12-02-2007, 11:52 PM
The last horror Gothic I've read is Dracula. I saw the movies before reading the book, and the book was a surprise. As I've noted in some other thread, the first half is great. It drags for a bit and then picks up for a good ending.
I guess it's not a horror gothic romance, but there are the sexual undercurrents in the stalking of two young women and the love story between Mina and Jonathan Harker. I guess I'm not as hung up on the classification. There are disturbing sections and characters in the book and any Gothic connoisseur should read it simply for the atmosphere and the worldwide vampire phenomenon it spawned. Who isn't freaked out by Renfield and the deserted ship that sails into England? It's a classic.
This weekend I watched the 1922 film Nosferatu and the first episode of the new CBS show Moonlight. Nosferatu has an ugly skeletal ghoulish vampire that will make any woman run screaming. Yuck! But this is really what Bram Stoker's vampire was and that was surprising to me. He was a creature of the dead and looked like it. Then Bela Lugosi came along and turned the character into a suave charmer. Gary Oldman's portrayal veered back and forth while Gerard Butler's Dracula 2000 was one sexy man. And, Moonlight has the vampire as a heartbreaking hero who only wants to do good.
What do you all think about these bloodsuckers? Do their stories belong under Horror or can they fall under Horror Gothic?
I guess it's not a horror gothic romance, but there are the sexual undercurrents in the stalking of two young women and the love story between Mina and Jonathan Harker. I guess I'm not as hung up on the classification. There are disturbing sections and characters in the book and any Gothic connoisseur should read it simply for the atmosphere and the worldwide vampire phenomenon it spawned. Who isn't freaked out by Renfield and the deserted ship that sails into England? It's a classic.
This weekend I watched the 1922 film Nosferatu and the first episode of the new CBS show Moonlight. Nosferatu has an ugly skeletal ghoulish vampire that will make any woman run screaming. Yuck! But this is really what Bram Stoker's vampire was and that was surprising to me. He was a creature of the dead and looked like it. Then Bela Lugosi came along and turned the character into a suave charmer. Gary Oldman's portrayal veered back and forth while Gerard Butler's Dracula 2000 was one sexy man. And, Moonlight has the vampire as a heartbreaking hero who only wants to do good.
What do you all think about these bloodsuckers? Do their stories belong under Horror or can they fall under Horror Gothic?