Hammer was period, their horrors were what they used to call costume pictures. Universal didn't adhere strictly to period and it's not difficult to see why. In the case of Dracula the book wasn't that old, the story, though written in the late Victorian era wasn't really tied to it. In 1931 it was less than forty years old, which made it nearly contemporary, as close to the early 30's as we are to when Stephen King's Carrie and Salem's Lot first appeared. Hard to believe, yet true. Were there to be new movie versions of those old Stephen King novels would they need to be set in their time frame or could they be updated easily enough? I'd say they'd update nicely.

It's tough to know what historical era the 1931 Frankenstein is set in. Universal-time, it seems. Some of the characters seem to be wearing contemporary clothing, others look more 19th century. I don't recall any cars or radios in the film, nor any mention of current events, so I guess it could be the previous century. Mary Shelley was early 19th century, Frankenstein a pre-Victorian novel. To me the James Whale film feels vaguely Victorian; if of that time most likely middle to late, after 1850.

Murders In the Rue Morgue is or appears to be set in more or less the same era in which Poe wrote and lived. It's stylistically atypical for Universal, or seems that way to me. One can see that it comes from that studio, it didn't feel Paramountish or Warnersish, yet it's easy to see that it's not Whale, not Browning (though it does have the ape and carny business).

Of the above films the last feels the most Hammerish or proto-Hammerish to me, yet it's the first two Hammer remade. Uni's other major early talkie horror, The Mummy, was remade by Hammer but I've never seen it or its sequels. The orignal is so satisfying to me I can't imagine anyone topping it, don't even want to see them try. (Whale's The Invsible Man is generally not classed as a pure horror, was set in modern England, yet as with Dracula its subject matter made it, for its time, flexible in terms of what era is could be set. It could have worked with a Victorian or Edwardian setting, looks fine to me set in 1933.)

Last Edited By: telegonus Sep 1 08 2:35 AM. Edited 1 times.