Why is the horror genre so popular on Blu-ray?

[parklife]

Today I watched two documentaries about VHS collecting – Rewind This! and Adjust Your Tracking – and it got me thinking about the apparent popularity of horror and/or exploitation fare on home video. In both documentaries, most VHS collectors seemed primarily interested in horror films (especially low-budget ones) and it seems like a lot of Blu-ray collectors go after similar stuff. Looking through the "Post Pictures of Your Blu-Ray Collection" thread, I see huge fans of Scream Factory and releases like the Friday the 13th box set prominently displayed on shelves. Independent studios and distributors like Code Red, Synapse, Blue Underground, etc. seem to put out a ton of "trashy" horror titles to a very welcoming audience.

It's interesting to me because VHS and Blu-ray are completely different formats that provide completely different movie-watching experiences, yet horror films seem to be popular on both. Did collectors who bought these kinds of films on VHS just move onto the next format, continuing to buy the same kinds of films?

My two main questions are: why are these kinds of films released in such a seemingly high volume, and why do they have such a devoted "cult" following?

Some more questions for members who collect horror on Blu-ray:
- How much of your collection is made up of such films?
- Did you start collecting the genre on Blu-ray or on a previous format?
- How does the feeling of watching a "sleazy" horror flick on Blu-ray differ from watching one on another format? Personally, I think the technical superiority of Blu-ray legitimizes works that I would otherwise dismiss as "trashy." VHS kind of has the opposite effect for me, and cheapens the look and feel of pretty much everything. However, a VHS collector in Adjust Your Tracking insisted that the clarity of Blu-ray ruins effects that aren't as clearly visible on VHS.
- Does Blu-ray provide the optimal viewing experience for these kinds of films? The VHS collectors in the two documentaries seem to favour the technical crudeness of tapes and VHS transfers over proper aspect ratios, bonus features, or increased resolution.
- How does the artwork for horror films compare between Blu-ray and previous formats? Do you ever buy BD releases because of the cover? The collectors in the docs praise VHS artwork and say that it was often the main reason they bought certain films (they also admitted that the cover often generated high expectations of quality or intensity that the film itself did not live up to).
- Does rarity/limited availability affect your purchase habits? A lot of these horror titles seem to have short production runs and occasionally a high price tag.
- Does it matter to you whether these titles are new or used? Referring to the VHS collectors once again, they seem to love the "history" of their tapes (visibly indicated by wear at certain points in the film, edits that reveal content taped over other content, etc.).

Obviously there would be far different answers if I asked the members of a VHS forum, but I'm really interested to read your thoughts!

[MifuneFan]

Originally Posted by parklife

It's interesting to me because VHS and Blu-ray are completely different formats that provide completely different movie-watching experiences, yet horror films seem to be popular on both.

Not really. They're both simply the formats of their time that allow you to watch the movies you love. If you it loved horror during VHS days you're still going to love it on BD, and 4K, and holograms

[Rich65]

I agree with the above statement, I have collected more films not just horror films on Blu-ray than other formats because I am able to afford it now than when I was younger. I love the horror genre in general, I have a few what could be called "sleazy" horror films but I lean toward the more traditional horror films Universal Monsters, Hammer Horror etc. About 100 of the films in my library are horror. I'll take the original Psycho and Cape Fear over most slasher films any day, but I don't mind the occasional cheesy horror movie. If I was that picky I sure as heck wouldn't have Monster Dog in my collection . Limited availability doesn't affect my decision, for example Grizzly had a print run of 3000 units. I bought it because I like the movie, if I didn't I wouldn't care how few copies there were. I think most people who had or have horror movies on vhs and dvd enjoy watching these films in the best possible format. I know my favorites I upgraded as they came out.

[Clark Kent]

Demographics of the Blu-ray owner base perfectly align with the demographics of horror collectors. It's that simple.

[cakefactory]

Fans of other genres are more likely to find the films they want to see in a library, too.

[Opips3]

Yes!! Advanced HD horror movies show real blood glory!!

I stuck, expensive The Blob (1988) is limited stocks.

[buck135]

I started collecting films on VHS in the late eighties. Horror has always been a favorite of mine especially growing up un the eighties. Seeing print ads for films such as Fright Night and the Friday the 13th films peaked my interest more and more. Trailers would warn children under the age of seventeen that they were too young to handle this spectacle! Edited broadcast versions of Halloween and the sequel on a hand held black and white TV was of more interest to me than going trick or treating. Once I saw Freddy, I was hooked and never looked back. I like many on here want the very best version possible of these films. Night of the Living Dead '68 and '90 as well as Halloween (1978) are examples of horror films that have received polarizing opinions on what their current blu-ray's should look like. Of the 600+ films I own, approximately 150 are horror films.

