Gothic

In the realm of Art History, the term "Gothic" was originally a derogatory synonym for "Barbaric", used to describe the pointed-arch style of architecture which had developed in France in the 12th century and was popular in Europe from the late 12th to the 16th century. This medieval architecture that came to be known as Gothic was a huge departure from the aesthetic proportions and shapes of classical Greco-Roman art. In fact, most Humanists considered it bizarre and barbaric, inspiring the (strictly nominal) reference to Gothic tribes responsible for the Sack of Rome (410 AD), which Renaissance authors believed triggered the demise of the Classical world and all the values they held dear. The first known use of Gothic in this sense was circa 1518, in a letter sent by Italian painter and architect Raphael (Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, 1483-1520) to Pope Leo X. The term was subsequently popularized by Italian artist and writer Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574), who used it as early as 1530, calling Gothic art a "disorder" and "monstrous and barbarous".

Quite different is the term "Gothic" as it applies to literature. First used in English in the early 19th century to describe the literary style that used medieval settings in Northern Europe to suggest horror and mystery while emphasizing violent, grotesque, or macabre events in a desolate, foreboding milieu. It's precisely this "literary" sense of the word Gothic that this Tag encompasses, in that it groups together films set in dusty castles, gloomy basements and foreboding cemeteries, often populated by spectral entities and vampires.

The movie's atmosphere takes on paramount importance, given it must infuse the genre's traditional shadowy gray settings with that characteristic sense of impending doom and intangible menace, typically associated with harrowing events that played out in the distant past.