Cinematic Evil

Prior to the enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code in 1934, Hollywood films were infamous for featuring violence, sexuality, profanity, drug use, and all manner of moral turpitude. Despite this, it wasn’t until the middle of the century that what might be called “pure” or “intrinsic” evil became a prominent theme in American film. In this chapter, I investigate the varieties of evil on display in American cinema and conclude that perhaps the relatively late appearance of “pure” evil depicted cinematically may have had to do with the very sorts of very real evils occurring in the very actual world in the middle of the twentieth century.