The American Nightmare

A valuable documentary to those who have seen 70s horror films, particularly the featured 6 by 5 directors. The film convincingly proposes that said wave of horror cinema reflected collective political and social traumas, but it somewhat overstates the importance of these underpinnings. Actually, the overtly polemical "Shivers" is the weakest of the batch featured, while Hooper's masterpiece "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" boasts a nuanced realism and has no agenda, no definite political allegory.

This needed to be at least three hours long.

interesting, but unfortunately it doesn't mention any contemporary films at all

Covers 1968-78, one film each from 4 directors plus make up artist Tom Savini. If you want to see just how unexpected the New Horror movement (no one calls it that) was, check out Ebert's contemporary review of Night of the Living Dead. The American Nightmare is a good, light intro, giving us a good feel of what influence very volatile personal and sociopolitical factors had on some of the most frightening movies of all time.

I've always been interested in where great horror comes from, both from a sociohistorical perspective and from the perspective of the brains making them. This, then, was right up my alley. Interviews from the great directors themselves are very enlightening, as these men are extraordinarily well-spoken and shed light on where their work came from. Main criticism is that there isn't enough of it, really; it's quite short and I'd like to see more in-depth analysis of these films.