[Val Lewton]

Originally Posted by parklife

Some more questions for members who collect horror on Blu-ray:
- How much of your collection is made up of such films?
- Did you start collecting the genre on Blu-ray or on a previous format?
- How does the feeling of watching a "sleazy" horror flick on Blu-ray differ from watching one on another format? Personally, I think the technical superiority of Blu-ray legitimizes works that I would otherwise dismiss as "trashy." VHS kind of has the opposite effect for me, and cheapens the look and feel of pretty much everything. However, a VHS collector in Adjust Your Tracking insisted that the clarity of Blu-ray ruins effects that aren't as clearly visible on VHS.
- Does Blu-ray provide the optimal viewing experience for these kinds of films? The VHS collectors in the two documentaries seem to favour the technical crudeness of tapes and VHS transfers over proper aspect ratios, bonus features, or increased resolution.
- How does the artwork for horror films compare between Blu-ray and previous formats? Do you ever buy BD releases because of the cover? The collectors in the docs praise VHS artwork and say that it was often the main reason they bought certain films (they also admitted that the cover often generated high expectations of quality or intensity that the film itself did not live up to).
- Does rarity/limited availability affect your purchase habits? A lot of these horror titles seem to have short production runs and occasionally a high price tag.
- Does it matter to you whether these titles are new or used? Referring to the VHS collectors once again, they seem to love the "history" of their tapes (visibly indicated by wear at certain points in the film, edits that reveal content taped over other content, etc.).

- Almost all of my collection is made up of these movies.

- I started collecting back in the VHS days.

- There is no doubt, the best way to watch these movies are on blu-ray.

- The people that claim they prefer the look of VHS are lying to themselves. While it is awesome to build a virtual horror library for dirt cheap, and there is a thrill to finding extremely rare VHS movies in thrift shops and yard sales, in the end it's about the excitement over building a collection. I used to have shelves and shelves of amazingly rare VHS horror/exploitation. But it certainly wasn't because I preferred the quality, it was because I was finding amazing stuff for $1 or under. As those rarities made their way on to DVD and blu-ray, I happily got rid of the VHS (with a few exceptions).

- I never buy a blu-ray because of the artwork, but I'm glad so many companies have been using original artwork on the front or offer it on the reverse. When I was buying VHS, I would always buy a $1 movie if it had cool artwork. Even if the movie was shit, it looked cool in my collection.

- When I buy used, I literally couldn't care less about the history or who owned it prior.

I've seen those documentaries, and while I marvel at some of those collections, the idea of preferring the format is a tad ridiculous to me. But who am I to judge? We're all into different things.

[happydood]

Originally Posted by cakefactory

Fans of other genres are more likely to find the films they want to see in a library, too.

This, and... While Horror/Exploitation/and otherwise fun but trashy movies have been widely available in every home video incarnation, we may not have always had access to them. I remember looking longingly at VHS covers my folks would NEVER let me rent when I was younger so they became forbidden fruit.

Alas, when I finally saw some of the more lurid ones, 'fruit' isn't the type of organic matter I'd call a lot of them. Still, you gotta chase the dragon! So I made up for it with a vengeance and found a way to rent or buy a lot of titles I was denied earlier and for every 10 garbage movies, I'd get to see The Thing- uncut!- which I'd only ever gotten to see in the butchered television version. There are Classics with a capital C in the genre that were labeled too violent, too gross, or too trashy when they were first released. But I kind of feel like horror movies also tend to be the place where social and political issues that hit us on the deepest of psychological and spiritual levels get worked out. Hence so many that are direct responses to major wars, major awakenings of sexual awareness, major financial catastrophes.

In short, while Horror is by no means the only genre I love or the only genre that says something about existence, it's usually the genre that gets there first.

[EvilResident]

I'm 31 and I started collecting a lot of horror on VHS when I was in highschool. I used to love the hunt for things I'd never seen before. As it stands now, I'd like to see movies the way they were originally shown, but I'm not nearly as picky as a lot of other people. The movie itself is ultimately the most important things, though I really am into extras too.

Take a look at my collection... The vast majority of it is horror.

[MechaGodzilla]

Horror is a popular genre and it would seem its fans are generally more likely to be collectors than fans of many other genres.

As for me, I enjoy horror and a sizable part (7% according to this site) of my collection is horror. I don't focus on it though, I don't really see myself as having a "favorite genre" as such and buy movies that interest me/that I enjoy, whatever genre(s) they're considered to belong to.

