One actor who helped pave the way for the change in outlook and acceptance of the horror genre was Lon (Alonso) Chaney, Sr., known as "the man of a thousand faces" because of his transformative, grotesque makeup and acting genius as a pantomime artist. He appeared in numerous silent horror films beginning in 1913 at Universal Studios. He was soon to become the first American horror-film star and Hollywood's first great character actor. His first grotesque character role as a fake cripple (a contorted figure named the Frog), his breakthrough role, was in The Miracle Man (1919) (a film that only partially survives). Chaney's films, collaborating with director Tod Browning on ten feature films over a decade, included these examples of lurid melodrama (and horror) and crime:


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There were a few very early renditions in the 1900s of the classic tale taken from Robert Louis Stevenson's story "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" (and Thomas Russell Sullivan's 1887 stage play "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde") about a doctor/scientist whose evil side was brought out by a magic formula. The first filmed version was also the first American horror film - director Otis Turner's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1908) with Hobart Bosworth in the lead role - by the Selig Polyscope Corporation. The next was Thanhouser Film Corporation's (New York) one-reel Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1912) with future director James Cruze starring as the title character. And then superstar King Baggot appeared in independent IMP's (the future Universal Studios) two-reeler Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1913). Broadway idol John Barrymore also starred in one of the earliest versions of the Jekyll/Hyde story, a silent film from Famous Players-Lasky Corporation titled Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920). [Another almost forgotten version in 1920 from the Pioneer Film Corporation starred Sheldon Lewis.] The familiar story was later re-made in many versions, but the two most noteworthy versions were:

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The first American serial was the groundbreaking 12-reel What Happened to Mary? (1912), a production of Thomas A. Edison's Company, that starred Mary Fuller (the first true serial queen), and was released concurrently with the serial story "What Happened to Mary?" in McClure's Ladies' World Magazine. Each film chapter was released simultaneously with the corresponding story in the magazine, one story per month, beginning July 26th, 1912. The series was followed with the six-episode Who Will Marry Mary? (1913), and with another twelve episode series, The Active Life of Dolly of the Dailies (1914).

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War films were suddenly big business again, after the success of war genre films in the mid-20s caused a revival, such as The Patent Leather Kid (1927) (with Best Actor-nominated Richard Barthelmess) and the early talkie She Goes to War (1929) with Eleanor Boardman. The start of the talkie era meant that war films would now be supplemented with the realistic sounds of war - aerial dogfights, explosions, gunfire, etc. Millionaire director/producer Howard Hughes' expensive Hell's Angels (1930) featured more impressive WWI aerial battle sequences - and the debut of platinum blonde sex symbol Jean Harlow (speaking the famous saucy line: "Would you be shocked if I put on something more comfortable?") in love with two English brothers who were British Royal Flying Corps pilots (Ben Lyon and James Hall).

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Young Frankenstein (1974) is one of writer-producer- director Mel Brooks' best films - a nostalgic, hilarious spoof-tribute to classic horror films (with its authentic black and white cinematography and production design/set decoration), and in particular, of Mary Shelley's classic novel. This was his follow-up film to his westerns spoof (Blazing Saddles (1974)). Later, co-writer and actor Wilder attempted his own Old Dark House genre spoof, Haunted Honeymoon (1986).

Although the film had two Academy Awards nominations (that didn't win), Best Adapted Screenplay (for Mel Brooks and star Gene Wilder) and Best Sound, two deserving cast members, Gene Wilder and Madeline Kahn, were un-nominated, as was the wonderfully crisp black-and-white cinematography by Gerald Hirschfeld. The film ranges from slapstick and farce to dirty, bawdy humor to irreverent satire.

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Alex Raymond's 1934 science-fiction comic strip hero Flash Gordon was brought to the screen in 1936 by Universal, with star Larry "Buster" Crabbe as the title character, and sexy blonde Jean Rogers as terrorized heroine-girlfriend Dale Arden, and villainous planet Mongo ruler Ming the Merciless, portrayed by Charles Middleton.

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By the time Republic Studios had created all of its Dick Tracy serials--60 episodes altogether, after its initial 15-episode entry Dick Tracy (1937) with lead actor Ralph Byrd as the square-jawed shamus, it had become the longest-running series in serials history (the other films in the series were the 15-chapter Dick Tracy Returns (1938), 15 cliff-hanging episodes in Dick Tracy's G-Men (1939), and 15 crime-fighting episodes in Dick Tracy vs. Crime, Inc. (1941)).

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Sports-oriented action pictures have also appeared in this genre. Boxing pictures (the Rocky series of 1976, 1979, 1982, 1985, and 1990), car racing films (i.e., John Frankenheimer's Grand Prix (1966), the 'Cannonball Run' films (1976, 1981, and 1984), Days of Thunder (1990), Gone in 60 Seconds (2000) and The Fast and the Furious (2001)), aviation dogfight films (Top Gun (1986)), baseball flicks (i.e., Eight Men Out (1988)) and other sports topics have often appeared as subjects in action films.

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Cast
Patrick Wilson ... Barry Munday
Mae Whitman ... Candice
Chloë Sevigny ... Jennifer Farley
Malcolm McDowell ... Mr. Farley
Judy Greer ... Ginger Farley
Missi Pyle ... Lida Griggs
Colin Hanks ... Heavy Metal Greg
Emily Procter ... Deborah
Jean Smart ... Carol Munday
Cybill Shepherd ... Mrs. Farley
Christopher McDonald ... Dr. Preston Edwards
Shea Whigham ... Donald
Billy Dee Williams ... Lonnie Green
Kyle Gass

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With much of its female cast already in place, Cameron Diaz, Wendi McLendon-Covey, Brooklyn Decker, Anna Kendrick, Rebel Wilson and Jennifer Lopez, director Kirk Jones continued to complete his male leads for What To Expect When You're Expecting, the star-studded adaptation of the popular pregnancy guidebook series from Lionsgate and Phoenix Pictures.

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