Film subgenre that involves a killer murdering people using blades
Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960) was a huge success on release, and a critical influence on the slasher genre
A slasher film is a subgenre of horror films involving a killer or a group of killers stalking and murdering a group of people, usually by use of bladed or sharp tools.[1] Although the term "slasher" may occasionally be used informally as a generic term for any horror film involving murder, film analysts cite an established set of characteristics which set slasher films apart from other horror subgenres, such as monster movies, splatter films, supernatural and psychological horror films.[2]
Slasher films typically adhere to a specific formula: a past wrongful action causes severe trauma that is reinforced by a commemoration or anniversary that reactivates or re-inspires the killer.[8][9] Built around stalk-and-murder sequences, the films draw upon the audience's feelings of catharsis, recreation, and displacement, as related to sexual pleasure.[10]Paste magazine's definition notes that, "slasher villains are human beings, or were human beings at some point ... Slasher villains are human killers whose actions are objectively evil, because they’re meant to be bound by human morality. That’s part of the fear that the genre is meant to prey upon, the idea that killers walk among us."[11] Films with similar structures that have non-human antagonists lacking a conscience, such as Alien or The Terminator, are not traditionally considered slasher films (though many slasher antagonists are superhuman, have supernatural traits, or possess slightly warped or abstract anthropomorphic forms both physically and metaphysically).[12]
Common tropes
The final girltrope is discussed in film studies as being a young woman (occasionally a young man) left alone to face the killer's advances in the movie's end.[8]Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), the heroine in Halloween, is an example of a typical final girl.[9] Final girls are often, like Laurie Strode, virgins among sexually active teens.[13] Others have called the trope "self-mythologising" based on a handful of especially high-profile examples, asserting that its prominence has been overstated – particularly the innocent, virginal qualities ascribed to putative final girls - and that, in the 21st century, the trope has been filtered through the lens of parody, subversion, and self-aware humour (e.g. Final Girl) rather than deployed sincerely.[14]
When slasher films become franchises, they typically take on villain protagonist characteristics, with the series following the continued efforts of their antagonists, rather than any of the killer's disposable victims, including any individual entry's heroes or final survivor(s) (who, in so far as they continue to appear within the series, are often killed off immediately after their next on-screen appearance, which has become its own trope). Examples of antiheroes around whom the respective series have become centered include Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees, Chucky and Leatherface.[15] The antagonist is envisioned and embedded into the public psyche as the main and most marketable/recognisable character, even if his screentime is dwarfed in any specific film by the nominal protagonists. The Scream film series is a rarity that follows its heroine Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) rather than masked killer Ghostface, whose identity changes from film to film, and is only revealed in each entry's finale.[16]
Another alleged trope frequently associated with slasher discourse - and horror more broadly - is that of the "black character(s) dying first" (often formulated as "always dying first"). Actual analyses of the films, such as a 2013 investigative piece in Complex, have found that the trope is largely self-mythologising as opposed to being a statistical reality (per Complex, in only 10% of the fifty analysed movies, all containing one or more speaking black characters, did any of them die first).[17]
Origins
A scene from the Grand Guignol, a format some critics have cited as an influence on the slasher film
The appeal of watching people inflict violence upon each other dates back thousands of years to Ancient Rome,[18] though fictionalized accounts became marketable with late 19th century horror plays produced at the Grand Guignol.[19]Maurice Tourneur's The Lunatics (1912) used visceral violence to attract the Guignol's audience. In the United States, public outcry over films like this eventually led to the passage of the Hays Code in 1930.[20] The Hays Code is one of the entertainment industry's earliest set of guidelines restricting sexuality and violence deemed unacceptable.[20][21]
Crime writer Mary Roberts Rinehart influenced horror literature with her novel The Circular Staircase (1908),[22] adapted into the silent film The Bat (1926), about guests in a remote mansion menaced by a killer in a grotesque mask.[23] Its success led to a series of "old dark house" films including The Cat and the Canary (1927), based on John Willard's 1922 stage play, and Universal Pictures' The Old Dark House (1932), based on the novel by J.B. Priestley.[23] In both films, the town dwellers are pitted against strange country folk, a recurring theme in later horror films. Along with the "madman on the loose" plotline, these films employed several influences upon the slasher genre, such as lengthy point of view shots and a "sins of the father" catalyst to propel the plot's mayhem.[24]
George Archainbaud's Thirteen Women (1932) tells the story of a sorority whose former members are set against one another by a vengeful peer who crosses out their yearbook photos, a device used in subsequent films Prom Night (1980) and Graduation Day (1981).[25] Early examples include a maniac seeking revenge in The Terror (1928), based on the play by Edgar Wallace.
Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960) used visuals that had been deemed unacceptable by movie studios, including scenes of violence, sexuality, and the shot of a toilet flushing. The film featured an iconic score by Bernard Herrmann that has been frequently imitated in slasher and horror films.[33] That same year, Michael Powell released Peeping Tom, showing the killer's perspective as he murders women to photograph their dying expressions.[4][34]
Francis Ford Coppola's debut, Dementia 13 (1963), takes place in an Irish castle where relatives gather to commemorate a family death but are murdered one by one.[27]William Castle's Homicidal (1961) features gore in its murder scenes, something both Psycho and PeepingTom had edited out.[44][45] Richard Hillard's Violent Midnight (1963) showed a black-gloved killer's point of view as they pull down a branch to watch a victim and also featured a skinny-dipping scene.[46]Crown International's Terrified (1963) features a masked killer.[47] Spain's The House That Screamed (1969) features violent murders and preempted later campus-based slashers.[48]
Post-World War II Germany adapted British writer Edgar Wallace's crime novels into a subgenre of their own called Krimi films.[52] The Krimi films were released in the late 1950s through the early 1970s and featured villains in bold costumes accompanied by jazz scores from composers such as Martin Böttcher and Peter Thomas.[27][53]Fellowship of the Frog (1959), about a murderer terrorizing London, was successful in America, leading to similar adaptations like The Green Archer (1961) and Dead Eyes of London (1961). The Rialto Studio produced 32 Krimi films between 1959 and 1970.[54]
Italy's giallo thrillers are crime procedurals or murder mysteries interlaced with eroticism and psychological horror.[49]Giallo films feature unidentified killers murdering in grand fashions.[49] Unlike most American slasher films the protagonists of gialli are frequently (but not always) jet-setting adults sporting the most stylish Milan fashions.[27] These protagonists are often outsiders reluctantly brought into the mystery through extenuating circumstances, like witnessing a murder or being suspected of the crimes themselves.[55] Much like Krimi films, gialli plots tended to be outlandish and improbable, occasionally employing supernatural elements.[27][49]Mario Bava's A Bay of Blood (1971) is a whodunit featuring a subplot depicting creative death sequences on a secluded lakeside setting, which greatly inspired Friday the 13th (1980), its 1981 sequel and subsequent slashers.[56][57]Sergio Martino's Torso (1973) featured a masked killer preying upon beautiful and promiscuous young women in retribution for a past misdeed. Torso's edge-of-your-seat climax finds a sensible "final girl"[58] facing off with the killer in an isolated villa.[59][60]Umberto Lenzi's Eyeball (1975), which unfolds in an Agatha Christie manner, is noted by some as a slasher precursor, as American tourists are targeted by a killer wearing a red raincoat.[61][62]
By 1974 the exploitation film battled political correctness and their popularity waned, and while films like The Love Butcher (1975) and The Redeemer: Son of Satan (1976) were accused of promoting bigotry, the low-budget independent film The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) became a major hit and the most commercially successful horror film since The Exorcist. The story concerns a violent clash of cultures and ideals between the counter-culture and traditional conservative values, with the film's squealing antagonist Leatherface carrying a chainsaw and wearing the faces of victims he and his family eat. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre spawned imitators and its false "based on a true story" advertisements gave way to reenactments of true crime. The Town That Dreaded Sundown (1976), based on the Phantom Killer case, and Another Son of Sam (1977), based on the Son of Sam slayings, cashed-in on headlines and public fascination. Wes Craven modernized the Sawney Bean legend in The Hills Have Eyes (1977) by building upon themes presented in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. The Hills Have Eyes was another huge financial success, relaunching Craven's career after it had been damaged by controversy surrounding his previous film, The Last House on the Left (1972).[75]
