H for Horrific: The Horror Movie Drought | Episode 2

Step back in time to a mysterious era of horror films and learn about the shocking history of the BBFC's "H for Horrific" card. 

Join Adam and Charlotte as they uncover the truth behind the horror movie drought of the 1930s. Their research unveils the impact of cultural, technological, administrative, and international pressures on the studios, causing them to shy away from the spine-chilling genre.

Find out how the introduction of sound in early talkies revolutionized horror films, terrifying audiences by omitting incidental music and making films more accessible to children. Witness the rise of censorship, the birth of rating systems, and the struggle of studios to navigate the restrictive rules imposed by censor boards.

The classic Bela Lugosi film "The Human Monster" is highlighted as a case study, being the first film ever to be rated H for Horrific by the BBFC. 

Get ready for a mesmerizing journey into the hidden history of horror films, revealing the captivating chain of events that led to the revival of horror cinema to a ravenously eager audience! 

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Transcript

H for Horrific

Adam: Welcome to a very scary edition of perf damage. 

Charlotte: I don't think anybody's scared by that. no. Okay. 

Adam: No, I tried. 

Charlotte: All right. 

Charlotte: Today we've got a little different format for you.

Charlotte: We are gonna do a retelling of a presentation that I gave at an AMIA conference a couple years ago. AMIA is an archivist conference stands for the association of moving image. Archivists. Archivists from all over the world come together and share stories, discuss issues, come up with solutions, , all kinds of stuff. And one of my favorite things that we do every year at this conference is you can submit clips from something that you've worked on.

Charlotte: Because again, it's all moving image, archivist. You can pick something that you worked on, that you wanna share with everybody. So it's a really fun chance to be able to get all that stuff that, you don't get to show anybody and you get to show it, in a theater and introduce it.

Charlotte: It's a lot of fun. So what type of stuff do you see 

Adam: generally? 

Charlotte: Oh man. You could see anything from outtakes, from a newscast or just all kinds of random stuff. Lots of shorts and things too. Yeah. It's a lot of fun and hopefully we'll be in person again this year. I think it's in Pittsburgh and I hope I get 

Adam: to go.

Adam: Ooh, that's where zombies were founded. What Pittsburgh, that's where Romero's from. Oh, like, what are you talking about? Zombies? Weren't founded there. 

Charlotte: That's I mean, that's what you said. 

Adam: As if they were elected officials or something. Yeah. 

Charlotte: There's a big statue in the middle of town.

Charlotte: 

Charlotte: Okay. All right. Keeping it spooky. Thanks for joining us here. 

Adam: So Charlotte, what was your presentation about? 

Charlotte: Well, I'm so glad you asked it was called H four horrific. I know we teased this a couple episodes ago. So H for horrific is a rating card in the UK in the 1930s 

Adam: how'd you stumble across the, the H for horrific 

Charlotte: card.

Charlotte: So I was working on the preservation of this film called the human monster. Originally it was released in the UK under the name, the dark eyes of London. So I'm doing some research into the title and I see that it, said to be the first film ever rated H for horrific.

Charlotte: And I thought, what the heck is that? That sounds amazing. You went, yes, please. I don't know. I mean, I'd never heard of this because, I'm used to us ratings and hearing about the code and that sort of thing. So I haven't really dealt with too many cards from the BBFC, especially from the 1930s.

Charlotte: So I had to find out more about this card and I just went down a rabbit hole what is this card? Where did it come from? Why was it called this? How long did it last? What movies got slapped with this card? So I did all this research 

Charlotte: and I thought it was so interesting. And my colleagues got really annoyed at me talking about it. 

Adam: Hey, but didn't one of them want to make an H for horrific shirt? 

Charlotte: no, those were colleagues of mine at the library of Congress.

Charlotte: I was trying to find a copy of the film that actually had the intact H for horrific card. See, that's something that was removed from the original negative and was replaced with the X, the X card. Yep the H for horrific card was replaced in the 1950s by the X rating. So their X rating is different than our X rating.

Charlotte: It is. But what would happen was they would go in and they would cut that off the original negative and they replaced it so that it was up to date because who cares about a rating card, but there's pictures out there of this H for horrific card.

Charlotte: No, you can 

Adam: find it on some prints for other movies. 

Charlotte: I was looking for the one for the dark eyes of London. Yeah. You were looking 

Adam: for the specific one. Yeah. Cause it lists the name of the title and everything in it. Mm-hmm and has it's an actual certificate mm-hmm it looks like it's stamped very official seal.

Charlotte: It's got signatures on it. Yeah. And signatures and everything different on each one. So I was trying to find it 

Charlotte: the library of Congress, helped me trying to locate a print and they said, if we find this, we need to make shirts.

Charlotte: And I said, yes, we do. Hopefully we'll find it one day. Maybe we'll make those shirts. 