I started collecting movies (horror and otherwise) on DVD, now I've mostly moved on to BD but still rely on DVD for titles only available on that format. I prefer good PQ/AQ for horror as any other genre, and after seeing how good movies like The Exorcist, Halloween, Alien, The Hunger, In the Mouth of Madness and others look on the format I couldn't imagine watching them on VHS.

[Bigwayne]

I actually watched a documentary last night "Why Horror" it pretty much discusses people like horror, and how it has become so popular. I think as far as owning a lot of these movies on Blu, it kinda goes back to those VHS days when you would rent/buy a movie for the artwork/print ad etc, except with Blu and can see these movies with much better detail, and sound quality. Some of these movies also spark up nostalgia. I love the horror genre and have since the 80's.

Here are just my Horror Blu's (yes they have their own separate shelf)

[Wernski]

Yeah, this topic has been on my mind, too. I'm a big horror fan, so it works for me. I had Blood Rage (Nightmare At Shadow Woods as I knew it) taped off of cable since I was a kid, and I would've thought me and maybe five people in the world was interested in this film when all of a sudden Arrow released a 3-disc 4k restoration on DVD and blu. So the horror fan in me is happily reaping the benefits.

But it's also frustrating and strange to me that much bigger and even flat-out better films of other genres (i.e. drama and comedy) generate so much less interest. You can only get anamorphic transfers of many of Woody Allen's films through imports, and when a label like Twilight Time does make a limited run of one of his titles, you know it's tiny count of 3000 is in no danger of selling out for years. I've been trying to find Szabo's Hanussen (it was nominated for an academy award!), but it's never been released in English in any country on DVD, let alone blu-ray. Meanwhile, Scream Factory is re-releasing John Carpenter films that already have in-print US blu-ray releases and fans are flocking to them.

It's like horror film fans are the only film fans that've stuck around. That parts awesome, but where's everybody else?

Personally, I think the technical superiority of Blu-ray legitimizes works that I would otherwise dismiss as "trashy."

I think this is definitely true. Everyone pretty much knows Lawrence of Arabia is well shot, but horror films, especially ones like 80s slasher films, were always so dismissed and derided, that it's actually kind of a revelation to see them presented in high quality, in their original aspect ratio, etc. I mean, some still look pretty amateurish; but in a lot of them you really see they were actually crafted by someone who put a lot of time and care into the framing, lighting, etc.

I lived through that period when "slasher film" was a term of pure disdain. People vilified them largely without seeing them, and if they did it was junk quality video transfers that had been cut and possibly re-scored by distributors. That's why it blew people's minds when you could find someone like Kevin Bacon, a good respected actor, had an early role in F13. Because it was just taken for granted that everybody in those films were garbage who couldn't act and didn't care to learn. Reviewers would just say things like, "acting is what you'd expect for one of these films." And it wouldn't matter if the acting really was terrible, or really subtle and effective. It was all confirmation bias, and now seeing the films how they were meant to seen, finding out there's more to most of them. And even the flawed or terrible ones probably showed at least some struggling filmmakers trying and injecting some care into the production.

[Spencer_Kain92]

I would definitely say Horror is my favorite genre and I find myself buying and blind buying Horror titles more often than any other genre.

[Kriztoffer Swank]

For whatever reason, horror films offer up greater rewatchability than most other movies, same goes for quality B-movies like Big Trouble in Little China and Repo Man. Even the kind of not-so-good ones often have a certain fun quality to them; horror/exploitation movies are like rollercoasters. I mean, sure, I could watch a really good movie but would almost rather revisit an absurd slasher like Madman, and stuff like this is good for when you're having buddies over.

It's also fun to collect. Eventually I'd like to have a HUGE slasher collection, even holding on to really terrible ones. A lot of labels have been bringing these movies out on Blu-ray and it's fun to snatch them up, including so many I haven't seen. Prior to that I was collecting on DVD and have been swapping those out for BD releases when I can.

Horror fans have always seemed to have a collector mentality and loyalty to the genre. That's why you're seeing so many limited releases at premium prices because really only the die-hard horror fans are eating them up. It's to the point where I mostly just buy horror films because I know they're the ones I'll revisit the most; other and better movies I watch only a few years or so, and some truly magnificent pieces of art like Ikiru I see once in 8–10 years. I guess it's like gorging on milk chocolate versus savoring refined chocolate.

I've known some who think VHS is the ideal way to see horror films, that the low quality picture adds to the sleaziness by making it look grimier. I guess I see their point but would personally rather have a brand-spankin'-new master from the original negative done right.

[Val Lewton]

Originally Posted by Wernski

I lived through that period when "slasher film" was a term of pure disdain.