Following holiday-themed exploitation films Home for the Holidays (1972), All Through the House (1972) and Silent Night, Bloody Night (1973), Christmas horror film Black Christmas (1974) uses horror as a board to debate social topics of its time, including feminism, abortion, and alcoholism. Using the "killer calling from inside the house" gimmick, Black Christmas is visually and thematically a precursor to John Carpenter's Halloween (1978), as young women are terrorized in a previously safe environment during an iconic holiday. Like Halloween, Clark's film opens with a lengthy point-of-view, but it differs in the treatment of the killer's identity. Despite making $4,053,000 on a $620,000 budget, Black Christmas was initially criticized, with Variety complaining that it was a "bloody, senseless kill-for-kicks" flick that exploited unnecessary violence. Despite its modest initial box office run, the film has garnered critical reappraisal, with film historians noting its importance in the horror film genre and some even citing it as the original slasher film.[76]
1978–1984: Golden Age
Jumpstarted by the massive success of John Carpenter's Halloween (1978), the era commonly cited as the Golden Age of slasher films is 1978–1984, with some scholars citing over 100 similar films released over the six-year period.[3][10][27] Despite most films receiving negative reviews, many Golden Age slasher films were extremely profitable and have established cult followings.[6] Many films reused Halloween's template of a murderous figure stalking teens, though they escalated the gore and nudity from Carpenter's restrained film. Golden Age slasher films exploited dangers lurking in American institutions such as high schools, colleges, summer camps, and hospitals.[77]
1978
Cashing in on the drive-in success of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), The Toolbox Murders was quickly and cheaply shot but did not generate the interest of the former films. Exploitative Killer's Delight is a San Francisco-set serial killer story claiming to take inspiration from Ted Bundy and the Zodiac Killer.[78] Leading up to Halloween's October release were August's gialli-inspired Eyes of Laura Mars (written by John Carpenter) and September's "babysitter in peril" TV Movie Are You in the House Alone? Of them, TheEyes of Laura Mars grossed $20 million against a $7 million budget.[79]
Influenced by the French New Wave's Eyes Without a Face (1960), science fiction thriller Westworld (1973) and Black Christmas (1974), Halloween was directed, composed and co-written by Carpenter, and produced and co-written by Debra Hill on a budget of $300,000 provided by Syrian-American producer Moustapha Akkad. To minimize costs, locations were reduced and time took place over a brief period.[80]Jamie Lee Curtis, daughter of Janet Leigh, was cast as the heroine Laurie Strode while veteran actor Donald Pleasence was cast as Dr. Sam Loomis, an homage to John Gavin's character in Psycho.[80]Halloween's opening tracks a six-year-old's point-of-view as he kills his older sister, a scene emulated in numerous films such as Blow Out (1981) and The Funhouse (1981). Carpenter and Hill deny writing sexually active teens to be victims in favor of a virginal "final girl" survivor, though subsequent filmmakers copied what appeared to be a "sex-equals-death" mantra.[81]
When shown an early cut of Halloween without a musical score, all major American studios declined to distribute it, one executive even remarking that it was not scary. Carpenter added music himself, and the film was distributed locally in four Kansas City theaters through Akkad's Compass International Pictures in October 1978. Word-of-mouth made the movie a sleeper hit that was selected to screen at the November 1978 Chicago Film Festival, where the country's major critics acclaimed it. Halloween grew into a major box office success, grossing over $70 million worldwide and selling over 20 million tickets in North America, becoming the most profitable independent film until being surpassed by Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990).[80]
1979
Though the telekinesis-themed slasher Tourist Trap was initially unsuccessful, it has undergone a reappraisal by fans. 1979's most successful slasher was Fred Walton's When a Stranger Calls, which sold 8.5 million tickets in North America. Its success has largely been credited to its opening scene, in which a babysitter (Carol Kane) is taunted by a caller who repeatedly asks, "Have you checked the children?"[82] Less successful were Ray Dennis Steckler's burlesque slasher The Hollywood Strangler Meets the Skid Row Slasher and Abel Ferrara's The Driller Killer, both of which featured gratuitous on-screen violence against vagrant people.
