Written and directed by David A. Weiner
Featuring Tom Atkins, Doug Bradley and John Bloom
Running time: 4 hours and 24 minutes

by Nikk Nelson

One day, circa 1990 or 1991, when I was in first grade, the PE teacher Mr. Honor substituted for our class. Years later, when I would grow up to be a teacher, I realized that day he had absolutely no plan. So, we played Junior Outburst. It’s a game I don’t see around anymore. Basically, it was like a board game version of Family Feud. The “host” had a game card with a topic on it like ‘Side Dishes at a Barbecue’ and the ten most popular answers were on the card. As the players guessed correctly, the host would click off the tabs on the cardholder next to words like ‘Potato Salad’ and however many you got right in a minute were the points you earned for your team. That day, Mr. Honor put the card ‘Popular Horror Movies’ into the cardholder and started the timer. All anyone heard for the next thirty seconds was me naming horror movies and Mr. Honor clicking the cardholder. I got all ten. A week later, my mom was called in for a conference with my principal who was “concerned” and recommended I be kept from viewing “such violence and filth”. But my mom knew it was already too late. I was a diehard horror fan and there was no turning back.

To this day, I get the occasional sideways glance from people when they find out I’m a horror fan. We run an Airbnb in our home and one guest, before booking, told my wife they were “somewhat put off” by the basement, where my walls are adorned with horror movie posters almost exclusively. My mother-in-law, an evangelical minister, once put her hand on my shoulder and asked if she could cast the demons out. I told her she might want to use both hands. The closest I can get to an explanation of why I admire the genre so much comes from one of my heroes, Tom Savini. He was a combat photographer during the Vietnam War. What he witnessed could be done to a human body is enough to drive anyone to dismiss the human race altogether. But Tom Savini came home and turned that real, actual, horror, into art. What horror taught me from a very early age, if you’ll pardon the cheese, is that trauma can imprison you but art can set you free. David A. Weiner’s In Search of Darkness (2019) is a comprehensive celebration of horror films as an artform.

In the last decade or so, horror documentaries seem to be exploding in popularity. 1428 Films released retrospective documentaries for both the Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th film franchises—Never Sleep Again (2010) and Crystal Lake Memories (2013), respectively. Other favorites of mine include Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film (2006) and Best Worst Movie (2009), a documentary about the fandom of Troll 2 (1990). A Shudder subscription introduced me to new favorites including You’re So Cool Brewster! The Story of Fright Night (2016), Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror (2019), Why Horror? (2014), and Eli Roth’s History of Horror (TV—AMC) and I am so excited to hear that In Search of Darkness is landing as a Shudder exclusive. Its production is the kind of Cinderella story you like to hear. I was an early supporter of the project back in its Kickstarter days, so I’ve actually had my bluray copy of the documentary for months. I was so excited. For every great horror documentary out there, there’s ten that are absolutely wretched. From the get go, you knew that David A. Weiner was making something special.

Chronicling the entire history of horror movies in the 1980’s is no simple task. To say it was the heyday of the genre is like saying Lake Michigan is moist. Yet, the documentary does so seamlessly, from why we watch horror and the VHS home video revolution, to that decade’s lasting impact on horror movies today. Clocking in at almost four and a half hours, I watched it in one sitting, and I could have gone for more. I didn’t want it to end. It’s that immersive and that good. Unsubstantiated internet rumors say a sequel is already in the works and I really hope it’s true. This is true fanservice and there absolutely needs to be more of it in the world.

It would almost be easier to list who’s not in this documentary. Actors, directors, special effects artists, fans, web and magazine writers, poster artists—insert GIF of Gary Oldman in Léon: The Professional (1994) screaming, “Everyone!”. That, in itself, makes the documentary a marvelous achievement. My favorite interviewee is probably Alex Winter, just because I know him most as Bill to Keanu Reeves’s Ted and am not used to hearing him speak so articulately and intelligently about, well, anything—no offense to Bill, whom I adore. I could listen to just him talk for hours. Some movies are delved into more deeply than others and for me, watching it the first time through, I was legitimately giddy wondering which movie they were going to talk about next. The music, animations, and transitions all work to flawlessly support what’s happening on screen. There are a bunch of great horror documentaries out there but credit where credit’s due—Hail to the King, baby.

Available to watch exclusively on Shudder on July 30.