Since the film industry began, audiences have gone to monster movies to be thrilled and terrified. Today, directors are remaking classic monster movies like The Mummy and King Kong into violent action-adventures full of stunning special effects. But too often, in these flashy effects extravaganzas, the true art that made the original movies so successful is lost. Modern audiences are too quick to disregard the old versions of these films with the words ‘bad special effects, black and white, old’, when they have so much entertainment to offer, and can teach us a lot about successful and clever film-making.
The old monster movie was generally closer to horror than action, and showed very little violence. Instead, it made use of suspense and the power of the audience’s imagination to create fear and get a reaction. There was an art to how the original directors skilfully used more subtle suggestion to create tension.
The Mummy, released in 1932, was originally a horror movie. In 1999, when it was remade, it had become an adventure romp in the style of ‘Indiana Jones’. There is nothing wrong with that, and both films achieved exactly what they were intended to achieve. However, it is interesting to compare the films, and see how, although they are based on the same story, they are very different. The most noticeable difference between the two films is the lack of obvious special effects in the 1932 version. But effects were not necessary to create the desired feeling. Take, for example, the awakening scene, in which the mummy is raised from the dead. The 1999 mummy is a gooey, half-rotten corpse, and its first actions are to rip... The rest of this article is available to subscribers of Eyeline
Production still from King Kong, 1933. Courtesy of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and Michael Callaghan/Effie Holdings, Sydney
Production still from King Kong, 2005. © 2005 Universal Studios.
