ABSTRACT
Horror movies are the hardy perennials of the cinema garden. Starting from that insight, the horror genre becomes a particularly interesting expression of the human psyche; and a rich seam for psychoanalytic film theorists, who point to all manner of repressed issues and regressive behaviour being manifested in these films. Horror films had their most celebrated flowering in the early 1930s in America. If The Cabinet of Dr Caligari epitomises the generalisation that European horror films of the period were predominantly psychological, then the movies of Lon Chaney well represent America's proclivity for a more physical type of horror. The idea of using the cinematic language of horror films when making a film based on true events is also taken up by writer-director Christian de Chalonge in his film Docteur Petiot. Thus medical horror movies give film-makers and audiences the chance to explore a very wide variety of issues.
