Directed by Carl Th. Dreyer • 1932 • France, West Germany
Starring Julian West, Maurice Schutz, Rena Mandel
With VAMPYR, Danish filmmaker Carl Theodor Dreyer channeled his genius for creating mesmerizing atmosphere and austere, unsettling imagery into the horror genre. The result—a chilling film about a student of the occult who encounters supernatural haunts and local evildoers in a village outside of Paris—is nearly unclassifiable. A host of stunning camera and editing tricks and densely layered sounds create a mood of dreamlike terror. With its roiling fogs, ominous scythes, and foreboding echoes, VAMPYR is one of cinema’s great nightmares.
Up Next in Art-House Horror
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Eyes Without a Face
Directed by Georges Franju • 1960 • France
Starring Pierre Brasseur, Alida Valli, François GuérinAt his secluded chateau in the French countryside, a brilliant, obsessive doctor (Pierre Brasseur) attempts a radical plastic surgery to restore the beauty of his daughter’s disfigured countenance—a...
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Jigoku
Directed by Nobuo Nakagawa • 1960 • Japan
Starring Shigeru Amachi, Utako Mitsuya, Yoichi NumataShocking, outrageous, and poetic, JIGOKU (HELL, a.k.a. THE SINNERS OF HELL) is the most innovative creation from Nobuo Nakagawa, the father of the Japanese horror film. After a young theology student ...
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Carnival of Souls
Directed by Herk Harvey • 1962 • United States
Starring Candace Hilligoss, Frances Feist, Sidney BergerA young woman (Candace Hilligoss) in a small Kansas town survives a drag race accident, then agrees to take a job as a church organist in Salt Lake City. En route, she is haunted by a bizarre ...
