People all over the world are getting ready to celebrate this fall’s Halloween. Halloween is an exciting yearly tradition where people have fun dressing up, eating candy, getting together and enjoying themselves overall. Halloween entertains us with haunted houses, creepy costumes, blood curling decorations and horror movies. These unique symbols make the holiday more thrilling and enjoyable in its own way.

Horror movies have been associated with Halloween for many years, keeping viewers entertained and on the edge of their seats wanting more. Horror movies can be traced all the way back to the original days of filmmaking, but in the early twentieth century had been well established with the new age of motion pictures and filmmakers creating fresh and unique ideas in the horror genre. According to history from the New York Film Academy, “Le Manoir du Diable,” sometimes known in English as “The Haunted Castle” or “ The House of the Devil,” was released in 1896, and is widely accepted to be the first horror movie.

The 1930s and 40s are now known as the “Age Of Horror,” an iconic era that brought classic figures such as Frankenstein, the mummy, Dracula, the Invisible Man, wolf man and many more to the silver screen. Although the genre was incredibly popular during this time, most film critics agree that the 1980s throughout the early 2000s was the peak of horror movies.

A new generation of horror monsters came to life in the 1980s: Jason, Freddy Krueger, Pinhead, and Michael Myers, along with many other scary characters. These characters have become Halloween classics, with each spawning film franchises that still release new movies to this day.

Horror movies can usually be sorted into the categories of supernatural, psychological or slasher. Supernatural movies regularly consists of ghost or paranormal activity; movies like “Insidious” or “The Exorcist” are supernatural. Physiological films go into the dark tales of the human mind keeping viewers interested, examples are movie like “Split” , “Us” or “Get Out”. Slasher movies are the idea of iconic characters who keep the viewers engaged with the unpredictable actions of fan favorite figures such as Freddy Krueger, Chucky and Michael Myers.

Without horror movies, Halloween would not be what it is today. Creepy films have captivated audiences and kept them wanting more throughout the years of evolution and history of the genre. Even though we associate these films with this time of year, it’s fun to get scared any time.