On this day in movie history - 1000 Women in Horror (2025 documentary & book):

1000 Women in Horror

documentary directed by Donna Davies,

written by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas,

based on the book by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas,

released at the Melbourne International Film Festival in Australia on August 21, 2025.

Cast: Tonjia Atomic, Roxanne Benjamin, Akela Cooper, Mattie Do, Brea Grant, Mary Harron, Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, Cerise Howard, Kier-La Janisse, Nikyatu Jusu, Nikyatu Jusu, Natasha Kermani, Roseanne Liang, Annalise Lockhart, Toby Poser, Sara Risher, Gigi Saul Guerrero, Lin Shaye, Kate Siegel, Chelsea Stardust, Jenn Wexler, April Wolfe.

Recommended reading:

1000 Women In Horror, 1895-2018

By Alexandra Heller-Nicholas.

Published by BearManor Media.

Published 2020.

ISBN-10: 1629333867

ISBN-13: 978-1629333861

Description:

Blowing a kiss back through time and space from Aaliyah to Jill Rae Zurborg, 1000 Women in Horror, 1895-2018 is a love letter to both the stars and the often-invisible women who have made the genre what it is today. From Classical Hollywood to alt-Nollywood, mumblegore to J-horror, this book offers a tiny global snapshot of the vast number of women who have worked in the creation of dark and spooky movies for well over a century, both behind and in front of the camera, and in films both widely known and comparatively obscure.

Featuring a selected filmography of over 700 feature films directed or co-directed by women, this book also features interviews with Rutanya Alda, Tara Anaïse, Tonjia Atomic, Anna Biller, Axelle Carolyn, Aislinn Clarke, BJ Colangelo, Mattie Do, Julia Ducournau, Jordan Hall, Catherine Hardwicke, Katherine Kean, Karen Lam, Izzy Lee, Barbara Magnolfi, Marsha Mason, Donna McRae, Patrushkha Mierzwa, Hannah Neurotica, Alexandra Paul, Isabel Peppard, Cassandra ‘Elvira’ Peterson, Debbie Rochon, Mia’Kate Russell, Gigi Saul Guerrero, Elizabeth Shepherd, Jen and Sylvia Soska, Brinke Stevens, Barbie Wilde and Silvana Zancolò.

About the Author: Alexandra Heller-Nicholas is a film critic from Melbourne, Australia. She has written eight books on cult, horror and exploitation cinema with an emphasis on gender politics, including Rape-Revenge Films: A Critical Study (2011), books on Dario Argento’s Suspiria (2015), Abel Ferrara’s Ms. 45 (2017) and Robert Harmon’s The Hitcher (2018), and the Bram Stoker Award nominated book Masks in Horror Cinema: Eyes Without Faces (2019). She is a member of the Alliance of Women Film Journalists and the Australian Film Crit-ics Association. Alexandra holds a PhD in Screen Studies from the University of Melbourne and is an Adjunct Professor at Deakin University and a Research Fellow at RMIT University.