1980
The election of Ronald Reagan as the 40th president of the United States drew in a new age of conservatism that ushered concern of rising violence on film.[1][27] The slasher film, at the height of its commercial power, also became the center of a political and cultural maelstrom. Sean S. Cunningham's sleeper hit Friday the 13th was the year's most commercially successful slasher film, grossing more than $59.7 million and selling nearly 15 million tickets in North America.[83] Despite a financial success, distributor Paramount Pictures was criticized for "lowering" itself to release a violent exploitation film, with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert famously despising the film.[84] Siskel, in his Chicago Tribune review, revealed the identity and fate of the film's killer in an attempt to hurt its box office, and provided the address of the chairman of Paramount Pictures for viewers to complain.[85] The MPAA was criticized for allowing Friday the 13th an R rating, but its violence would inspire gorier films to follow, as it set a new bar for acceptable levels of on-screen violence. The criticisms that began with Friday the 13th would lead to the genre's eventual decline in subsequent years.[86]
The small-budget thrillers Silent Scream and Prom Night were box office hits with 3.2 and 5.5 million admissions, respectively.[87] Jamie Lee Curtis starred in the independent Prom Night, as well studio films Terror Train and The Fog to earn her "scream queen" title.[9]MGM's the Halloween-clone He Knows You're Alone sold nearly 2 million tickets, though Paramount PicturesJohn Huston-directed Phobia only sold an estimated 22,000 tickets.[87] Two high-profile slasher-thrillers were met with protest, William Friedkin's Cruising and Gordon Willis' Windows, both of which equate homosexuality with psychosis. Cruising drew protests from gay rights groups, and though it pre-dates the AIDS crisis, the film's portrayal of the gay community fueled subsequent backlash once the virus became an epidemic.[27][88]
Slasher films reached a saturation point in 1981, as heavily promoted movies like My Bloody Valentine and The Burning were box office failures.[27][10][87] After the success of Friday the 13th, Paramount Pictures picked up My Bloody Valentine with hopes to achieve similar success. The film became the subject of intense scrutiny in the wake of John Lennon's murder, and was released heavily edited; lacking the draw of gore, My Bloody Valentine barely sold 2 million tickets in North America, much less than the 15 million sold by Friday the 13th the year beforehand.[87] Thematically similar to My Bloody Valentine, The Prowler hoped to lure an audience with gore effects by Friday the 13th's Tom Savini but large MPAA edits contributed to its failure to find a nationwide distributor.[27] Suffering similar censorship was The Burning, which also employed Savini's special effects, though it does mark the feature film debuts of Brad Grey, Holly Hunter, Jason Alexander, Fisher Stevens, Bob Weinstein and Harvey Weinstein.
Straight-to-video productions cut costs to maximize profit. The independent horror film Madman opened in New York City's top 10, according to Variety, but soon fell out of theaters for a much healthier life on home video.[27]The Dorm That Dripped Blood and Honeymoon Horror, each made for between $50–90,000, became successful in the early days of VHS.[87] Because of this change, independent productions began having difficulties finding theatrical distribution. Girls Nite Out had a very limited release in 1982 but was re-released in 1983 in more theaters until finally finding a home on VHS. Paul Lynch's Humongous was released through AVCO Embassy Pictures, but a change in management severely limited the film's theatrical release. Films such as Hospital Massacre and Night Warning enjoyed strong home rentals from video stores, though Dark Sanity, The Forest, Unhinged, Trick or Treats, and Island of Blood fell into obscurity with little theatrical releases and only sub-par video transfers.[99]
In Canada, whodunitCurtains had a brief theatrical life before finding new life on VHS, while criticism toward American Nightmare's portrayal of prostitutes, drug addicts, and pornography addicts hurt its video rentals.[101]Sledgehammer was shot-on-video for just $40,000, with a gender-reversal climax showing Playgirl model Ted Prior as a "final guy."[27][87] Other home video slashers from the year include Blood Beat,Double Exposure, and Scalps, the latter claiming to be one of the most censored films in history.[101] Releases began to distance from the genre. The poster for Mortuary features a hand bursting from the grave, though the undead have nothing to do with the film. Distributors were aware of fading box office profits, and they were attempting to hoodwink audiences into thinking long-shelved releases like Mortuary were different.
