Dear reader, this is filmmaker, playwright, and novelist, Dalton Norman. I've been a senior writer at Screen Rant since 2021, and covered almost everything. My real passion is cult cinema, an obsession I've been feeding since my halcyon days in film school. I've seen a startling number of horror movies, so I feel confident declaring that Boris Karloff is the Greatest Horror Actor Of All Time, but you can comment your pick below.
One of my earliest movie memories is hearing my film-loving grandmother recount tales of going to see the horror matinées. Though they were nearly two decades old then, films like Dracula (1931) and Frankenstein (1931) gave her nightmares. Titans of terror like Bela Lugosi haunted her dreams, but one name appeared more than the others; Karloff.
Horror actors almost never get the same respect as their dramatic peers, and even today the genre still remains stigmatized. Boris Karloff not only helped bring horror into Hollywood's Golden Age, but he also set the standard that every performer playing a movie monster has followed in the decades since. No other horror actor had Karloff's chops, largely because he could actually act.
Karloff wasn't the first actor to make a career out of horror (see Lon Chaney Sr.), but his versatility and longevity are his greatest strengths. He appeared in most of the greatest horror films of his era, and his performances often made those movies classics. You can disagree in the comments, but Karloff is the GOAT.
Karloff Helped Create Two Of The Greatest Monsters In Horror Movie History
Film is ultimately collaborative, and no one piece supersedes the whole. Boris Karloff, like all great horror actors, was a cog in a much larger machine, but his talent certainly kept the wheels turning. He burst on the scene with the advent of sound, and he quickly became the premier name in horror with films like Frankenstein and The Mummy.
It seems simple today, but I see Karloff's appearance as the monster in James Whale's groundbreaking Frankenstein as a watershed moment in film acting history. Gone was the caricature style of the earlier era, and in came a heartbreaking pathos that had never been seen before. The monster had a human soul, which made him all the more nightmarish.
Jack Pierce deserves credit for his unbelievable monster makeup, but it is only window dressing for Karloff's staggering performance. He would repeat the trick the next year in The Mummy, breathing nefarious life into the mesmerizing Imhotep, in both of his crusty forms.
Those performances weren't just brilliant for their time, they have stood up in the near-century since their premieres. Every version of Frankenstein's monster owes a debt to Karloff, as does every horror performer who has tried to give the genre something more than cheesy overacting.
He Was More Versatile Than His Fellow Horror Stars
The early days of Hollywood's sound era was a weeding-out period, with the most talented and versatile stars rising, while others were left behind when silent pictures died out. Boris Karloff's meteoric ascent wasn't just because he was good at playing monsters, but because he could play nearly anything.
After Boris Karloff became simply, KARLOFF, thanks to his horror acumen, he still landed a few comedy roles. Movies like You'll Find Out mostly took advantage of Karloff's creep factor, but he still showcased a keen knowledge of humor. Later films like The Comedy of Terrors were more overt examples of Karloff's wit.
When contrasted with peers like Bela Lugosi, Karloff was simply more flexible in the types of parts he was capable of playing. Monsters were his specialty, but even in horror, he was diverse. When he switched roles to play the mad scientist in House of Frankenstein, he demonstrated a deeper understanding of what that character called for.
Karloff was also able to adjust his style depending on where he was working, and his performance in the Italian classic, Black Sabbath, is wildly different from his American or British films. Furthermore, he was perfectly suited for television, once again adjusting to shifting trends as they came. His performance as The Grinch is one of his defining moments.
Karloff’s Longevity Was Unmatched
Boris Karloff worked from the 1910s until the last year of the 1960s, a 50-year career in a time when Hollywood stars fizzled quickly. He appeared in nearly 200 films throughout his life, a pace that would be unheard of in today's era. All this was made doubly impressive by the fact that he was typecast into the horror genre.
He was able to overcome the genre's stigma and keep working, while maintaining a consistent level of quality in his own output. Even if many of his films are dismissed or entirely forgotten, Karloff himself is often the best part of each one. Contemporaries like Lugosi or Lon Chaney Jr. were ground down by the business, while Karloff flourished.
He survived eras of horror history, and rode waves of change as the genre's popularity ebbed and flowed. However, as a movie like Targets demonstrates, it was the same Boris Karloff all along. Horror has evolved with new gruesome spectacles in the decades since his death, but Karloff's legacy as the Greatest Horror Actor Of All Time is untouchable.
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