Various Authors — A Century Of Horror- A Pictorial History Of Cinefa
As with the teams' other books A Century of Horror- comes in the form of a large format paperback- with an epic page count of five hundred & twenty pages. And it’s in glorious & buoyant full-colour through-out.
The books is laid out in decades- with the end of the book featuring two bonus chapters- one on Japanese horror, and one on euro horror- each of these feature effective colour coded strips- so you can easily see where each decade starts/ finishes. Also each of the chapters start off with the great art we’ve come to expect from the team- taking in a selection of key monsters/ actors/ creatures from each( the 1940's one is used for the review index pic for this review).
For each decade/ chapter we first get an around twenty-page write-up about the focused decade. Like the teams' other books, each of these is written by different writers- so you get a nice switch in tone & type of writing from decade-to-decade- some chapters see a general overview- with key & important films, while others group a decades film into the themes, while others go from year-to-year decade rundown, once again discussing key films. Each write-up is most accomplished- with a good balance between facts, decade scope, and of course effective short write-ups about some of the key films.
The main focus of each decade/ chapter is, of course, the stills & rare posters many of which are from other lands- as with all the teams other books I’m in awe of their collections- as it really is staging some of the stuff they have, and many of these I’ve never before. Thorough most of the decades you really do get a great collection of stuff, as we move towards the ’80s & 90’s- we get a lot more familiar pictures- but they are still nicely arranged & you do still get some rare gems.
As with all of the team's titles A Century Of Horror- A Pictorial History Of Cinefantastique is decidedly limited in it’s printing- so it’s really best to purchase directly from the team here, but it can also be found in a few selected specialized shops/sites. All in all, it’s another very classy book, that’s perfect for you or the horror fan in your life!.