1984
The public had largely lost interest in theatrically released slashers, drawing a close to the Golden Age.[1][13] Production rates plummeted and major studios all but abandoned the genre that, only a few years earlier, had been very profitable. Many 1984 slasher films with brief theatrical runs found varying degrees of success on home video, such as Splatter University, Satan's Blade, Blood Theatre, Rocktober Blood and Fatal Games. Movies like The Prey and Evil Judgement were filmed years prior and finally were given small theatrical releases. Silent Madness used 3D to ride the success of Friday the 13th Part III (1982), though the effect did not translate to the VHS format.[27]
Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter brought the saga of Jason Voorhees to a close, with his demise the main marketing tool. It worked, with The Final Chapter selling 10 million tickets in North America, hinting the series would continue even if Jason's demise marked a shift in the genre.[87]
This shift was emphasized by the controversy from Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984): Unlike the recent appearance of other Christmas horror films, including the same year's Don't Open till Christmas, promotional material for Silent Night, Deadly Night pictured a killer Santa with the tagline: "He knows when you've been naughty!" According to Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film, a 2006 documentary, the movie "became the flashpoint, igniting protests across the nation".[103] Protesters picketed theaters playing the film with placards reading, "Deck the hall with holly – not bodies!"[104][87] Released in November 1984 by TriStar Pictures, persistent carol-singers forced one Bronx cinema to pull Silent Night, Deadly Night a week into its run. The widespread outrage led to the film's removal, with only 741,500 tickets sold.[104][87]
As interest in the Golden Age slasher waned, Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street revitalized the genre by mixing fantasy and the supernatural in a cost-effective way. Craven had toyed with slasher films before in Deadly Blessing (1981), though he was frustrated that the genre he had helped create with The Last House on the Left (1972) and The Hills Have Eyes (1977) had not benefited him financially. Developing A Nightmare on Elm Street since 1981, Craven recognized time running out due to declining revenues from theatrical slasher film releases.[105]A Nightmare on Elm Street and especially its villain Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) became cultural phenomenons.[106] On a budget of just $1.8 million, the film was a commercial success, grossing more than $25.5 million (7.6 million admissions) in North America and launched one of the most successful film series in history.[87][106]A Nightmare on Elm Street provided the success that New Line Cinema needed to become a major Hollywood company. To this day, New Line is referred to as "The House That Freddy Built".[107] The final slasher film released during the Golden Age, The Initiation, was greatly overshadowed by A Nightmare on Elm Street (though both films feature dreams as plot points and a horribly burned "nightmare man").[27] The success of A Nightmare on Elm Street welcomed in a new wave of horror films that relied on special effects, almost completely silencing the smaller low-budget Golden Age features.[1][108]
1984–1995: Direct-to-video films and franchises
Despite A Nightmare on Elm Street's success, fatigue hit the slasher genre, and its popularity had declined substantially. The home video revolution, fueled by the popularity of VHS, provided a new outlet for low-budget filmmaking. Without major studio backing for theatrical release, slasher films became second only to pornography in the home video market. The drop in budgets to accommodate a more economic approach was usually met with a decline in quality. Holdovers filmed during the Golden Age such as Too Scared to Scream (filmed in 1981, released in 1985), The Mutilator (filmed in 1984, released in 1985), Blood Rage (filmed in 1983, released in 1987), Killer Party (filmed in 1984, released in 1986) and Mountaintop Motel Massacre (filmed in 1983, released in 1986) found video distribution.
Mirroring the punk rock movement, novice filmmakers proved anyone could make a movie on home video, resulting in shot-on-video slashers Blood Cult (1985), The Ripper (1985), Spine (1986), Truth or Dare? (1986), Killer Workout (1987), and Death Spa (1989).[109] Lesser-known horror properties Sleepaway Camp, The Slumber Party Massacre and Silent Night, Deadly Night became series on home video. The Hills Have Eyes Part 2 (1985) and Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985) were theatrically released but neither film was embraced by fans or critics and took steep box office declines from their predecessors; still, Friday the 13th: A New Beginning was a modest hit opening at the top of the box office and finishing its run with 6.2 million admissions.[110] Rushed into production, A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy's Revenge (1985) became the highest grossing horror film of 1985. The success of the first two Elm Street films inspired a wave of "dream" slashers that included Dreamaniac (1986), Bad Dreams (1988), Deadly Dreams (1988), and Dream Demon (1988). Of those films, Bad Dreams was a minor hit with 2.4 million admissions.[111]
Trying to cater the public of adult action thrillers that were popular in the 1980s, Sylvester Stallone's cop-thriller Cobra (1986) is a thinly-veiled slasher film advertised as an action movie, and sold 13.2 million tickets. The home video market made stars out of character actors such as Terry O'Quinn and Bruce Campbell, whose respective independent horror-thrillers The Stepfather (1987) and Maniac Cop (1988) found more support on home video than in theaters. Quinn returned for Stepfather II (1989) but chose not to reprise his role in Stepfather III (1992), Destroyer (1988), while Campbell followed a similar route with a cameo in Maniac Cop 2 (1990) and no participation in Maniac Cop III: Badge of Silence (1993).