Adam: Okay. So How did you get the panel at AMIA? What was your proposal like? 

Charlotte: Oh, my proposal was amazing. was 

Adam: it due tell, 

Charlotte: Do I just read a little bit from the proposal?

Charlotte: I 

Adam: would. Why not? Okay. Yeah. I think It'd be kind of interesting and an intrinsic way for people to hear what kind of things have to be submitted to get on a panel. All 

Charlotte: right. Well, I don't wanna spoil the whole presentation, so I'll just read the beginning and then we can sort of jump in and go through all the fun stuff.

Charlotte: While accessing different archives around the world for materials to preserve an older film, you always run the risk. That one or more of your elements will be from a different censored cut. When this happens, determining the true original version of the film is done by comparing multiple elements.

Charlotte: And by researching deep into the history of a title while gathering elements for the preservation of the Bela Lugosi film, the human monster, I stumbled upon a rating that was previously unknown to me, the BBFCs H four horrific card. During my investigation into the significance of the H for horrific card, I was shocked to find that there was a temporary stop in horror production in the late 1930s in both the us and the UK, even more alarming was that most theories maintained that the H for horrific card, along with the Hayes code were directly to blame for it.

Charlotte: Through further research. I determined that there were a myriad of factors that brought the cessation of production of horror feature films.

Charlotte: During the years, 1936 to 1938. In this presentation, I intend to examine the cultural technological administrative and international pressures that cause studio to steer clear of the material. The human monster will be used as a case study to examine the results of these outside forces being the first British horror film to carry the dreaded H for horrific rating in the UK and the allowances the studios had to make to resume production of horror films.

Charlotte: Well, I'm in 

Adam: So do you want to just get right into this? 

Charlotte: Before we jump into this, I really feel like we should warn the audience about what we're about to talk about.

Adam: How do you, do we feel that it would be a little unkind to begin this presentation without a word of friendly warning. We're about to unfold. One of the strangest tales ever told it deals with two great forces of Hollywood film, studios and censorship. I think it may thrill you. It may shock you. It might even horrify you.

Adam: If you feel that you do not want to subject your nerves to such a strain leave, now's your chance can say we didn't warn you

Charlotte: While preserving films, oftentimes the film archivist will find themselves reaching out and accessing different archives for materials when borrowing elements from different locations around the world, you'll often find that your materials don't always match.

Charlotte: Sometimes elements don't match because damaged sections had to be removed sometimes it's because the film was shortened for time, like many Roy Rogers films, which were cut for television 

Adam: and they actually cut the original negatives on those. Right. That's right.

Charlotte: We're fortunate that we have friends at the BFI, the British film Institute who let us borrow copies. And a lot of times they have a second or third generation element that we can access.

Charlotte: That will be the full cut . So we'll use their full cut . As a guide. And we'll insert the original negative, where we can. And that's how we reassemble 'em. 

Adam: I think that's really cool that you are resembling the original versions of those old Roy Rogers, cuz for generations now people have only been able to see them in, in the television form.

Adam: That's 

Charlotte: right. And a lot of them, they would cut out the songs. Oh, the best parts. Yeah. They cut those for television. So many of them are missing songs. Theatrically. They were only a little over an hour, but they had to cut them to under an hour to make room for commercials commercials.

Charlotte: Yeah. And sometimes in the negative, they've actually spliced in the little sponsors message card. Oh, that's kind of cool. Yeah. Yeah. So we preserve those too. Nice.

Charlotte: Sometimes the reason why different elements don't match is because one version was censored for content. When this happens, determining the true original version of a film can be tricky. 

Charlotte: That's why preservation work is often begun with research into the title and production of the film.

Charlotte: In 2018, I started preservation work on the Bela Lugosi film, the human monster. Originally this film was released in the UK as the dark eyes of London in 1939, because it was originally a UK title.

Charlotte: I reached out to the BFI who not only held the original negative, but graciously let us borrow it for the preservation work while gathering elements for the preservation. I didn't find a different censored cut between the us and the UK elements. 

Charlotte: But what I did find was that this film was said to be the first ever to receive the H for horrific certificate from the BBFC in the UK upon its release. Now, if you've never heard of this rating before, you're not alone, because at the time this was completely new to me as well.

Charlotte: To my surprise. Many scholars maintained that the age for horrific card in the UK was directly to blame for a horror movie band that affected both the us and the UK and the late 1930s. Now the mention of a horror movie band wasn't new, but this was the first time I'd heard it blamed on a UK specific rating card.

Charlotte: Naturally I soon found myself with more questions than answers. 

Charlotte: Before we go any deeper, if you've never heard tales of the horror movie band of the 1930s, don't feel too bad. 

