Hammer Horror

Hammer Films is a film production company that is based in the UK. The company was founded in 1934 by William Hinds and James Carreras. The company is best known for a series of gothic films made from the mid 1950’s until the 1970’s. Hammer also produces thrillers, science fiction, film noir and comedies and, in later years, television series.

 Hammer eventually ceased production in the mid 1980’s due to the saturation of the horror film market by competitors and the loss of American funding forced the changes to the company. In 2000, Hammer was bought by a consortium including advertising executive and art collector Cherles Saatchi and publishing millionaires Neil Mendoza and William Sieghart. They announced that they had plans to begin making films again but after that, none were produced.

In May 2007, Hammer was sold again to a consortium headed by Dutch media tycoon John De Mol. He announced that he had plans to spend around $50m (£25m) on new horror films. The new owners also acquired the Hammer groups film library which consisted of 295 movies. Simon Oaked, who took over as CEO of Hammer, said: “Hammer is a great British brand and we intend to take it back into production and develop its global potential. The brand is still alove but no one had invested in it for a long time.” Since then it has produced the feature films Let Me In (2010), The Resident (2011) and The Woman In Black (2012).