In the Catbird Seat/Joe Kirkish

Ever since the master magician of the silent screen, Georges Melies, brought flickering demons and dancing skeletons to shrieking audiences of the early 1900s, horror films have been around.

Their pleasurable terror was rife in the '40s, when Lon Chaney, Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi spooked up the screen, later topped by Vincent Price, Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee into the '70s. But even before them, up through the silent '20s, when "Phantom of the Opera" and the first vampire movie from Germany, "Nosferatu," along and other ghoulish thrillers, set the pace.

Now, sadly, with electronic magic taking over, style and good writing are replaced with special effects, so phantoms, blood-sucking vampires, voodoo dolls and stalking creatures continue, but with tasteless sadomasochistic realism with pornographic desensitization the result. Buckets of blood, slashings, gougings, dismemberment - anything - as the ante is ever upped; the films no longer scare, they simply disgust.

So let's see what great classics can be dredged up for fright night - classics based on Val Lewton's dictum: "What you don't see is far more terrifying than what you do."

First, Lewton's most celebrated productions, "The Cat People" (1942) and "I Walked with a Zombie" (1943) - the former an example of his dictum, as the throaty sounds of the unseen "cats" freeze the blood; and in the latter, with nightly voodoo drums sending chills down the spine.

"The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" (1919) is seen through the eyes of the insane, in a German town constructed in crazy geometrics. It features a squat old man with evil, piercing eyes - the terrifying Dr. Caligari - who travels with a death-seeking sleepwalker.

"Nosferatu" (1922) and its American remake, "Dracula" (1931) created the matrix for all vampires. The German original ignored most of Bram Stoker's description to feature a totally evil monster, while the latter, closer to the original, introduced a love interest between a suave vampire and his blood-sucked victims.

"Freaks" (1932) came from the next great horror filmmaker, Tod Browning. With a cast of real circus freaks, he weaves a tale of romance and revenge, with two memorable sequences: a strange wedding and the final horrific conclusion.

"King Kong" (1933) offers a bonus with Willis O'Brien's stop-action special effects, introducing the first of a long line of creatures in tragic love with beautiful women.

"The Black Cat (1934) returns Boris Karloff after his earlier success in "Frankenstein," here coupled with "Dracula's" Bela Lugosi - with devil worshiping in bizarre settings and with even more bizarre characters - a real classic, followed up by a "Frankenstein" sequel, "Bride of Frankenstein" (1935) and a whole slew of Frankenstein and Dracula updates into the 70s - none of them quite living up to the originals. Hammer Studios starred Lee and Cushing in a variety of horror films, interesting only for their historical importance during a period of mostly forgettable nights in the dark. Garish lighting, grotesque make-up and voluptuous females drew audiences.

With the atomic bomb, a new horror genre emerged, starting with "The Thing" (1951), in which scientists in the frozen north battle a plant-like creature from outer space. Plenty of other worldly creatures followed, all featuring evil men, robots or monsters out to get us.

Then arrived the the sickies, from the "Halloween" and "Saw" series to dozens of look-alikes - in which ugliness and despicable characters are enjoyed in heavy doses - anything horrific to conceal abysmal scripting. By contrast, look for the rare wonders of the '70s to '90s, like "Carrie," "A Clockwork Orange," "The Blair Witch Project," "Signs" and "The Shining" - unforgettable, brilliantly conceived.

The early horror classics may seem corny (but never tame), yet they built a remarkable genre that, perverted as it has become today, still lives on.

Rotten tomatoes averages: "Where the Wild Things Are," 84% fresh; "Astro Boy," 42% fresh; "Cirque du Freak," 35% fresh; "Saw VI," 22% fresh.