Charlotte: It's a niche subject, but if you're into vintage horror, it's something that pops up in the horror community. There are numerous books that cover the topic of a horror movie ban 

Charlotte: The book universal horrors, the studio's classic films by Tom Weaver, Michael Brunis and John BNIs is a book about the golden age of horror. And it says 

Adam: with an outright ban on horror movies imposed by the British Commonwealth, 

Charlotte: The monster show a book about the history of horror by David J Skal says 

Adam: Britain chose not to look at horror films from America, despite the ban universal felt the domestic market was strong.

Charlotte: There's a book that censored screams by Tom Johnson, which is a whole book about the British ban.

Charlotte: And even on the cover, it says 

Adam: the British ban on Hollywood horror in the thirties. 

Charlotte: And then a Val Lewtin book featuring the dark by Edward G Bansak says the 

Adam: eighth certificate was the kiss of death for Universal's horror exports. 

Charlotte: The info even appears on the B BF C's own website. 

Adam: Historically the B BFC has often treated horror as a special case. And in the late 1930s actually introduced an H for horror rating to warn the public of the likely content of such works. Indeed. Horror films were banned in case they damaged public morale, often not being released until several years later when their initial power to disturb had somewhat waned.

Charlotte: The horror movie band is also mentioned in loads of history of horror documentaries.

Charlotte: The popularity of horror films soared in the 1930s. So I wanted to examine all the films that came out since the early 19 hundreds and see how many horror films were usually released in a year.

Charlotte: This brought up the question, how does something get labeled a horror film? The word horror is so subjective 

Adam: People in the horror community are saying, that's not horror.

Adam: Well, this isn't horror. 

Charlotte: Yeah. Sometimes a thriller is labeled as horror. 

Adam: Right. It's a very subjective term. what you find horrific is not the same thing that I find horrific or frightening.

Adam: Right. And that's why I think it's a tough genre to actually pin down. 

Charlotte: Right. And looking at all the movies that came out, all this data is coming from I M D B. And a lot of that input is all user input. So again, very subjective and you get a lot of dirty 

Adam: data. So you'll get a crime picture, which is clearly a crime picture labeled as a horror 

Charlotte: picture.

Charlotte: And what is horror? What's the definition of horror? 

Adam: The actual definition of horror, the quality of something that causes feelings of fear, dread and shock. 

Charlotte: very subjective, massively 

Adam: subjective.

Charlotte: There's another definition here. Something that is difficult to deal with or watch, because it is so bad or unpleasant, 

Charlotte: you know, I could label a lot of your trash films as horror if that's the case.

Adam: Well, some of them are, but some of them are just unpleasant to sit through. I agree. They're 

Charlotte: difficult to deal with or watch because it is so bad. Yes. 

Charlotte: So in looking through films that were labeled as horror films, there were a few things that came up that were totally not horror films. One of 'em was the hound of BA villas that was labeled as a horror film. That's a crime detective picture. 

Charlotte: Another one was SOS coast guard, which is a Republic serial. It happens to start be Lugosi, it's not horror at all, but because bay lives in it, it's labeled as horror.

Charlotte: There was a film, the ticket of leave man about a man wrongfully accused of a series of murders committed by a crazed killer and he must prove his innocence and catch the murderer.

Charlotte: This was labeled as horror. 

Adam: Probably cuz of the word crazed killer 

Charlotte: this brought up the question is this the result of algorithms that are labeling movies as horror based on keywords, like Bela Lugosi is in it. So it's gotta be horror or are these user contributions? That data is not available. 

Charlotte: So for this research, we only looked at stuff that was released in the us and UK, since that's where this supposed horror movie band happened,

Charlotte: There were no films that were labeled as horror during the horror movie band years. So by the numbers, we can clearly see that something happened. Whether movies were mislabeled as horror or not. Nothing was labeled as horror during those years.

Charlotte: in the early 1930s, the PCA code, what's the PCA code, it's the production code administration and the British board of film sensors. Both released warnings against horror films.

Charlotte: That's when this all started. So what changed in the 1930s? To begin. I jumped back to horror films of the 1920s to see what all changed with the genre over the decade, 

Charlotte: there were plenty of horror films released in the 1920s. So what put the world into such a panic in the 1930s, where horror films in the 1930s, just much more scary and horrifying to look at than their predecessors.

Charlotte: In my opinion, the makeup is often more disturbing in horror films of the 1920s than films that followed a decade later. Just look at lawn Chaney's makeup and the fantom of the opera, which if you don't know, he applied this makeup himself, it's definitely unnerving.

Charlotte: If you slip on your 1920 shoes, remember that many soldiers were returning home wounded and disfigured from world war I, 

Charlotte: this was the Dawn of plastic surgery, and it wasn't uncommon to see horrific photos like these, that heavily resembled Cheney's makeup in the Phantom of the opera. 

Charlotte: I don't think the correlation between Cheney's makeup and wounded vets is a coincidence. 

Charlotte: The Phantom of the opera was actually banned for a handful of years in the UK for being too horrifying for general distribution. 

