Classic Horror Movie Trivia
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This classic horror movie trivia quiz has 60 free questions with answers and runs from the silent era to 1980: the German Expressionists, the Universal monsters and the make-up men behind them, Val Lewton's shadows, the 1950s creature features, Hammer's Dracula and Frankenstein, Hitchcock's Psycho and The Birds, Romero's ghouls, and the 1970s wave from The Exorcist and Texas Chain Saw to Halloween, Suspiria and Alien. The questions cover the actors, directors and studios, but also the production stories worth retelling: why Nosferatu was ordered destroyed, what Michael Myers' mask started life as, why the Jaws shark stays hidden, and what the Alien cast were not warned about. It works for a Halloween party round, a film-club warm-up, or a solo test of how deep your horror knowledge goes. Every answer has been checked against a reference encyclopaedia entry on the film or the person, and each question shows its source once you have answered.
30 of 60 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which 1922 silent film starred Max Schreck as the vampire Count Orlok?
Nosferatu
Nosferatu was an unauthorised Dracula adaptation: Bram Stoker's widow sued and a court ordered every copy destroyed, yet a few prints survived.
Q 02Who directed the 1922 unauthorised Dracula adaptation with Max Schreck as Count Orlok?
F. W. Murnau
F. W. Murnau filmed a Henrik Galeen script that changed the names but kept the story, so Stoker's widow sued for copyright and the studio, Prana-Film, went bankrupt.
Q 03Which 1920 German silent film features a murderous sleepwalker?
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari cast Conrad Veidt as the sleepwalker Cesare, and its twisted, distorted sets became the model for German Expressionist cinema.
Q 04Which 1925 silent film reveals a skull-like face that its star designed himself?
The Phantom of the Opera
The Phantom of the Opera starred Lon Chaney, the 'Man of a Thousand Faces', who learned expressive pantomime as a child to communicate with his deaf parents.
Q 05Who played the Monster in Universal's 1931 Frankenstein?
Boris Karloff
Boris Karloff, born William Henry Pratt in London, was billed only as '?' in the opening credits; his name appeared in the cast list at the end.
Q 06Who created the flat-headed, bolt-necked make-up for the 1931 Frankenstein monster?
Jack Pierce
Jack Pierce designed the look, and the famous neck 'bolts' are really electrodes, the terminals for the current that brings the Monster to life.
Q 07Which actress played both Mary Shelley and the Bride in Bride of Frankenstein (1935)?
Elsa Lanchester
Elsa Lanchester was credited by name only for Mary Shelley in the prologue, while the Bride herself was billed as '?'.
Q 08The Universal Dracula (1931) shared its sets at night with a second version shot in which language?
Spanish
Spanish: a separate cast and crew under director George Melford took over the same sets each night once Tod Browning's unit had gone home.
Q 09Bela Lugosi, the screen's first great Dracula, acted with which country's National Theatre?
Hungary
Hungary: he acted with its National Theatre in Budapest from 1913 to 1919, though his birthplace, Lugos, now lies across the border in Romania.
Q 10In The Mummy (1932), what brings the mummy back to life?
A scroll read aloud
A scroll read aloud by a young archaeologist, the Scroll of Thoth, wakes the mummy, and the sight of it walking off leaves him laughing insanely.
Q 11Which actor's face is hidden in bandages for almost all of The Invisible Man (1933)?
Claude Rains
Claude Rains, in his first American screen role, had to act almost entirely with his voice, and the part made him a star.
Q 12In The Wolf Man (1941), a werewolf sees which symbol on the palm of his next victim?
A pentagram
A pentagram on Gwen's palm marks her as next; Larry's disbelieving father then ties him to a chair to prove the curse is all in his mind.
Q 13Who played Larry Talbot, the title character of The Wolf Man?
Lon Chaney Jr.
Lon Chaney Jr., born Creighton Chaney, took his late father's famous name only after years acting under his own, and this role made him a star in his own right.
Q 21Vincent Price's House of Wax (1953) was the first major-studio colour film to use which gimmick?