Me too, and what amazes me more about the slasher craze wasn't that critics had disdain for them, it was the amount of critics that actually called them dangerous! It's one thing to call them trash or misogynistic, it's another to actually suggest they are corrupting kids. Siskel and Ebert were particularly prone to elevating the moral panic surrounding slasher movies - and probably helped sell more tickets in the process.

[Michael24]

I love horror. If money wasn't a problem I'd have a lot more of it. 8.6% of my collection is horror. (15.2% if you include what I have on DVD.) I was kind of a late-bloomer, too, and didn't even really get into the genre until 1996, when I was almost 18. Slashers especially (my favorite sub-genre) are, to me, the film equivalent of campfire ghost stories. In the moment, they hold your attention with suspense and scares, then in the end you kind of have a laugh over what a fun and thrilling ride it was. Like going on a rollercoaster or through a spooky funhouse attraction.

Originally Posted by Val Lewton

Siskel and Ebert were particularly prone to elevating the moral panic surrounding slasher movies - and probably helped sell more tickets in the process.

Although they did find a lot of horror films trashy, they would acknowledge when one was good. They both praised Halloween very highly, for example. They said in a retro review of it that they weren't against horror in general, just (what they considered) bad horror.

I do agree it's stupid to call horror dangerous, though. If a kid is "corrupted" by a horror movie, then they've clearly already got other problems going on. A normal kid is going to know the difference between reality and fantasy, and that horror movies are just fun make believe.

[Val Lewton]

Originally Posted by Michael24

Although they did find a lot of horror films trashy, they would acknowledge when one was good. They both praised Halloween very highly, for example. They said in a retro review of it that they weren't against horror in general, just (what they considered) bad horror.

I do agree it's stupid to call horror dangerous, though. If a kid is "corrupted" by a horror movie, then they've clearly already got other problems going on. A normal kid is going to know that difference between reality and fantasy, and that horror movies are just fun make believe.

While I grew up with Siskel and Ebert, and watched them religiously, their "slasher special" is an embarrassingly perfect example of moral panic at the time. Not unlike the panic that surrounded comic books of the 50's, music in the 80's, or more recently video games.

I still like Roger Ebert, but he has been guilty of the "Please...won't you think of the Children!" variety of self righteousness from the very beginning. Check out his initial review of Night of the Living Dead. It reads less like a review from a critic from Chicago than it does like one from John Lithgow's preacher from Footloose. It's even hilariously titled "Just Another Horror Movie - Or Is It?"

http://monstermemories.blogspot.com/...of-living.html

[thesender]

I think as has been mentioned, a lot of it is nostalgia.

People have fond memories of watching a lot of older horror movies in their childhood/teens and they are reliving their past, through these plastic discs that present these films in quality that exceeds that of our memories.

The leading companies that distribute these titles have also figured out a way to play us consumers, by marketing limited editions and special editions with packaging and extra features that lure us in and makes us feel like we need to own it, to relive it. So we effectively feel like we are purchasing or saving artefacts of our own history and reliving our past. And for the horror films we haven't seen or don't own, we feel as though we should have seen them and we need to add them to our collections and save these artefacts as well.

That is my two cents worth.

[ThePhantom]

Originally Posted by Val Lewton

I still like Roger Ebert, but he has been guilty of the "Please...won't you think of the Children!" variety of self righteousness from the very beginning. Check out his initial review of Night of the Living Dead. It reads less like a review from a critic from Chicago than it does like one from John Lithgow's preacher from Footloose. It's even hilariously titled "Just Another Horror Movie - Or Is It?"

http://monstermemories.blogspot.com/...of-living.html

In the case of Night of the Living Dead, we have to consider the time in which it was released. It was October 1968, a month or so before the MPAA rating system came into effect. Most people had never seen violence and gore like that in a movie -- certainly not children. Sure, H.G. Lewis practically invented the splatter film in 1963 with Blood Feast, but his films weren't typically showing to crowds filled with children. Night of the Living Dead, on other hand, was playing to matinee crowds with kids as young as six or seven -- many of them without their parents (no MPAA yet, so it was the Wild West). The children (and most adults too) were fully unprepared for what Night of the Living Dead would show them because most people had never seen anything like it before.

With that context, Ebert's reaction makes a lot more sense. In today's day and age, where we can see Day of the Dead-level gore on primetime cable TV every week (thanks, Greg Nicotero!), Ebert's reaction might seem ridiculous, but not back in 1968.

My aunt was one of those kids who saw Night of the Living Dead in 1968 with no parental supervision and she was traumatized. I'm not even being hyperbolic here: she had violent night terrors that began after seeing it and continued well into her 20s when she was diagnosed with PTSD caused by the experience. I'm sure most kids weren't affected quite that much, of course, but it just goes to show that movies can indeed have a damaging impact on a child's mind.