Adam: Lon Cheney's noseless face is very, very similar to a famous world war I veteran picture where the guy was actually missing his nose.

Adam: And I think that's where he got his actual inspiration for that. 

Charlotte: Horror films often reflect what's happening in society. And that was sort of the most horrific thing that people were seeing. 

Adam: Yeah. It wasn't uncommon, these people came home maimed and, you would see that in daily life, so that, constant reminder of the horrors of war was surrounding you at all times. And it changed fundamentally what we consider scary. Because you now are seeing it for real.

Charlotte: So the interesting thing is you have this scary makeup in the 1920s, but you didn't have CENS freaking out like they did in the 1930s.

Charlotte: So if it's not the makeup, what else changed in the 1930s?

Charlotte: Was it just censorship in general? Well, the silent era also had its own battles with censorship let's jump back. Even further. In the late 18 hundreds movies arrived in the us and critics sailed them as a threat to morality in the early 19 hundreds, Chicago enacted the first movie censorship law in America, cities and states around the nation created local censorship boards in the following years resulting in a variety of different rules and standards.

Charlotte: This means every state had its own censorship rules. 

Charlotte: It's like when you go to an airport in different areas of the country and all their TSA has different rules. Some of 'em require this summer.

Adam: Do I take my shoes off? does my laptop have to go in its own thing? Yeah. It's always different, no matter where 

Charlotte: you go. So for studios to release a movie in any of these states, they had to follow each state's individual rules. 

Charlotte: In 1909, the national board of censorship is created after complaints about indecent films being released 

Charlotte: In 1912 in the UK, the British board of film sensors started introducing the aisles to the U for universal and a for adult ratings. We're gonna refer to the British board of film sensors as the B BFC.

Charlotte: . In 1915. The Supreme court holds that movies are not protected by the first amendment.

Charlotte: The ruling allows state and local boards to continue censoring films that same year, the NAACP and others protest against birth of a nation DW Griffith's film about the civil war and reconstruction, which insights riots in Ohio, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Colorado. It will become the most banned film in the us history because of its controversial racial content.

Charlotte: In 1916 in the UK, the national council of public morals was created in 1922. The motion picture producers and distributors of America, is formed, led by former postmaster general William H.

Charlotte: Hayes. The birth of censorship happened alongside the birth of film. They've always been inseparable twins, censorship alone cannot be solely to blame for the horror movie band

Charlotte: Okay, so the makeup was scary in the 1920s sensors have been around just as long as movies themselves have. So what else changed in horror in the 1930s? The biggest change sound.

Charlotte: In the late 1920s and early 1930s movies were transitioning from silence to talkies. And this was an adjustment for audiences. Movie goers were certainly used to hearing music with movies. As many were accompanied by piano music played by someone in the theater.

Charlotte: When we got 

Charlotte: around to adding sound on picture, the filmmakers of early talks really overthought things.

Charlotte: They felt that audiences would not understand incidental music just playing in the background of a scene. And so they only added music when the source of the music clearly be identified within the scene, like at an opera or a street musician that's called 

Adam: diegetic sound. That's right. If it happens within the frame and you can see it happening, that is diegetic  sound.

Charlotte: So I'd say, oh, Hey, I really like this band we're watching. Yeah. They're really great, 

Adam: bro. This band is 

Charlotte: really rocking. Yeah. I love this. Do you want another beer? I'm gonna go get a beer. 

Adam: I love beer. Let's help beer. 

Charlotte: Yeah. Enjoy the music. I'll be 

Adam: right back. Okay. I'm listening to this music. That's happening right there.

Adam: Yeah. On the stage. You see that band. 

Charlotte: Okay. I think they got the point. Okay. Whereas incidental music.

Charlotte: That's just, when you're talking and music happens to be playing and it makes what I'm saying more thrilling or jaws, think of jaws with the music 

Adam: Jaws, wasn't actually making that, that music wasn't coming from his fan. It wasn't no, he didn't have like a little speaker on there or, or anything like 

Charlotte: that.

Charlotte: But you can't have jobs without that music, but it's incidental music. It is incidental 

Adam: music.

Adam: I think that's a really funny concept because prior to that, during silence, someone would be playing an organ or a piano in the room.

Adam: So they always had incidental music playing over every image that they ever saw. 

Charlotte: But again, they could clearly see the source 

Adam: of the music. Yeah. But it wasn't a DGE source. It wasn't within the frame. It was outside. It was extra diegetic . So therefore it was incidental music. That's the funny thing 

Charlotte: I'd love to sit in on these arguments that people had about this.

Adam: Yeah, I think it was, it would be like, no, I don't think they're going to be able to understand that. Where are they from? No, that's the way they always talk in the old 

Charlotte: movies. Oh really fast and Nasally. 

