WATCHknownThe Old Dark House
1932 · USA · 70m
James Whale between the two Frankensteins, having a wonderful time, and Karloff is the least of it.
The films
486 entries, from the 1931 Universal cycle to last year. Curated, not exhaustive: a short shelf of things worth knowing about beats a long one nobody can navigate.
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8 films
WATCHknown
WATCHknownVampyr
1932 · France/Germany · 75m
Dreyer shooting through gauze at a plot that barely exists. Closer to a bad dream than a film.
WATCHknownWhite Zombie
1932 · USA · 69m
The first zombie film, made independently, with Lugosi controlling the dead on a Haitian sugar plantation.
WATCHcanonFreaks
1932 · USA · 64m
Tod Browning cast real sideshow performers, MGM cut a third of it, and it ended his career.
WATCHcanonBride of Frankenstein
1935 · USA · 78m
The Universal cycle's best film. Whale is openly funny and openly on the monster's side.
WATCHcanonDracula
1931 · USA · 75m
Stagey, slow, and it has no score at all. Lugosi's face is the entire reason it survives.
WATCHcanonFrankenstein
1931 · USA · 71m
Karloff in Jack Pierce's makeup, and the flat head is a copyrighted design rather than anything from the novel.
WATCHcanonKing Kong
1933 · USA · 100m
The first great monster film, and Willis O'Brien's animation still has more personality than anything rendered.