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Mark Kermode reveals the cinematic tricks and techniques used to create classic horror films, from The Phantom of the Opera to The Exorcist, Psycho to Get Out.

Mark Kermode continues his fresh and very personal look at the art of cinema by examining the techniques and conventions behind classic film genres, uncovering the ingredients that keep audiences coming back for more.

Mark turns to horror and shows how film-makers have devilishly deployed a range of cinematic tricks to exploit our deepest, darkest and most elemental fears. He explores the recurring elements of horror, including the journey, the jump scare, the scary place, the monster and the chase. He reveals how they have been refined and reinvented in films as diverse as the silent classic The Phantom of the Opera, low-budget cult shockers The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and The Evil Dead, and Oscar-winners The Silence of the Lambs and Get Out. Mark analyses the importance of archetypal figures such as the clown, the savant and the 'final girl'. And of course, he celebrates his beloved Exorcist films by examining two unforgettable but very different shock moments in The Exorcist and The Exorcist III.

Ultimately, Mark argues, horror is the most cinematic of genres, because no other kind of film deploys images and sound to such powerful and primal effect.

59 minutes

Last on

Sun 14 Jul 2024 00:50
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Music Played

Timings (where shown) are from the start of the programme in hours and minutes

  • 00:07

    Howard Shore, Munich Symphony Orchestra

    The Asylum

  • 00:15

    Goblin

    Suspiria

Credits

Presenter Mark Kermode
Executive Producer John Das
Executive Producer Richard Bright
Series Producer Nick Freand Jones

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