It's bad form to judge a book by its cover, but I've judged plenty of movies by their theatrical posters and VHS cover art in my day. And I'm not alone.
Growing up in that halcyon, pre-digital era, when film lovers didn't have perpetual access to the Internet Movie Database through their cell phones or iPads, posters and cover art were the only thing we had upon which to base our movie renting decisions. Copies of Fangoria and other horror-themed publications were too expensive to be purchased on a regular basis, and I spent countless hours walking up and down the aisles of my local video store, wearing a hole in the carpet of the horror section, trying to find a hidden gem buried in the pile of garbage on the shelf.
I love the horror movie posters and VHS box art of the '70s and '80s. So wonderfully silly, so delightfully zany! Back in those days, movie distributors knew they were selling crap, and the only way to entice video stores to buy it, and perpetual customers to rent it, was to come up with a madcap, crazy-looking picture to slap on the front. The worse the film, it seemed, the better the cover. Not always, but often.
Movie artwork has become decidedly mundane in recent years, however. Browsing the DVD and Blu-Ray racks at the Dickson City Best Buy or Wal-Mart is positively depressing: even movies that had phenomenal movie posters are being reissued onto DVD and Blu-Ray with absolutely garish covers. (Compare the phenomenal poster of David Lynch's The Elephant Man with its most recent DVD cover art, for instance. The mind reels. I wouldn't even have that travesty on my shelf, and The Elephant Man is one of my favorites movies!)
As such, I decided to put together this list of ten great horror movie posters from bygone years, starting in 1920 (back when the movies were pretty darn good!) and running all the way up to 1983, which is roughly when horror poster art began shifting towards the mainstream.
I do not claim that these are the best horror posters of all time. I say only that I love all of these posters very much, and I lament the fact that this style of artwork is no longer in vogue.
View the Classic Horror Movie Posters Slideshow
Enjoy!
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