Thanks for the thoughtful response. I know that this subject has been dealt with in other ways on the CHFB, but I wanted to approach it a little differently. Horror is definitely alive and well, just not wolfmen, vampires and mad doctors. So true about education being a part of why people no longer seem interested in the old gothic or gothic-inspired horror. The passing of superststition, of the old peasant-small town kind, is indeed a contributing factor. There's still a lot of interest in spirituality, but there's less dogma. Many people like weird science and the fantastic, however it's usually more of the Roswell-Bigfoot-little green men kind. Old movie lovers can watch Edward Van Sloan holding forth on vampires, mummies and the like, but to try something along these lines today, in a contemporary setting, and it would likely not work.

it seems to me that the last nail in the coffin for old-style horror was the end of backlot filming and the rise of CGI. The latter has got a lot of attention and annoys many people. It's certainly created a Brave New World of magic and fantasy in films, however it's a world in which a Jack Pierce or a Willis O'Brien have no place. The more stylish old-fashioned horror persisted into the first half of the 70's, with the Dr. Phibes films being maybe the last first rate examples of it. Once the non-studio 'teen slasher genre arrived, it was over. George Romero had been there already, in terms of non-Hollywood horror several years earlier.

I agree that grabbing a camera and just doing it, doing it right, that is, is probably the best way to go, though I do miss those backlots. Talent helps.