While the book cover couldn't look more like a high school sociology textbook, the contents are nicely organized and well illustrated. Muir starts each year off with a timeline of events and then moves into an alphabetical listing of the films reviewed from that year. Each movie includes complete cast and crew information, and many movies also include quotes from external reviews (both contemporary and retrospective), some of which contradict Muir and each other. Enveloping all this detailed information is a well-written introductory essay on the 1990s and how current events influenced the horror movies of the decade, and some intriguing appendices, including common themes from the 1990s (the police procedural, the interloper, the "meta" horror movie, etc.), movie tag lines, and Muir's personal top ten.

[full review here: http://spacebeer.blogspot.com/2013/02/horror-films-of-1990s-by-john-kenneth.html ] ( )

I read this beefy volume after Clark and Senn's similarly ambitious Sixties Shockers. While the 1960s were a transitional decade for horror movies, the 1990s were allegedly an ebb tide, in which horror was little-produced and hardly marketed as such. Muir does indeed cast a wide net, including such films as Jurassic Park (1993). "Interloper" and "police procedural" themes are among the elements that characterize the typical horror movies of the decade.

The central reviews section of the book is organized by year, and each year's chapter begins with a timeline inventorying events of major cultural significance for that year. The critical emphasis is on the relationship of cinematic themes to then-current events. So much is this the case, that the reviews tend to omit comparisons to earlier films, except for the most overt sequels and remakes. For example, the review of Body Parts (1991) does not mention the seminal Hands of Orlac (1924, 1960) Nor does discussion of The Masque of the Red Death (DTV 1991) bring up Roger Corman's magisterial 1964 version of the Poe tale. The stand-out exception is "Appendix D: Movie References in Scream," which catalogs dozens of film allusions that occur in that 1996 post-modern meta-movie.

The reviews are fully equipped with star ratings and opinionated verdicts, which seemed awfully "accurate" to me, when I was in a position to compare my own views. I was especially pleased with the glowing review of The Ninth Gate (1999) -- often the object of critical derision -- Muir even placed it at number five in his "Ten Best" list for the decade.

That list is one of a number of clever and useful apparatus elements placed as appendices. "1990s Horror Conventions" provides an index of movies by common tropes, such as "Car Won't Start," "H.P. Lovecraft," and "Vampires." (The absence of my favorite "Girl on Altar" is sadly due to its general neglect in the movies themselves.) "The 1990s Horror Hall of Fame" is an inventory of notable performers. Having noted that theater horror features were at a disadvantage in the 1990s because of small-screen competition from The X-Files, Muir backs up his claim by tabulating about thirty matches of central plot elements between 1990s horror films and individual X-Files episodes as "Appendix E."

On the whole, this book accomplishes its goals capably and with a fair amount of style. ( )

I was very excited about this book as I love horror movies. My plan was to read this book and if I enjoyed it, get the other books about the horror movies of other decades. If you merely want a listing of horror films from the decade, then this is the book for you. This book provides some information as well as background on a great many horror movies. I plan on using it to make a list of movies to watch, as there are a large number of movies from the 90's I missed. This book will help me a great deal with that endeavor.

However, much of the writing is very dry and academic. This is not the worst thing in the world, but it does make for a bit of boring read. Also, the manner in which the movies are reviewed and rated makes little to no sense to me. Some pretty awful movies are given a high rating and some really good movies are trashed, with little reasoning behind the positive or negative ratings.

Overall, if you are looking for a reference books to help you watch some movies, this will help. If you are looking for a fun read which gives a good idea of the movies of the 90's, this is not such a great find. ( )

I love horror movies and I love reading reference books about horror movies. I was a bit apprehensive when I got it. I don't how many times I have gotten a reference book and tried to read it only to find out the author didn't even bother to do research on anything he has printed. I absolutely loved this book. It is an essential reference book on the horror genre and an essential book that every horror movie buff should own. ( )

This book is a very nice volume of information about the Horror Films of the 1990s. There is so much information -- from what exactly was happening in our world during the time and how those events affected what film makers chose to bring us during these years.

The movie entries are amazing but I really loved the opening information and the Appendices in the back of the book. One Appendix featured Horror Conventions like which movies during this time used such things as "Holy Water Pistols", "The Car that Won't Start" or a sudden appearance of "The Cat Jump", usually featuring a screeching feline to name a few.

There is the Horror Hall of Fame, Actors and Actresses who have appeared in "at least three genre films during the decade.' There is the memorable movie tag lines, Movie references in the film Scream. Just added tidbits of really fun facts. A nice reference book that is one man's opinion. (I still love it even though he named Blair Witch Project the number 1 horror film of the 90s -- I thought the movie--that started out with such great promise--quickly became laughable and boring for me.)

This book made me want to go out and get John Muir's previous books dealing with Horror movies of the 70s and the 80s. A genuinely beautiful book, it will go on my book case next to two other favorites, Danse Macabre and Sixty Shockers. ( )