Horror has a long, rich history of celebrating queerness. This dates back to its 19th Century foundation in Gothic literature, specifically the famous story of the friendship among Mary Shelley, Percy Shelley, and Lord Byron, all sexually fluid writers whose work, especially Mary Shelley’s, explores themes of Otherness. Meanwhile, her hubs, Percy, was an anarchist who advocated for the rights of the marginalized. Queerness extends to other Gothic writers, including Oscar Wilde, author of the Portrait of Dorian Gray. Wilde is an important figure because he was put on trial in the late 19th Century for “gross indecency,” after the details of his homosexual affair with a British aristocrat became public. Needless to say, this profoundly negatively impacted the writer’s career, but he was unashamed of who he was and his sexuality.

Queerness extends to horror’s earliest film adaptations, too, including Nosferatu by gay director F.W. Murnau, and some of the most famed early Universal movies, specifically those by openly gay director James Whale, including Frankenstein, The Invisible Man, The Old Dark House, and most notably, Bride of Frankenstein, a campy feature that includes many theater actors who worked with Whale.

While horror does have some problematic depictions of the LGBTQ community, such as Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs, and the “bury your gays” trope that became all too prevalent in slashers of the 1980s, the genre has become more and more inclusive, with recent examples being Freaky, Attachment, Let the Right One In, Spiral, Bodies, Bodies, Bodies, and the haunting and mesmerizing I Saw the TV Glow, by non-binary director Jane Schoenbrun. These are just a few examples in an ever-growing canon.

Horror has and always will have a relationship to Otherness and by an extension queerness. In celebration of Pride Month and my love of horror, I wanted to share two lists I composed for 1428 Elm. The first is a list of classic queer horror movies, and the second is a list of more contemporary queer horror films.

Enjoy, and Happy Pride!