ABSTRACT
Chapter 1, “The Birth of the Black Boogeyman: Pre-1930s,” begins with silent films and “anthropological” shorts such as 1895’s Native Woman Washing a Negro Baby in Nassau to lay the groundwork for the ways in which Black people show up in the genre. This chapter describes how early (Black face) films such as 1904’s A Nigger in the Woodpile were not only presented as comedy shorts for non-Black audiences but could also be interpreted as horror with their depiction of violent, anti-Blackness. These films not only reflected the racist and white supremacist sensibilities of the time but also have a lingering impact on cinema that it, perhaps, has yet to shake. This chapter also examines the use of horror conventions by filmmaking innovator George Méliès, an illusionist and cinematographer who introduced one of the earliest “Blacks in horror” films on record. It also turns to D.W. Griffith, a film director who offered one of the most insidious and horrifying representations of Black people as, quite literally, bêtes noires, or black beasts.
