These Are Some of the Best Recent Spanish Horror Movies
(We’ve all seen REC, might want to check out Julia’s Eyes, Sleep Tight, La Influencia)
Spain's take on horror cinema dates back to roughly 1962 with the release of
The Awful Dr. Orloff (Screams in The Night). Well regarded as the
first true horror film to be created in the Spanish-speaking language, the film instantaneously became
a global success due in part to its resemblance with
The Brides of Dracula (1960); however, its stylistic elements remained new and emerging, incorporating excessive violence and heightened nudity. The director, Jesus Franco, introduced the style, assimilating Hammer horror films from England into a distinctly Spanish cinema, and directed or co-directed over 200 movies as a result.
In all, Spain's most prominent filmmakers have always been looked at as innovators, transforming the ways in which viewers outside the country consume and analyze the cultural distinctions strategically placed within plot lines, separate from their own everyday norms.
Still reeling from post-war anxiety and human trauma, and suffering from the economic fallout of The Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) and the fascism of the Franco years even into the 1960s to the 1970s, Spanish horror movies portrayed the fears and anxieties attached to these uncertainties and reflected social and political pain points. Both jaw-dropping and spine quivering, these projects have increasingly boomed in the early
2000s,accurately illuminating the uneasiness tied to cultures, identities, and personal desires,
past and present day. These international scary movies continue to navigate viewers through a roller coaster of emotions, unleashed by the distinctive emergence of the new wave of Spanish horror. These are some of the best Spanish horror films of recent years.
