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A Filmmaker's Review: "100 Years of Horror" S1, E14-26 (Amazon Prime)

5/5 - A five star account of some of the best themes to hit horror since cinema's early days...

By Annie KapurPublished 4 years ago 4 min read
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This series has been such an incredible thing to watch - I would've never have thought about ten or fifteen years ago that I would've had the chance to find anything like this. Thank you Amazon Prime for bringing me closer to many documentaries, series etc. that I wouldn't have found otherwise. This is such an incredible series and even though I have a master's degree in this stuff - there's still so much I learnt about the rich history and culture surrounding this incredible and ever-expansive genre. Christopher Lee's narration is near-perfect, giving the series that extra little chill.

From start to finish, this series is purely entertaining and last time you were here, you probably saw me go through episodes 1 through to 13 with thorough detail, letting you get to know my favourite episodes of the entire series. Starting off with "freaks" - the second part of this series is very effective for teaching us about the ever-growing genre. Let's have a look at the best of the second section!

So, one of my favourite episodes of the second half was entitled "Maniacs" and it's episode 17. It goes through the best psychopaths, sociopaths, strangers, loners, dark and deep characters of cinema history including the intensely terrifying Hannibal Lecter. This episode is all about how the psychotic stranger was created, how it evolved and how it was perfected. It is a brilliant and incredible episode with a thorough detailed analysis on maniacs and how they've basically created the 'thriller' genre of cinema.

Another episode I really enjoyed was called 'sorcerers', episode 19. It was a brilliant episode about how magicians, Aleister Crowley type characters and many more satanists etc. have made there way on to the screen. It's a brilliant account of how cinema and the cinematic universe of magicians has changed from the very beginning of cinema. It's a beautiful episode because it's not just about horror, it's about how magic works on screen and whether it is effective at all.

Another episode I loved watching was called 'mad doctors' - it was episode 23. This is a very Victor Frankenstein episode because of the nature of the doctors involved and from Doctor Frankenstein to Doctor Strangelove, there are many in and beyond the documentary episode to explore. I found this so much fun because we got to witness what it was like to (as in the maniacs episode) work with the madness of normal and fairly regular human beings instead of monsters that were deformed physically. The entire concept of the mad doctor is such a brilliant one that I believe that not only did the episode do it justice but it gave us a starting point to see more of it.

Episode 24 actually frightened me, let me tell you why. When I was a child of about 5 or 6, a film came on television and it was about a mad scientist who fuses his DNA with that of a fly. It was called The Fly and it starred Jeff Goldblum and I have seen things far more terrifying than this but something must have happened because now, now I'm too scared to even see the poster. I can't even look at the machine let alone the actual image of the fly. I have no idea, to this day what happened. In this episode of "100 Years of Horror" - the Fly is part of the filmmaking history of 'man-made monsters' and I was literally covering my eyes. How horrifying! To this day, I have no idea why I'm so frightened of it.

When it comes to giants and dinosaurs, there's a certain mystery about them in film and so, the episode deals with both the horrific nature of the cinematic experience and the way in which it is satirised. It's a brilliant set of episodes and I believe that it is some of the most thorough research I have ever seen into giants on the cinema screen. A brilliant experience, I am sure to enjoy these episodes again and again as I learn new things about two sub-topics I myself have rarely touched on.

All in all, I loved this show from start to finish. I don't think I could say enough about it if I tried and I cut it down as much as I could because it is a review and not a narrative of some kind. I love this show and I can honestly say that I'm going to go right back to episode one and watch the entire series yet again. It is so well-made and yet so understandable to all audiences of every level of study - whether you are just getting into it or like me, you're more like a young student of some kind, maybe you're a director of horror yourself, a person studying their PhD in it, a veteran like Christopher Lee, or a guy who right now, is sitting on his couch about to watch his 300th run of The Exorcist. Whatever you are going through in your horror filmmaking experience, this show is absolutely perfect for you.

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About the Creator

Annie Kapur

190K+ Reads on Vocal.

English Lecturer

🎓Literature & Writing (B.A)

🎓Film & Writing (M.A)

🎓Secondary English Education (PgDipEd)

📍Birmingham, UK

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