Internationally, the slasher film remained profitable. Mexico released Zombie Apocalypse (1985), Don't Panic (1988), Grave Robbers (1990) and Hell's Trap (1990). Europe saw releases from Sweden's Blood Tracks (1985), The United Kingdom's Lucifer (1987), Spain's Anguish (1987) and Italy's StageFright (1987) and BodyCount (1987). In the Pacific, Australia released Symphony of Evil (1987), Houseboat Horror (1989), and Bloodmoon (1990), while Japan released Evil Dead Trap (1988).[115]
Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994) used characters from his original Elm Street film in self-referential and ironic ways, as the actors played versions of their true personas targeted by a movie-inspired demon. Despite solid critical reviews, New Nightmare failed to attract moviegoers and sold only 2.3 million tickets the North American box office, the lowest of any Elm Street film.[117][118] The slasher genre's surprising meta-resurgence came in the form of Craven's sleeper hitScream (1996).[citation needed] Directed by Craven and written by Kevin Williamson, Scream juggled postmodern humor with visceral horror. The film played on nostalgia for the golden age of slasher films, but appealed to a younger audience with contemporary stars and popular music. Williamson, a self-confessed fan of slasher films, wrote the characters as well-versed in horror film lore and knowing all the clichés that the audience were aware of.[citation needed] With 23.3 million admissions, Scream became both the highest grossing slasher film of all time and the first of the genre to cross $100 million at the domestic box office, making it the most successful horror film since The Silence of the Lambs (1991).[failed verification][119] The marketing for Scream distanced itself from the slasher genre as it passed itself as a "new thriller" that showcased the celebrity of its stars Drew Barrymore, Courteney Cox and Neve Campbell over its horror elements.[citation needed]
The two Scream films and I Know What You Did Last Summer were also popular in international markets. In Asia, Hong Kong released The Deadly Camp (1999) and South Korea released Bloody Beach (2000), The Record (2001), and Nightmare (2000).[citation needed] Australia's postmodern slasher Cut (2000) cast American actress Molly Ringwald as its heroine.[citation needed] Britain released Lighthouse (1999) and the Netherlands had two teen slashers, School's Out (1999) and The Pool (2001).[citation needed]Bollywood produced two unofficial remakes of I Know What You Did Last Summer: the first was a musical-slasher hybrid called Kucch To Hai (2003), while the second was a more straightforward slasher called Dhund: The Fog (2003).[citation needed]
After the turn of the millennium, the post-Scream wave of slasher films were both critically and financially disappointing, leading to the genre's sharp decline.[citation needed] These films include 2001's Valentine (11% Rotten Tomatoes, 3.5 million admissions) and Jason X (19% Rotten Tomatoes, 2.3 million admissions), and 2002's Halloween: Resurrection (10% Rotten Tomatoes, 5.2 million admissions).[127][128][129][130][131][132] In development for 17 years with 17 different writers attached to at different points, New Line Cinema's Freddy vs. Jason (2003) took note from the Scream films and mixed nostalgia and self-aware humor with recognizable actors.[133] It sold a massive 14 million tickets at the domestic box office and beat Scream 2's record opening weekend for a slasher film[failed verification] with a gross of $36.4 million over three days.[134]
Coming off the success of the Paranormal Activity and Insidious franchises, Jason Blum and his Blumhouse Productions began looking into rebooting popular slasher titles with "legacy sequels" that largely ignored the proceeding films in favor of new chapters, though not strict remakes. Blumhouse teamed with popular television showrunnerRyan Murphy to produce a metafictional sequel to The Town That Dreaded Sundown (1976), though[failed verification]the newer film received mixed critical reviews and failed financially with an estimated $154,418 in streaming sales.[150][151] For their next slasher film, Blumhouse recruited director David Gordon Green and writer Danny McBride to reunite producer/composer John Carpenter and star Jamie Lee Curtis for Halloween (2018).