Adam: They're not gonna understand cuz they can't see the music being played on the screen. you're supposed to talk back to me in, in a voice similar to that.

Adam: I just 

Charlotte: can't I'm just laughing too much. 

Adam: come on. It's so ridiculous. What's your 1920s voice. I, I don't know, bro. You had too much beer. Yeah. At the rock concert. I 

Charlotte: think I had too much beer at that concert. I can't think straight bro. but this music man, this music on the stage 

Adam: right in front of us is great.

Adam: It is pretty great music. That's happening right in front of us. Yeah, bro, on that stage. Cool. Catch you later, bro. All right bro. 

Charlotte: We're dumb if you don't know already. We're really dumb. All right. So let's talk about Dracula. Dracula was released in 1931. 

Charlotte: To tie this in to what we're talking about with incidental and detic sound Dracula only has music playing under the opening credits and when Dracula visits the symphony in London and people can clearly be seen playing instruments on the stage.

Charlotte: So imagine that audiences who were used to silent films, which had live and sometimes recorded music, but no voices were at the beginning of the sound era experiencing talkies, which featured voices. With hardly any music at all. During this transition audiences found themselves in talkies, they were possibly more silent than silent films had been before.

Charlotte: It's hard to imagine what this transition was like

Charlotte: So we've decided to do a little experiment, suspend your belief for a minute. And let's imagine that the horror film Dracula has been released as a silent picture 

Charlotte: let's play a scene from Dracula the way it was released and listen to the absence of the music and how creepy that makes it.

Charlotte: Now Notice how silent that clip was and how that lack of sound really amplifies the scare factor. 

Charlotte: It's so much more creepy without music underneath when you just have the howling and the rustling, and then you've got bail's voice 

Charlotte: So let's imagine that the horror film Dracula has been released as a silent picture 

Charlotte: We'll pair it with a popular little piano song. Maybe what they might have heard in the day. 

Charlotte: So there's gonna be cards. We'll read the cards for you since you can't see them, but we'll try to describe what's happening in the picture 

Adam: fade in a Gothic window. There's bats with bats 

Charlotte: fluttering around a man's looking around a room. 

Adam: Oh, someone's walking slowly down the stairs. He's an Armadillo. Randomly 

Charlotte: creepy man. Walking down the stairs. Oh, up. He's saying something. I am Dracula. Whoa. Guy looks at him from the bottom of the stairs. He starts walking up towards him.

Charlotte: I don't know why you would now the Dracula guy's pointing outside. He's talking. What's he saying, listen to them. Children of the night, what music they make.

Adam: Okay. Okay. He's still standing like that. He's got his arms out, stretched all at 

Charlotte: the guy at the bottom of the stairs. Looks, fade out Cris. Okay. Cause remember we don't have Bela LAI's voice there. So we don't know what he sounds like. 

Adam: I mean, we all know what he 

Charlotte: sounds like, but back in the, if it was a silent film, you wouldn't have read that.

Charlotte: Like that's true. Yeah. You wouldn't know. So you just read like, Hey Dracula, if you know, you're you. Yeah. If he's from the 

Adam: Bronx. Yeah. Hey Hey yo, Jonathan Naka, what you throwing 

Charlotte: down there, 

Charlotte: as we know, Dracula was not a silent film, but it is credited as the first talkie horror film.

Charlotte: The addition of audible dialogue meant that films were now more accessible to children. Since reading inner titles was no longer required to follow along with the story. In the early thirties, with the rise in popularity of horror films with the sudden flood of children pouring into theaters in the early 1930s there were many outcry from morality, campaigners, including the newly formed Catholic Legion of decency. As a result, many films of various genres were being substantially cut or even banned all together.

Charlotte: Their main goal wasn't necessarily to band films, but more so to protect children from seeing these movies. In England freaks, an island of lost souls were banned outright and films like Dr. Jeckle and Mr. Hyde had to be cut by over 700 feet before it could be released

Charlotte: in the us, both Scarface and convention city were banned

Charlotte: All right. So let's talk about the BBFC for a second here. Since it's inception in 1912, the UK only had two official ratings. You, which stood for universal, meaning that the film was suitable for all audiences, a for adult, which required anyone under 16 to be accompanied by an adult, snow white, and the seven doors received an, a rating on its initial release.

Adam: That's so weird.

Adam: You know, that whistle while you work that's a horrible, horrible song for kids. Well, 

Charlotte: it's unpleasant and something you don't wanna listen to. Wasn't that the definition of horror yeah. I guess somebody didn't like that. They didn't want to it to get stuck in their head.

Charlotte: In the early thirties, it was becoming painfully obvious that having such a black and white approach to censorship was not going to cut it to try and help appease the morality. Campaigners who cried that the B, B, C needed to do something to protect impressionable children.

