ABSTRACT
This chapter approaches the mix between horror and other genres – melodrama, science-fiction and thriller. First, it analyzes the combination between the melodramatic imagination and horror in two of the most outstanding films of the 21st century – La piel que habito/The Skin I Live In (Pedro Almodóvar) and Blancanieves (Pablo Berger, 2012). Specifically, it studies how both films address the interface gender/genre in questioning several building blocks of contemporary Spanish identity. Then it explores how Spanish cinema has approached postapocalyptic dystopias. On the one hand, it focuses on a variety of zombie narratives both in Spanish and English language; on the other, it scrutinizes a variety of films that utilize dystopian future scenarios to engage with current social formations and events such as economic inequality, racial bias and the effects of global pandemics. Finally, it analyzes the cinematic adaptation of Dolores Redondo’s best-selling novel40 The Baztán Trilogy into a three-film franchise. It examines how the films bring together a transnational mode of address – the serial killer framework – and local and regional elements that remit to Basque and Navarrese mythology in an attempt to create a mainstream product for all audiences.
