South African Horror Cinema

Calum Waddell is a lecturer at the University of Aberdeen, UK, and has authored such monographs as The Style of Sleaze: The American Exploitation Film (2018) and Images of Apartheid: Filmmaking on the Fringe in the Old South Africa (2023).

• List of FiguresAbout the AuthorAcknowledgementsForewordIntroduction: South African Horror Cinema: An Introduction1. Problems Enough in South Africa: Jannie totsiens and the Birth of South African Horror Cinema2. The Myth of Integration: South African Horror in the Seventies3. Total Onslaught: The Anti-Apartheid Nightmare Cinema of Darrell Roodt4. South African Trash: The B-Scheme Initiative5. Greater Intimidation: South African Horror in the Final Years of Apartheid6. Country of my Skull: District 9 and South African Horror After Apartheid7. Schlock, Showmax and Soft Power: South African Horror Cinema After District 9CONCLUSION: “Unreal and Imaginary” – South African Horror CinemaBibliographyFilmographyIndex

Waddell locates the study of South African horror film within the international canon. His analytical terrain questions exceptionalism and identifies socially indicative meta intertexts. The nuanced study embraces the local in terms of the apartheid and Cold War eras when monsters and demons lurked everywhere. Via an internationalization of South African film studies, Waddell excavates films, directors and narratives often underplayed by contemporary scholars. This work is a game changer – it is a ‘post horror’ examination that draws South African film into the global mainstream.