[152] As a direct sequel to Carpenter's 1978 original film that ignored all other films in the franchise, 2018's Halloween opened to record-breaking numbers, including the largest debut for a slasher film and the largest debut of a female-led horror film.[153] The film was a massive success and would go on to sell 17.4 million tickets at the domestic box office, second only to the 1978 original and the first two Scream films in terms of audience attendance for a slasher film.[154] The film's success spawned two sequels, Halloween Kills (2021) and Halloween Ends (2022), though they were struck with diminishing returns by selling a respective 9 million and 6.1 million tickets during their domestic runs.[155][156] Blumhouse and Universal Pictures re-teamed to release a second remake of Black Christmas in 2019, which was poorly received and bombed at the box office.[157]
In the early 2010s, the success of FX's American Horror Story and AMC's The Walking Dead encouraged network television to develop horror franchises as series. Several networks structured or based their developing TV series on slasher films. A&E produced Bates Motel as a contemporary prequel to Alfred Hitchcock's 1960s classic Psycho, which depicted the lives of Norman Bates (Freddie Highmore) and his deranged mother Norma (Vera Farmiga). The series remains A&E's longest-running scripted drama program, and particular praise was given to Highmore and Farmiga, with the latter receiving a Primetime Emmy nomination.[167][168]
Slasher anthologies allowed filmmakers to explore new settings and mysteries every season. In 2015 Ryan Murphy, the creator of American Horror Story, produced the comedy-slasher series Scream Queens for Fox.[178] Starring Jamie Lee Curtis, Emma Roberts, Keke Palmer, Niecy Nash, Billie Lourd, and Abigail Breslin, the series developed a devoted cult following but was cancelled after two seasons.[179] Created by Aaron Martin, an anthology series simply titled Slasher premiered on the streaming platformChiller in 2016.[180] The first season, subtitled The Executioner, received positive reviews.[181]Slasher moved to Netflix for its second and third seasons, titled Guilty Party and Solstice, and then to Shudder for its fourth and fifth seasons, titled Flesh & Blood and Ripper.[182][183][184] In 2022, writer Ryan J. Brown debuted his comedy-horror series Wreck on BBC Three which takes inspiration from slasher and horror fiction.[185][186]
A series of original, low-budget slasher franchises began to emerge in the early 2020s. Damien Leone's Terrifier (2016) drew attention for its villain Art the Clown (David Howard Thornton) and its inventive practical effects, but its perceived as misogynistic violence became controversial and the film failed to catch on with the general public.[failed verification] Leone's kickstarter-funded sequel Terrifier 2 (2022)[failed verification] received much more attention and positive reviews (86% on Rotten Tomatoes) with many reviewers commenting on the development of its final girl (played by Lauren LaVera). Released by Bloody Disgusting, Terrifier 2 became a box office success with over one million domestic admissions.[2][5]Terrifier 3 was released in 2024 with Leone, Thornton, and LaVera returning.[7] The film became the highest-grossing unrated film of all time, raking in over $50 million in box office. Also working on low-budgets for independent distributor A24, director Ti West delivered a trilogy of slashers that received critical acclaim. West's first film, the 1970s-set X (2022), starred Mia Goth, Scott Mescudi, Brittany Snow, and Jenna Ortega and scored 94% on Rotten Tomatoes and sold over a million tickets.[192][193] West reunited with Goth for X's 1920s-set prequel Pearl (2022), which scored even higher at 93% and sold just under a million tickets.[194][195] Both X and Pearl were successful on streaming downloads. X's 1980s-set sequel MaXXXine, the final film in the trilogy, also stars Goth and was released in 2024.[196]
^ abcVera Dika (1990). Games of Terror: Halloween, Friday the 13th and the Films of the Stalker Cycle. Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. ISBN978-0-8386-3364-9.
^ abcdeTroy, Howarth (2015). So deadly, so perverse: 50 years of Italian giallo films. Baltimore: Midnight Marquee Press. ISBN9781936168507. OCLC923061416.
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