(no subject)

[darchildre]

This morning, I have reached a section in my WWI horror books that talks about the beginnings of American horror film and its influences and how they're necessarily different than European horror film of the same period. Cool and good.

So I started thinking about how weird it is that so many early American-made horror films are set in Europe. A lot of this is because many early horror films are based on existing works - Frankenstein, Dracula, Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde - which are set in Europe, and probably some of it is also due to the fact that horror feels safer if it feels like something that happened far away. And also, yes, the war and all.

But I wanted to figure out what the first American-made horror film actually set in the States was and guys, that is frustratingly hard to google. I think it was Dr X* from 1932 but I am in no way certain. Anyone got a suggestion for an earlier film?





*It is, of course, a Warner Bros film. Of course it would be.

Comments

[frenchroast]

What's interesting (and you might already know this) is that other countries do this, too. In French fantastic horror lit, stories are often set in Italy and Spain, because they're spookier/more mysterious.