7. The Old Dark House
Director James Whale brought us some of the most influential and successful horror films of all time in a staggering run of films from 1931 to 1935, including Frankenstein (1931), The Invisible Man (1933) and the Bride of Frankenstein (1935), but one of the films he made while on this awe-inspiring streak became lost to time: 1932's The Old Dark House. Despite the presence of horror stalwart Boris Karloff, on its initial release the film fared poorly at the North American box office. Critics gave it a lukewarm reception and eventually, all prints of The Old Dark House became lost. In its absence, The Old Dark House began to gain a reputation as one of the great examples of Gothic horror filmmaking. However, cinephiles had to rely on hearsay and secondhand accounts of the film's greatness without the benefit of being able to see it for themselves. That is until 1968 when horror director Curtis Harrington discovered a copy of the film buried deep within the vaults of Universal Studios. The film was restored and released to general audiences. Critics found that the film lived up to its reputation as one of the all-time horror greats and The Old Dark House currently holds 100% fresh rating on the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes.