Merchants
of Menace: The Business of Horror Cinema
Edited
by Richard Nowell
Bloomsbury
Publishing
264
pages. Illustrated
229 x 152 mm
ISBN: 9781623564209
REVIEW BY ADRIAN SMITH
Many books have been written about
the horror genre, from almost every conceivable perspective. Here however, is a
somewhat different approach: the horror industry as an economy. Films, after
all, require finance, and whilst artistic decisions are usually at the
forefront of analysis, without the money men in the background cinema as we
know it would not exist today.
Merchants of
Menace, with a
tribute to William Castle on its cover, attempts to give the reader a history
of the horror genre from the 1930s Universal cycle through to the American
remakes of today. A collection of essays on the horror genre, one will also
find an in-depth look at the re-launch of Hammer as a brand and business
entity, the zombies of Poverty Row and many more. It is a fascinating approach
to the subject and causes the reader to ponder issues in a way they were
probably not thought of before, such as the economic power of atmosphere; what
exactly is atmosphere and how is it defined and turned into a commodity by
filmmakers? Using the unsettling British horror City of the Dead (1960,
U.S. title Horror Hotel) as an example, Robert Spadoni discusses how the
film foregrounds atmosphere over narrative and how the two are often in
conflict with each other.
This collection helps redress the
balance between an understanding of the horror film as an entertainment medium
and as a business. This will be of great interest to fans of the genre, but
also points out wider issues that go beyond horror into the film industry as a
whole. It is often said that you will always make money in the film business
from horror and sex. Perhaps this suggests an obvious direction for Nowell's
future research.
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