As video stores and VCRs propagated throughout the country in the ‘80s and ‘90s, the popularity and production of horror movies boomed with them. Combining the cheap overhead costs of many threadbare production companies along with the possibility of lurid VHS box art with eye-catching names (Sorority Babes In The Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama, anyone?), horror was a perfect fit for the video era. While horror movies still appear to be the go-to films for no-budget filmmakers, digital streaming services have rendered most box art useless, with the hype of the back cover’s description promising a terrifying descent into madness now a flat plot summary.
With a new series of images, artist Chris MacGibbon hearkens back to those years strolling along the aisles of the horror section in a video store. MacGibbon has taken modern horror movies of the past decade and imagined the VHS box art they would have had. Incorporating a lot of familiar fonts and logos, and even the genre stickers most video stores affixed to their boxes, MacGibbon faithfully recreates mementos from a bygone age. As seen in the gallery below, it’s very easy to picture these tapes in their large plastic binder cases or their slightly tattered paper boxes on a shelf next to copies of C.H.U.D. or Creepshow. Hell, MacGibbon is able to even make Paranormal Activity look exciting.
[via Bloody Disgusting]
