A New Heritage of Horror: The English Gothic Cinema

David Pirie’s acclaimed history of British gothic film and television has long been regarded as a foundational study of the roots of British horror, identifying it as ’the only staple cinematic myth which Britain can properly claim as its own.’

This edition has been revised and updated to include discussion of films and TV dramas that have been newly discovered, restored or released since publication of the previous edition in 2007, as well as addressing newly-emergent screenwriters, directors and genres.

Drawing on insider accounts and archival sources, David Pirie investigates the notion of horror versus realism in popular fiction, and analyses the horror boom that developed around films including The Others and 28 Days Later. He chronicles British horror cinema from its origins in Gothic literature traces the rise of Hammer Films, its key directors and films as well as its battles with the censors, explores major horror sub genres including comedy horror and sci-fi, and brings the story up to the present day, where horror is flourishing in new ways, with films such as Shaun of the Dead, Under the Skin and Censor; the rise of genres such as folk horror and films that tackle questions of race and gender, and the emergence of a new generation of writers and directors including Prano Bailey-Bond, Ben Wheatley and Edgar Wright.

David Pirie is a screenwriter, film producer, film critic, and novelist. A former Film Editor of Time Out, Pirie has written for publications including Sight and Sound, Monthly Film Bulletin, The Times, the Guardian and the Daily Telegraph. As a screenwriter, Pirie has achieved a reputation for his noirish original thrillers, classic adaptations and period gothic pieces including the hit ITV series Murderland starring Robbie Coltrane (2009). Pirie was nominated for a BAFTA for his adaptation of Wilkie Collins’s The Woman in White (BBC, 1997), and in 2018 he co-executive produced the BBC’s five hour production of the same novel, starring Jessie Buckley.Pirie is the creator of the Murder Rooms novels and BBC TV dramas inspired by the Sherlock Holmes stories. His work for TV and film includes the New York TV Festival award-winning Rainy Day Women (1984); Element of Doubt (1996), Natural Lies (1992); Ashenden (1991), and Black Easter (1995) and he also worked (uncredited) on the screenplay for Lars von Trier’s Oscar-nominated Breaking the Waves (1996