Charlotte: And as a way to help the film studios by not having to band films, the B, B, C introduced the H for horrific advisory card. The H advisory was added to alert parents of horror themed material. It did not officially prohibit anyone from seeing a film, but some local councils ruled that only those age 16 or older could be admitted.

Charlotte: This advisory was put on the films that weren't quite bad enough to be band outright, but also that weren't okay. Enough to receive the a for adult rating in a way it was sort of like their unrated label

Charlotte: Back in the us in 1933, the Roman Catholic national Legion of decency was founded and began to rate films independently, putting pressure on the film industry, although both the B, B, C, and precursor to the MPAA were established early on. It wasn't until 1934, that censorship really started gathering steam.

Charlotte: Both boards began issuing stern warnings to the studios advising against the production and release of horror films,

Charlotte: but that didn't really phase Hollywood because the 1930s gave us horror films from all studios, 

Charlotte: When you think of horror in the 1930s, one studio stands out above all others universal. Now they didn't make the most films during the 1930s, but they were the most popular and financially successful Frankenstein in 1930. One made 12 million, which is equivalent to about 200 million today.

Charlotte: So let's talk about universal for a second. 

Adam: Carl Laemmle founded and ran universal and his son, Carl Laemmle Jr. Became the youngest, president of production ever in the early 1930s. Yeah. In the early 1930s, they called him the wonder kid. 

Charlotte: He loved horror films. He absolutely did. And

Charlotte: he's the reason universal produced the most iconic horror of the era, right? I 

Adam: He was directly responsible for both Dracula, which was a play first and then followed by Frankenstein, which was a book. 

Charlotte: But only a few years later, universal went massively over budget on showboat. And they ended up having to sell most of universal. Well, he burned 

Adam: bright what can you say? Right. Yeah. . 

Charlotte: In 1936, 80% of universal stock was bought by an associate producer named Charles Rogers, who at the time was employed at paramount pictures.

Charlotte: Universal was renamed new universal, and it reduced production and it closed European operations.

Charlotte: Charles Rogers was aware of the PCA and the BBFC, and the warnings that they had issued towards the so-called genre films. 

Adam: Also in 1936 Dracula's daughter. Produced, which was the last of the Laemmle era pictures. Dracula daughter was one of the most censored pictures of the time period too. Oh, really? Yeah. It was cut heavily everywhere that it was shown for lesbianism.

Adam: Oh, There was no actual lesbianism, but it was implied. Right. And that's what killed people. So they chopped that movie to shreds. 

Charlotte: So that was sort of the, the nail on the 

Adam: coffin. It pretty much was, you know, it's, it's funny that they sold the year that it was actually produced because that movie was the one that really caused a lot of commotion.

Charlotte: .In 1936, the studio released an official announcement saying that they would 

Adam: go in for less tense drama and so called horror pictures and make more pictures to amuse and enthuse audiences, .

Charlotte: So the company we think of that made horror films in the thirties, stopped making them for a while in 1930s, they were actually the first ones to stop doing it. Yeah. 

Adam: 1936. Yeah. I mean we didn't mention all the other ones. They did like mad love in 35.

Adam: Oh there's so many. Yeah, they were producing a lot of horror pictures. It was their bread and butter at the time. So yeah. Junior loved it. Yeah. Well it was making them money too. 

Charlotte: okay. 

Charlotte: So let's go back to the UK for a second. In 1937, the H advisory label officially became the H for horrific certificate, joining both the U for universal and a for adult rating. Now, the difference here is that the certificate officially banned the attendance of children under the age of 16, from attending a film.

Charlotte: Meanwhile, in America, film studios continued to battle the PCA, under the watchful eye of Joseph brain 

Charlotte: Both boards Issued stern warnings to the studios, advising against making horror films, creating the fear that no horror would be able to receive a passable rating.

Adam: Unlike Hayes brain took his job very seriously.

Adam: Hayes was a little more laid back and let the studios get away with a lot of stuff. Well, I think they could whine and dine him. Yes. He liked the attention and he liked being a man about town mm-hmm 

Charlotte: in 1933, the Roman Catholic national Legion of decency was founded and began to rate films independently, putting pressure on the.

Charlotte: The motion picture producers and distributors of America 

Charlotte: had up until then enforced the motion. Picture industry's own self censorship standards. Albeit not very seriously. 

Adam: Yeah. Self censorship being the operative word in that sentence. 

Charlotte: Hayes, who had been in charge of enforcing this voluntary code since 1927, worried that the NLDS efforts could weaken his own power and that of his office and hurt industry profits Hayes appointed the tough Irish Catholic Joseph B to the head, the production code administration, the PCA, a newly created department of the M P P D a Which was created to administer the motion, picture production code, unlike previous attempts at self censorship the PCA decisions became binding. No film could be exhibited in an American theater without a stamp of approval from the PCA, any producer attempting to do so face to fine of at least $25,000.

