Twenty-five years ago, Dr. Robert Bork, a professor of art history at the University of Iowa and a specialist in the study of Gothic architecture, was working in his office when a student knocked on the door. Throughout the room were pictures of Cologne Cathedral, an 1880 church in Germany and one of Dr. Bork’s favorite buildings. The images, seemingly, caught the student’s attention. “Dr. Bork,” he said. “Why does it look so evil?”
There is nothing inherently scary or sinister about the structure. As an example of Gothic architecture, it bears many iconic elements of the style: pointed arches, flying buttresses, tall spires, rib vaults, window tracery, and stained glass. But it was never meant to invoke fear. So the student’s question was interesting to the professor. “I asked him why he said that,” Dr. Bork tells AD. “And he replied, ‘Well, it looks just like the skyscraper in Ghostbusters.’”
For decades, Gothic architecture has been a go-to style for production designers, writers, and even musicians looking to convey terror through physical spaces. In Dracula (1931) Carfax Abbey is based on Whitby Abbey, a Gothic monastery; Manderly from Alfred Hitchcock’s Rebecca (1939) pulls inspiration from Gothic houses; and more modern films and shows like Crimson Peak (2015) and Wednesday (2022) keep the trope alive.