Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		4.0
Overall		3.5

Eli Roth's History of Horror: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie Review

Monster mashup.

Reviewed by Randy Miller III November 4, 2020

AMC's accurately-named Eli Roth's History of Horror treats viewers to a lightweight, informal tour of the popular genre. Each 40-odd minute episode is hosted by the polarizing torture porn director, who's surrounded by plenty of big names including Stephen King, John Landis, Edgar Wright, Quentin Tarantino, Rob Zombie, Greg Nicotero, Linda Blair, Leonard Maltin, Jamie Lee Curtis, Elijah Wood, Joe Dante, and dozens more, many of which appear in more than one of this first season's seven episodes. Grouped together by subject, these outings include "Zombies", "Slashers" (parts 1 and 2), "The Demons Inside", "Killer Creatures", "Vampires", and "Ghost Stories", with a second season already underway as of last month. Although hampered by annoying format issues, History of Horror mostly skates by on the strength of its source material and should entertain just about anyone who doesn't know all this stuff by heart.

All seven episodes are relatively laid-back and accessible, with interviews either presented one-on-one or in a loose roundtable format. Not surprisingly for this type of material, most of them play out like a series of mini-commentaries or behind-the-scenes featurettes, with key contributors often sharing personal memories from the set, revealing their influences as an actor/director, or just gushing like fans. Respect is also routinely heaped upon genre legends, some of whom appear via archival clips. Lots of classic horror fare is covered from partial/full franchise entries like Halloween, Friday the 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre; stand-alone classics such as Psycho, Shaun of the Dead, and Universal monster movies; no shortage of popular horror-themed TV shows like The Walking Dead (naturally) and True Blood; plus lesser-seen fare including Nightmare City, Maniac, and Black Christmas. Special effects -- mostly of the practical variety, but also some CGI -- is also part of the discussion, as well as the mixed reception of increasingly gory fare since Night of the Living Dead broke the squishy mold in 1968.

Unfortunately, the series' lightweight and fanboy-friendly tone ultimately works against it, or at least prevents it from digging as deep as the genre deserves. But History of Horror's main handicap can be traced right back to its title: Eli Roth just cannot resist the urge to place himself front and center here. Forget the fact that he's nowhere near a big enough genre fixture to feel like a credible host; he's also featured regularly during interviews, often diverting attention away from subjects or shown via nodding reaction shots. But really, it's not like we couldn't see it coming: the title itself was already a dead giveaway, and the Blu-ray cover art places him in front of much more recognizable horror icons. (Including Jason, who apparently swapped his trademark machete for a chainsaw.) Although it's clear that Roth is a very enthusiastic fan of the genre, that doesn't necessarily translate to a deep and worthwhile production.

Oh, and I almost forgot History of Horror's biggest flaw: the swear words are all censored. So you'll get all the brutal depictions of gory violence you can handle, but "shit" is apparently over the line. That's pretty fucked up.

Even so, there's more than enough good material to grant History of Horror an easy recommendation, whether you're a newcomer to the genre or at least have a passing interest in at least half of the episodes' subject matter. But it's RLJ Entertainment's Blu-ray package that puts it over the top: not only do we get a rock-solid A/V presentation, but there's also a full-length bonus disc that includes over two hours of extended interviews with key contributors.

Eli Roth's History of Horror: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

History of Horror divides its total running time neatly between interview footage and film clips, with only the latter showing unavoidable room for improvement. For the most part, these highlights appear to match their best home video versions -- at least by 2018 standards -- from beautiful black-and-white fare like The Haunting to grimy, low-budget 80s flicks to outliers like 28 Days Later, with its purposefully garish standard-def picture loaded with jagged edges and aliasing. So while it's no surprise that the end result is a visual mixed bag (though clearly no fault of the filmmakers or RLJ Entertainment's Blu-ray), most of these clips at least preserve each film's original aspect ratio; though some are slightly opened up to 1.78:1, many of them -- especially those shot in 2.35:1 -- thankfully haven't been panned and scanned. This is actually rare for documentaries of this type, and I'm glad the exception was made.