Adam: You know, what's funny is that, in a lot of ways, this is still in practice with the MPA. many, , theatrical distributors still will not carry a film that is unrated. 

Charlotte: But studios liked controversial genre cycles like horror because a little bit of controversy could increase box office performance. As soon as the H for horrific card was official, Joseph Breen used this opportunity to issue stern warnings to Hollywood studios when they submitted a horror script for approval.

Adam: So basically he would say things like, are you sure you wanna make a picture like this because it's not gonna be able to play overseas, 

Charlotte: We won't be able to show this and they won't be able to show it in the UK because of that H for horrific card.

Adam: When probably none of that was really true. 

Charlotte: So in 1937, we toss out a lot of dates here. I know a lot of dates and facts and things, but in 1937, the H for horrific advisory officially became the H for horrific card, which bans anyone under 16 from seeing a film in the UK. 

Charlotte: Although horror films held strong at the box office studios were adjusting to living within the lines of the code, and no one wanted to risk making a film that would get banned in 1936, no horror films were put into production and only a few were released into theaters much to the sensors delight. It seemed that the horror film cycle was finally.

Charlotte: the second coming of horror was caused by a double feature that reignited the public's passion for horror.

Charlotte: Towards the end of 1938, a small movie theater in Los Angeles took a chance on a double bill, pairing Frankenstein and Dracula for a weekend little did they know this would become an overnight sensation? More screenings were added until the double feature was running almost 24 hours a day.

Charlotte: Lines of patrons hungry for horror queued up around the block causing police to be called, to control the crowd. Universal took notice and began to strike new prints to rent, to theaters around the country and fast tracked son of Frankenstein into production. In 1939, the horror drought was over the depression was coming to an end and more horror films than ever before. Returned to film studio slates horror was officially back, but as promised the sensors did not make it easy for them to receive a passable rating

Charlotte: now that brings us back to the human monster in the start of this project. The dark eyes of London later released in the us as the human monster became the first British horror film released with the H for horrific certificate. The certificate banned anyone 16 and under accompanied or not from seeing the film, but like the other BBFC certificates, this was still left up to local councils to enforce in the us censorship was enforced at the state level.

Charlotte: And although the code had to approve the films first, each state could request a myriad of cuts to the film or changes to advertisements before a film could be released in their territory.

Charlotte: The us markets were not keen on the human monster in fact, the production code administration sent a very stern letter to monogram pictures in January, 1940. After a preview screening, one note stated 

Adam: brutal details are not necessary for plot motivation.

Adam: In our opinion, specifically, they violate the code 

Charlotte: and they went further on to say from 

Adam: a moral and psychological standpoint, this picture is a disgrace. 

Charlotte: Several states had similar views on what was decent for the public. Remember at this time, states were still in control of censoring.

Charlotte: There's a drowning scene in the human monster that many states asked to be removed 

Adam: in their defense. It is pretty brutal scene, especially for the time period.

Charlotte: Pennsylvania, asked for changes to be made to the advertisements for the film. They wanted anything objectionable to women or referencing violence or showing dead bodies to be removed. If you look at the six lobby cards released for the human monster, that leaves two outta six.

Charlotte: There's another scene in the film where a dead guy is dragged across the floor before he is tossed out of a window states like Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and Illinois, all ask for this scene to be removed.

Charlotte: fortunately all of these scenes were still in the original negative held by the BFI. 

Charlotte: As you can see censorship, wasn't a one size fits all. And due to this, several scenes have been lost forever due to censorship. For example, the original ending to freaks is lost because it was censored. 

Charlotte: now How big of an impact did the H for horrific certificate have?

Charlotte: Unfortunately, the number of films that were slapped with this certificate is not conclusive because the B, B, C suffered a fire during world war II and many records were lost.

Charlotte: However we do know the following films were rated H for horrific dark eyes of London, the 13th chair, the monster walks the gorilla, the cat in the Canary, the ghost of Frankenstein, the return of the vampire voodoo man, the fall house of usher, captive wild woman, and more, oddly enough, no films were actually banned in the UK between 1936 and 1942.

Adam: So there was no actual ban. No, there was no horror ban. 

Charlotte: Banning films in 1950 in the UK, the rating system was changed. Again. The age for horrific rating was replaced and retired by the trendier X rating. The change in the rating system happened in the us too.

Charlotte: Were ratings were changed and strictly enforced . 

Adam: . did you know that this whole scenario repeated itself in the eighties with the video nasties? 

Charlotte: No. What are the video? 

Adam: Nasties was a term that was applied to a group of films that were outright Bann.

Adam: In the UK on video in the 1980s. What kinds of films? Films like Andy Warhol's flesh for Frankenstein. Pagus blood feast, the burning. Oh, so horror films, all horror films. I'm sorry. Yes. All horror films, cannibal Holocaust was one of them. And during that time, period, if you were renting these films, you could be arrested and prosecuted.

