From the 1960s to 2010s: What was the best decade for horror movies?
No genre of filmmaking captures the zeitgeist quite like horror. Each decade possesses distinct visual pallets, favourite subject matters, and overarching tropes. As a genre designed to elicit fear and unsettle audiences, horror explores the darkest themes of the era using any fitting device to conjure prescient thrills, whether that be monsters like Frankenstein in the age of medical development, the supernatural in times where death lingers, religious mania or apocalyptic events.
Classic horror and gothic literature, like those created by Edgar Allan Poe, H.P. Lovecraft and Mary Shelley, undoubtedly inspired horror movies, giving them the necessary imagery and tone. From its humble beginnings in the silent era to the popular high-grossing blockbusters, horror has overseen dramatic and ongoing development.
It has created many sub-genres along the way, such as body horror, comedy horror, slasher films, supernatural horror and psychological horror, among many others. The genre even triumphed against initial controversy and criticisms which claimed the genre was morally corrupt and detrimental to society.
As mentioned, its flexibility and satisfying representation of the decade it came from makes horror an ever-evolving and recircling beast. So how can we recognise a decade’s horror through its style and subject matter? What are the best horror films from each decade? Which decade is the best? We’re exploring this in our decade-by-decade breakdown below.
What was the best decade for horror?
1960s
Psychological thrillers and supernatural haunted houses characterised 1960s horror, emphasising suspense. In thrillers, the pursuit of the antagonist dictates the plot while keeping things in the dark to build tension. In supernatural epics, the source of fear would be concealed from the viewer, instead using mysterious sounds and creepy shadows to break down the character’s and audience’s psyches. Soundtracks included eerie violins and classical music to convey the tones.
Furthermore, societal development and issues were reflected in the rapid changes in horror, such as the Civil Rights struggle, women’s rights and artistic censorship. Horror’s visuals comprised starkly shaded black-and-white, following in the footsteps of film noir.
The best contributions to this decade employ all these traits, eventually becoming some of the genre’s most iconic features. Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho and Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom are quintessential psychological thrillers. Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby comments on female liberation through some tight suspense. George A. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead is a social critique in a black-and-white vérité style, and Robert Wise’s adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House uses its ghoulish atmosphere to terrify the audience into sleeping with the lights on without showing too much.
1970s
1970s horror doesn’t stray too far from its predecessor, as there is still that dependency on building suspense and tension to elicit emotional responses. with outbursts of colour and a new vibrancy. Also, with the societal discourse being dominated by religious conservativism and liberation, faith was a dominant feature.
Filmmakers utilised every opportunity to present forbidden imagery of witches, demons, and naked, moonlit rituals in their visuals. Tension, suspense and atmosphere still took centre stage in generation fear. However, the ’70s allowed horror to loosen the reigns and dip into gruesome gore, pushing back at stuffy censors with a bit of gratuity, but not too much to be slapped with a ban.
The decade saw some of horror’s best films come to fruition, representing a distinct style and ideology. The Exorcist, directed by William Peter Blatty, is a terrifying exploration of religion where the atmosphere is everything. Richard Donner’s The Omen is another supernatural possession story where suspense and gore harmonise. John Carpenter’s Halloween and Tobe Hopper’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre proved that a serial killer could terrify audiences through tension instead of blood. Not forgetting Alien, directed by Ridley Scott, which also brought brooding tension punctured by explosiveness to the sci-fi horror in a shocking chest-bursting fashion.
1980s
Here’s where the real changes began. The 1980s neglected the ’60s and ’70s preference for building tension. They chose to expose everything instead. The days when much of the horror happened out of shot were over. Now, audiences screamed at buckets of gore, over-eccentric villains and cheesy yet disturbing events. These were the new staples of ’80s horror.
Violins were replaced by punk rock and metal soundtracks. Horror was now a circus, a party even. These traits came from a progression in practical and visual effects, with body parts torn off using prosthetics. This resulted in an uprise of the slasher and body horror sub-genre. This decade is also distinguished by its bright signature colours, as the boldest shades of red and black accentuated the gore with excessive visuals. The ’80s emphasised “style over substance” as thematic insights were hidden behind vibrant visuals in a similar sense to the music of the era.