In contrast, all of the digitally-shot interviews are framed at 1.78:1 and look consistently attractive with suitably spooky backdrops, creative lighting choices, and no shortage of shadowy corners. They share a lot of visual similarities with James Cameron's The Story of Science Fiction, to the point that I wouldn't be surprised if some of the behind-the-scenes names were identical. Black levels run nice and deep in these cases, with "special effects" limited to vintage interviews where the deceased subject is usually projected on a wall. Skin tones look very natural, contrast levels are spot- on, and there are no blatant compression issues to be found. Overall, this Blu-ray offers a pleasing but obviously scattershot production that, under the circumstances, doesn't leave much room for realistic complaints.

Eli Roth's History of Horror: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Also like The Story of Science Fiction, History of Horror is unfortunately saddled with a DTS-HD 2.0 Master Audio mix. It certainly feels good enough for the "talking head" and roundtable interview segments (as well as older mono/stereo film clips), but comes up a little short where more modern fare is concerned. Still, the dialogue is key here and it sounds very crisp and clear, with solid channel separation and plenty of room for occasional music cues, jump scares, and other not-so-subtle background touches. I'd argue that a more ambitiously enveloping mix -- yes, during the interviews -- might have gone a long way towards History of Horrors' overall spooky effectiveness, but it's still hard to be too disappointed with what's essentially a made-for-TV production. Optional English (SDH) subtitles are included during the main feature and select extras; like the audio, there are no obvious sync issues or other defects.

Eli Roth's History of Horror: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

As mentioned earlier, all of the bonus features below are on their own dedicated third Blu-ray disc, which adds a considerable amount of value for those who have already watched History of Horror on AMC.

• Extended Interviews (2:17:24) - Seven key contributors from the series offer fuller takes on topics discussed during various episodes including their favorite horror movies and books, working on a low budget, dreams and nightmares, horror as a "safe space", emotional catharsis, early childhood horror memories, treasure hunting at video stores, the language of motion pictures, horror's earliest roots, dream projects, and more.

• Stephen King (14:51)
• Quentin Tarantino (24:09)
• Roger Corman (19:14)
• Joe Dante (19:50)
• Edgar Wright (22:30)
• Diablo Cody (12:25)
• John Landis (24:28)

• How "Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein" Influenced Tarantino (2:01) - The director speaks briefly about his love for this movie at a young age due to his combined loves of comedy and horror.

• How Video Games Resurrected Zombie Movies (1:35) - A short continuation of one idea expressed during the first episode, which also includes Edgar Wright's unabashed appreciation for Resident Evil 2.

• Is Horror Sexist or Feminist? (2:42) - Another extended scene from the two-part "Slashers" episode featuring Mary Harron, Diablo Cody, and others. Oh, and spoiler alert: the answer is "no."

• Making a Monster (2:48) - Robert "Freddy" Englund, Tony "Candyman" Todd, and Tobin "Jigsaw" Bell discuss additional thoughts and themes originally expressed during the last episode, "Monsters".

• Scarred for Life (3:22) - Eli Roth, Slash, actor Sara Paxton, Diablo Cody, Linda Blair, and others talk about horror movies that scared them the most, usually due to watching them at a very young age.

Eli Roth's History of Horror: Season 1 Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Not surprisingly, Eli Roth's History of Horror is very much a "what you see is what you get" production, providing a surface-level but watchable overview of the genre by someone who isn't exactly regarded as a top-tier name. But most of the interview subjects are and, while many of their stories lean much closer to fan service than deep-dive analysis (which ultimately makes History of Horror more fluffy than fascinating), it's at least worth a once-over whether you're new to the genre or a seasoned veteran. RLJ Entertainment's Blu-ray package, on the other hand, pulls out all the stops with a solid A/V presentation and an entire disc's worth of bonus features, serving up a solid amount of content for the asking price. If this sounds like your cup of tea mug of beer, it probably will be.