Adam: They would actually raid video stores, little mom and pop stores, confiscate the videos destroy them publicly so that people could see it happen. And then they would prosecute people.

Adam: Wow. Yeah, 

Charlotte: that seems a lot more intense than the old age for horrific 

Adam: cards. It was some of these movies were not available in the UK uncut until the DVD era, 

Adam: This moral outrage tends to flare up 

Charlotte: periodically, but it's always around what we think is right for children to watch, . And that's what 

Adam: the video NAS was too, because kids would go and rent movies. Right. And parents were out at work and they would watch them and the parents would come home and catch them watching these, movies that were kind of based around special vex technology at the time that had advanced to a point where things looked very realistic.

Adam: Right. And that's what caused the moral outrage again, it was your kids renting these 

Charlotte: films. Yeah. We always wanna tell other people how to raise their kids and what their kids should and shouldn't do. 

Adam: Hey, look, I watched all those movies when I was a kid. Exactly. And I turned out just fine poster child right 

Charlotte: there.

Charlotte: Yeah, just fine.

Charlotte: There were many factors that played into the horror movie hiatus in the 1930s. And although it's easy to point to the rise of censorship as the most direct cause I believe the real story is much more complex, resulting from a chain of events that all played a key role advancements in technology made horror films, scarier and more accessible to children.

Charlotte: The rise of children in theaters caused morality campaigners to demand that C boards in the us and UK officially enforced their guidelines, the official enforcement of the production code and BBFC certificates in the mid 1930s made the new regime at universal who had led the charge on horror exercise, more caution, and subsequently remove horror films from their.

Charlotte: As the depression got worse, it made it less desirable for other film studios to take a chance on potentially band or adult only horror films. And soon none were being made. All of these factors added up to make horror films, too much of a gamble to produce as studios figured out how to navigate and break the rules imposed by various sensor boards. The drought lasted only a few years until studios could no longer overlook the financial advantages of releasing horror films to a ravenously eager audience 

Charlotte: before we go, I wanna send a very special thank you to Katherine Claypool who helped me do all the research and perform this presentation at AMIA a couple years ago. I'd also like to thank the BFI for having the original negative for this and for all their help with research into the H for horrific card, the Herrick library who has all of the back and forth correspondence between the production code of America and the studio.

Charlotte: I'd also like to think the authors of the books that were just invaluable research for this whole project, for the documentaries that came out thanks the LOC. You guys are great.

Charlotte: And thanks to everybody who listened to me. Talk about this for at least a year before doing this presentation. 

Adam: Well, I think it was really interesting 

Charlotte: and thanks to Adam for collaborating and for all of your help with this you were as much a part of this whole thing as I was.

Adam: Aw, thanks. 

Adam: Thanks for joining us again. And thanks 

Charlotte: for listening to 

Adam: this. Our very spooky edition, the audible damage, 

Charlotte: the audio only presentation. It's really hard, cuz I love including clips and all kinds of fanciness and a presentation. So trying to figure out how to just do a, a talky only version of this is a little difficult, but hopefully it was entertaining and informative.

Adam: So did you 

Charlotte: like this style podcast? Do you want more like this that go deep dives into little micro things in cinema? Or do you like the rambling. Yeah. I think each has its place, but let us know 

Adam: Informed rambling. Thanks again for joining us. We'll see you next time here on per damage. 

Adam: Congratulations. You have survived this episode of perf damage. Please join us again next week for another exciting and informative episode of perf damage.

Charlotte: I don't know where this guy's 

Adam: from. He doesn't know where he is from. .

Adam: You know, what's funny. This is another little fact about H is for horrific. Say that again. This is another little fact about H is for horrific.

Adam: Say that again.

Adam: Here's another little fact about H is for horrific. 

Charlotte: Say that again. What did I say wrong that time? 

Adam: H for horrific H O H is for horrific is what I keep saying. Say that again? Here's another little stop smiling. Say that again. Here's another little fact about H for horrific previously released films like Frankenstein and Dracula were re were rerated were rerated H for. So 

Charlotte: hayes, who had been in charge of enforcing the voluntary code since 1927, worried that the NLDS efforts that's the national league of decency Legion, not the league in a, not of superhero group.

Adam: That would be cool if they were though, 

Charlotte: the national Legion of decency, 

Adam: I mean, H for horrific didn't actually ban the film. No, it just banned kids from seeing the film. Correct. 

Charlotte: So kind of like an R rating would do today, right?

Charlotte: Only it's 17. Yeah. 17. Yeah. That's really unfair. Cuz you get your driver's license at 16 and you think, oh, I'm going to that horror film and they won't let you in. Well, 

Adam: why 17? Why 17? Everything else is 18. Yeah. Why 

Charlotte: 17 

Adam: for movies that doesn't make sense to me?