 1930s as David O. Selznick’s story editor, directing second unit work on A Tale of Two Cities (1935) and script doctoring Gone With the Wind (1939), warning Selznick it would be “the mistake of his life.” While not Hollywood’s most prescient man, Lewton’s professionalism earned Selznick’s respect, and their collaboration led to Rko offering Lewton a producing job in 1942.

Rko was reeling from Orson Welles’ The Magnificent Ambersons, an expensive flop forcing a refocus on low budget films. Charles Koerner headed the studio’s B Unit, envisioning a horror series inspired by Universal Studio’s successful franchises. Where Universal culled from established literature (Dracula, Frankenstein), Rko worked from Koerner’s whim: he created a title and left the filmmakers to handle trivia like plot and characters.

The sickos behind the Saw franchise, Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan, are at it again in print form along with one of our favorite lunatics, Stephen Romano (Shock Festival), as this trio of terror have shined a Black Light on the horror scene.

We've been talking about their new book Black Light for a while now and just recently caught up with Romano, who had some choice words on the project ...

"Patrick and Marcus have created an amazing new horror character, and I was thrilled that they invited me to help flesh him out for the literary world," Romano tells DC exclusively. "But the new wrinkle this time is that we're not concentrating on a villain, like Jigsaw or Freddy or whatever. Our character is a pulp hero by way of Stephen King or Clive Barker. I don't think we get enough really awesome franchise heroes in the horror universe,...

Darby Jones, Bela Lugosi in Zombies on Broadway Karloff & Lugosi Horror Classics: Boris Karloff Disc Matters do not improve much over on Bela Lugosi’s disc. Horror enthusiasts will likely experience a gargantuan case of buyer’s remorse during the first scenes of You’ll Find Out (1940). What they’ll find out is that this movie is a vehicle not for Bela Lugosi, but for comedian/bandleader Kay Kyser and his Kollege of Musical Knowledge band, featuring Ginny Simms, Sully Mason and Ish Kabibble (who appears to have been the visual inspiration for Jim Carrey’s Lloyd character in Dumb and Dumber). Kyser and company’s style of comedy has, shall we say, not aged well, but this is [...]...

It’s time for out Top Ten of the week and this time we’re doing things a bit differently here at Wamg. Zombies in the movies are a much-loved genre favorite of fans, held close to their hearts since George Romero first introduced us to the concept on a whole new level back in 1968. Then again, they’ve also spawned some controversy amongst some fans as the genre has split into two basic categories recently… slow-moving zombies and fast-moving, even raging psychotic zombies. Which is right? Which is best? Well, that’s for you to decide. With that in mind, we’ve decided to compile a two-part list, laying out our five favorite slow-moving and five favorite fast-moving zombie flicks. The list also embraces the new ultra-fun zombie comedy from Ruben Fleischer that opens this Friday, October 2, 2009. In addition, its rare that a film not out in theaters yet...