Some of the best ’80s horror movies are Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead and Andrzej Żuławski’s Possession, both spectacles of overwhelming gore. John Carpenter revolutionised body horror in the cult classic The Thing. Sexually liberated teens were punished by Jason in the first few Friday the 13th films. Wes Craven earned his horror master status through the surreal Nightmare on Elm Street, with one of horror’s most unique villains. However, Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining is an anomaly as it emphasises atmosphere over gore and manages to stand out spectacularly.
1990s
The 1990s locked the 1980s’ over-the-top monster designs and body mutations in a vault and took inspiration from real-life serial killers instead. This decade also analysed the human psyche in thrillers, a callback to the ’60s. Filmmakers wrote characters suffering from mental breakdowns or character studies of psychopaths – something a little more serious compared to ’80s camp.
There was also the increasing relevancy of technology, which society perceived as both a positive and a negative. These horror films communicated the changes through their presentation of a gritty and realistic style. Vibrancy and excessiveness were no more. Horror looked too real, presented through the found-footage style and toned-down visuals. It mirrored the uprise of grunge culture, emphasising authenticity rather than celebrating the glam metal of the ’80s.
Final girls ran from killers in denim jackets after a grunge party in Craven’s meta-horror flick Scream. The Blair Witch Project, one of the first found footage films directed by Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez, changed the genre through its chilling style. Hideo Nakata did something new by making technology the villain in Ringu, blending it with the supernatural as a commentary on contemporary society. Silence of the Lambs, directed by Jonathan Demme, gave us horror’s most psychologically unsettling serial killers, and Adrian Lyne’s Jacob’s Ladder was a gritty portrayal of the psychological effects of war.
2000s
The new millennium brought many developments and changes, especially in horror. 2000s horror was either gory torture porn, regular gore, or supernatural, resulting from society’s increasing exposure to graphic imagery and an evergrowing concern with what there already was. Audiences were becoming desensitised to violence, leading to a decline in horror filmmaking. The terror had to be more upfront, more culturally based.
CGI was progressing, and filmmakers could now create any image they wanted from scratch. The 2000s also saw a niche yet powerful trope of sad supernatural stories, where ghosts were metaphors for grief and other turmoils. Stylistically, this decade’s horror was trend-based, with girls in skimpy outfits and frosted tips.
The apexes of gory torture porn were two horror series. The first was Leigh Whannell’s Saw, with its philosophical elements in its brutal traps. In addition to Saw, Eli Roth’s Hostel, a disturbing landscape of actual torture, churned stomachs and redefined the genre. Jeff Reddick produced iconic and innovative carnage in the Final Destination franchise, where human mortality was the enemy. Variety came in the form of emotional ghost stories, including Alejandro Amenábar Gothic film The Others and Guillermo del Toro’s The Devils Backbone, where a civil war was the backdrop.
2010s
The 2010s horror met with a blend of criticism and praise. It saw a rehash of classic horror through remakes and pointless origin stories, implying a lack of originality. In addition, an updated generation of horror masters created derivative supernatural films. Most of these came in franchises that gained momentum in this decade, moving horror to a more business-oriented realm.
The 2010s saw an overuse of platitudes, such as a dependency on jumpscares and hollow characters. Overall, this decade’s horror is characterised more by reimagined, overused content rather than a unique style. However, the latter half of the 2010s saw sparks of creativity and progression, with sociopolitical horrors becoming the next big trend as fatigue with the status quo set in.
Horror master James Wan created both the Insidious and The Conjuring franchises, with the latter dominating the horror industry. The several remakes included Evil Dead in 2013 and Poltergeist in 2014. Julien Maury and Alexandre Bustillo gave the origin story Leatherface to further tamper with the Texas Chainsaw Massacre timeline. There were also several weak and forgotten supernatural attempts, such as Jeff Wadlow’s Truth or Dare, Kevin Greutert’s Jessabelle and Stiles White’s Ouija. However, Jordan Peele’s racial commentary thriller Get Out was a beacon of hope for horror filmmaking.
So, what was the best decade for horror movies?
To conclude, horror developments over these six decades are remarkable, managing to categorise and define each era effortlessly. In marking out the best, the 2000s and 2010s don’t put up much of a fight.
The preceding decades in horror are too strong. The 1960s and ’70s were the scariest due to their slow-burning tension. They respected and celebrated the origins of horror stories the most. However, that slow burn factor doesn’t equate to the same thrilling entertainment that the 1980s provided. The ’80s horror masterpieces are the most eventful, artistic, and iconic – truly the greatest decade in the history of horror cinema.