3-D
3-D, ironically: director André de Toth was blind in one eye and could not see the effect himself.
Q 22The Fly (1958) ends with a tiny human-headed fly trapped in a spider's web crying what?
'Help me!'
'Help me!' squeaks the fly with the scientist's head as a spider closes in, until a police inspector crushes both with a rock.
Q 23Fallout from a 1954 US hydrogen bomb test at which Pacific atoll hit a Japanese fishing boat, partly inspiring Godzilla?
Bikini
Bikini Atoll hosted the Castle Bravo test, whose fallout sickened the crew of the Lucky Dragon No. 5; the film echoes it by making boats at sea the monster's first victims.
Q 14The Gill-man's underwater scenes in Creature from the Black Lagoon were shot in the natural springs of which southern state?
Florida
Florida's Wakulla Springs hosted the underwater unit, where Ricou Browning swam the part; Ben Chapman wore a second suit for every scene on land, so one monster had two actors.
Q 15Which studio released King Kong in 1933?
RKO
RKO's 'Eighth Wonder of the World' was in fact an 18-inch puppet, moved a frame at a time by effects pioneer Willis O'Brien.
Q 16Which actress screamed her way through King Kong as Ann Darrow?
Fay Wray
Fay Wray, feted for decades as the 'scream queen', titled her 1989 autobiography On the Other Hand in tribute to the giant model of Kong's hand.
Q 17Tod Browning's Freaks (1932), set in a circus sideshow, was banned in which country for over 30 years?
the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom's censors kept Freaks off screens until 1963, and the outcry at home was as costly: it effectively ended Tod Browning's directing career.
Q 18The jump-scare technique known as the 'Lewton Bus' comes from which 1942 film?
Cat People
Cat People builds a night-time stalking scene to its peak, then a city bus hisses into frame, its air brakes timed to make audiences jump.
Q 19James Arness, later Marshal Dillon in Gunsmoke, played the monster in which 1951 film?
The Thing from Another World
The Thing from Another World makes its thawed-out alien an advanced form of plant life, which one character sums up as an 'intellectual carrot'.
Q 20Them! (1954) unleashed giant irradiated versions of which creature on New Mexico?
Ants
Ants mutated by the first atomic bomb test grow to giant size in the desert, and two young queens escape to found new colonies, turning a local scare into a national one.
Q 24Godzilla's director, Ishirō Honda, later assisted which filmmaker?
Akira Kurosawa
Akira Kurosawa, a friend since their early days at the Toho studio, coaxed Honda out of retirement to assist on his last five films, including Ran.
Q 25Which 1957 film, with Christopher Lee as the Creature, was Hammer's first colour horror?
The Curse of Frankenstein
The Curse of Frankenstein cast Peter Cushing as the Baron opposite Lee's Creature, and the pair went on to become the faces of Hammer horror.
Q 26Christopher Lee played Lord Summerisle in which 1973 folk horror?
The Wicker Man
The Wicker Man has his pagan lord lure a devout policeman to a remote Scottish island, where the visitor himself becomes the May Day sacrifice.
Q 27Hammer's Van Helsing, Peter Cushing, is also known to Star Wars fans as which character?
Grand Moff Tarkin
Grand Moff Tarkin's boots pinched so badly that Cushing asked to be shot from the waist up and played many scenes in slippers.
Q 28Which director reportedly beat Hitchcock to the rights for the novel behind Les Diaboliques (1955)?
Henri-Georges Clouzot
Henri-Georges Clouzot reportedly got there first, and filmed it as the tale of a wife and a mistress who drown a cruel headmaster, only for the body to vanish.
Q 29Psycho's shower scene was storyboarded by which famous title designer?
Saul Bass
Saul Bass also made the film's jagged opening titles; he later claimed he had directed the scene too, but those on set credited Hitchcock.
Q 30Psycho was adapted from a 1959 novel by which author?
Robert Bloch
Robert Bloch's novel was scripted by Joseph Stefano, and the $40,000 Marion Crane steals is a decoy: it sinks unnoticed into a swamp along with her car.