Decades of Horror The 20s 30s & 40s (1920 - 1949)
by ba-david | created - 15 Jun 2011 | updated - 03 Apr 2013 | PublicAlso check out the other "Decades of Horror Lists". All Must See Horror Flicks from the 1920s until today. Also Check out my other lists like "Trashy but Great Horror Movies", "Directors an Facts" and many more. Find all my lists by clicking "Other Lists By" on the right side of the page. Or use this address: http://www.imdb.com/user/ur21934570/lists
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1. The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)
Not Rated | 67 min | Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Hypnotist Dr. Caligari uses a somnambulist, Cesare, to commit murders.
Director: Robert Wiene | Stars: Werner Krauss, Conrad Veidt, Friedrich Feher, Lil Dagover
Votes: 70,092
- Widely considered to be the first true horror film ever made.
- The sets were made out of paper, with the shadows painted on the walls.
- Weeks before the initial release of the film, posters with the tag-line "Du mußt Caligari werden!" ("You have to become Caligari!") were put up in Berlin without the slightest hint that they were promotion for the upcoming movie.
- Made before "horror" was a designated genre, this is sometimes cited as the first true horror film (although films with elements of the macabre were certainly made earlier).
2. Nosferatu (1922)
Not Rated | 94 min | Fantasy, Horror
Vampire Count Orlok expresses interest in a new residence and real estate agent Hutter's wife.
Director: F.W. Murnau | Stars: Max Schreck, Alexander Granach, Gustav von Wangenheim, Greta Schröder
Votes: 105,502
-The concept in popular culture that sunlight is lethal to vampires is based in this film.
- Director F.W. Murnau found Max Schreck "strikingly ugly" in real life and decided the vampire makeup would suffice with just pointy ears and false teeth.
3. The Phantom of the Opera (1925)
Passed | 93 min | Horror
A mad, disfigured composer seeks love with a lovely young opera singer.
Directors: Rupert Julian, Lon Chaney, Ernst Laemmle, Edward Sedgwick | Stars: Lon Chaney, Mary Philbin, Norman Kerry, Arthur Edmund Carewe
Votes: 20,118 | Gross: $3.75M
4. Faust (1926)
Not Rated | 107 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
The demon Mephisto wagers with God that he can corrupt a mortal man's soul.
Director: F.W. Murnau | Stars: Gösta Ekman, Emil Jannings, Camilla Horn, Frida Richard
Votes: 16,637
5. The Man Who Laughs (1928)
Not Rated | 110 min | Drama, Horror, Mystery
When a proud noble refuses to kiss the hand of the despotic King James in 1690, he is cruelly executed and his son surgically disfigured.
Director: Paul Leni | Stars: Mary Philbin, Conrad Veidt, Julius Molnar, Olga Baclanova
Votes: 8,078
6. Dracula (1931)
Passed | 75 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
Transylvanian vampire Count Dracula bends a naive real estate agent to his will, then takes up residence at a London estate where he sleeps in his coffin by day and searches for potential victims by night.
Directors: Tod Browning, Karl Freund | Stars: Bela Lugosi, Helen Chandler, David Manners, Dwight Frye
Votes: 58,663
7. Frankenstein (1931)
Passed | 70 min | Drama, Horror, Sci-Fi
Dr Henry Frankenstein is obsessed with assembling a living being from parts of several exhumed corpses.
Director: James Whale | Stars: Colin Clive, Mae Clarke, Boris Karloff, John Boles
Votes: 79,751
8. Freaks (1932)
Not Rated | 64 min | Drama, Horror
A circus' beautiful trapeze artist agrees to marry the leader of side-show performers, but his deformed friends discover she is only marrying him for his inheritance.
Director: Tod Browning | Stars: Wallace Ford, Leila Hyams, Olga Baclanova, Roscoe Ates
Votes: 50,633 | Gross: $0.63M
9. White Zombie (1932)
Passed | 69 min | Horror
A young man turns to a witch doctor to lure the woman he loves away from her fiancé, but instead turns her into a zombie slave.
Director: Victor Halperin | Stars: Bela Lugosi, Madge Bellamy, Joseph Cawthorn, Robert Frazer
Votes: 11,662
10. Bride of Frankenstein (1935)
Not Rated | 75 min | Drama, Horror, Sci-Fi
Mary Shelley reveals the main characters of her novel survived: Baron Henry Frankenstein, goaded by an even madder scientist, builds his monster a mate.
Director: James Whale | Stars: Boris Karloff, Elsa Lanchester, Colin Clive, Valerie Hobson
Votes: 53,284 | Gross: $4.36M
11. The Raven (1935)
Approved | 61 min | Crime, Horror
A brilliant surgeon with a morbid obsession for instruments of torture grows dangerously obsessed with a young socialite whose life he's saved.
Director: Lew Landers | Stars: Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Lester Matthews, Irene Ware
Votes: 6,654
12. The Wolf Man (1941)
Passed | 70 min | Horror, Mystery, Romance
Larry Talbot returns to his father's castle in Wales and meets a beautiful woman. One fateful night, Talbot escorts her to a local carnival where they meet a mysterious gypsy fortune teller.
Director: George Waggner | Stars: Claude Rains, Warren William, Lon Chaney Jr., Ralph Bellamy
Votes: 30,735
13. I Walked with a Zombie (1943)
Passed | 69 min | Drama, Fantasy, Horror
A nurse is hired to care for the wife of a sugar plantation owner, who has been acting strangely, on a Caribbean island.
Director: Jacques Tourneur | Stars: Frances Dee, Tom Conway, James Ellison, Edith Barrett
Votes: 13,668
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