Theme: Hell

Hell is the place in The Afterlife where those who are sinful and wicked in their mortal existence are damned to suffer throughout eternity. Hell is the dominion that is ruled over by The Devil and his legions of Demons. It is usually depicted as a realm of fire.

The most distinctive depictions of Hell came in the various film versions of Dante’s Inferno (1308-21) where Hell is seen as a series of circles where the damned are tortured in a manner befitting their sins in life.

By and large with a couple of exceptions, Light Fantasy films of the 1940s avoided depiction of Hell and The Devil. Since then there have been various depictions, often in a comedic vein. There have been a number of depictions of Hell in a horror context. It in itself is rarely visited but people are constantly coming across doorways and gateways leading to it, summoning demons or The Devil, or banishing others there.

There has been some depictions of Heaven from different cultures, notedly Chinese and Japanese, as well as Hades from Greek Mythology, and even few depictions of Hell in a science-fiction context.