As many iconic works have entered into the public domain since 2019, there has been a surge of horror film adaptations. These horror adaptations have received strong critiques for their deviation from or failure to say something unique about their source material. Ultimately, this criticism has spilled over into skepticism about the public domain itself, framing it as a creative dead-end. This critique, however, overlooks the underlying benefit of the public domain: the ability for anyone, not just corporations, to create their own version/adaptation of the same work. Despite consistent criticism surrounding public domain horror adaptations, a further study of these works reveals underlying contemporary industry conditions that lead to their creation, and demonstrates the enduring importance of the public domain in enabling creative freedom beyond pure corporate control.

These adaptations exist within the current characteristics of contemporary filmmaking; a type of filmmaking largely driven by financial risk-aversion that relies on Intellectual Property (IP) adaptations rather than original stories to guarantee audience attendance and big money earnings. Look no further than April 2025’s A Minecraft Movie that relied on the Minecraft IP to pull in over $150 million in a single weekend in the United States and Canada, as well as over $900 million worldwide across its theatrical run. As studios continue to embrace IP and risk-aversion as rules of the game, creators must either find ways to craft original stories within these confines, or find another way to keep the cost down, such as working in a historically proven low-cost genre: Horror.

Horror films are a popular selection for filmmakers as they can be made more economically compared to other genres by utilizing fewer elements such as limited locations, small casts, and visual ambiguity to enact the horror/unease. There is a long lineage of economical horror films that set off careers including John Carpenter’s Halloween, Sam Raimi’s The Evil Dead, and Mike Flanagan’s Absentia. Each film was made for less than $500,000, unadjusted for inflation, and launched careers of well known and successful filmmakers. While each film is hugely varied and different from one another, they are all connected by one common element: being original stories. But when IP is heavily guarded and protected by risk-averse studios, it makes sense to turn to the public domain for creative freedom as an independent filmmaker working with budgetary constrictions. 

Though shaped by the same constraints and standards, the resulting films vary wildly. Some horror films adapted from public domain works lean heavily on shock value while others take a more reflexive approach, using the tools of horror to comment on copyright itself. In 2022, Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey utilized the shock elements to draw an audience, while 2025’s Screamboat embedded a metatextual critique of copyright lengths.

In 2022, shortly after 1926’s Winnie-the-Pooh entered the public domain, filmmaker Rhys Frake-Waterfield, whose earlier indie films received little attention, announced Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey. By adapting the Pooh stories, Frake-Waterfield utilized their near-hundred year history and public recognition to garner immediate attention to his new production, highlighting the benefits that IP provides even in an area of filmmaking that is historically amenable to emerging filmmakers. 

Since its release, critics and viewers alike have highlighted the deviation from the childhood source material through a gory slasher adaptation. These critiques are reasonable and definitely feel notable to viewers as a dead-eyed Pooh Bear and tusk-bearing Piglet eat Eeyore. However jarring the contrast of the adaptation to the source material may be, it does not undercut the value of the public domain. In creating this adaptation, it acts as a celebration of the public domain as a vehicle for filmmakers and other creatives to remix old works for their own creative and commercial benefit and not just the benefit of select corporate IP holders.

The Blood and Honey film is an adaptation that does not utilize the Pooh stories for much more than audience familiarity. It utilizes the public domain works primarily as a shock factor to attract audience attention. Generally it grafts the iconography of these stories onto an indie horror film that would remain fundamentally unchanged if all of the Pooh elements were stripped away. Beneath the surface of this iconography is a standard slasher film playing in the mold of what has come before.

This adaptation does not diminish the original stories that still exist and are available to everyone. Nor does it create a new monopoly on the stories, as these Pooh stories remain in the public domain. Instead, it highlights the underlying conditions of filmmaking that surround the film during the time in which it was made. By entering the public domain in the 2020s, newly public domain works give rise to modern adaptations that reflect the popular trends of the moment. They fit within the confines of the corporate, risk-averse IP conditions that drive filmmaking. And yes, many are becoming franchises, itself a reflection of the current moment. Frake-Waterfield has expanded upon his original Blood and Honey film with a direct sequel as well as the greater Twisted Childhood Universe, pulling from other public domain works such as the original Bambi and Peter Pan. 

Similarly to Blood and Honey, the recent Screamboat adaptation of Steamboat Willie by Steven LaMorte is also a grafting of a public domain work onto a more standard narrative. In a 2025 interview with Paul Marsh, LaMorte reveals that he had been working on a Staten Island Ferry horror film since the early 2010s. However, following Steamboat Willie’s passage into the public domain in 2024, LaMorte reworked the film into an adaptation. In contrast to Blood and Honey, Screamboat functions as a metatextual film commenting not only on the original work, but also the nature of the public domain. It is not solely a horror film based on a public domain work, but a horror film about corporate copyright terms and how these long terms may alienate creators from their original works. This perspective becomes especially vivid in the film’s midsection, which recounts the story of Willie’s separation from Walt Disney in a visually striking animated flashback.

Utilizing animation reminiscent of the original Steamboat Willie cartoon, the film recounts an old man’s tale of how Willie was separated from his creator, an animated depiction of Walt Disney. Much like in real life, the film too omits inclusion of Ub Iwerks as a creator of Mickey Mouse, reinforcing how authorship itself can be obscured by copyright mythologies. In the course of the tale, Walt falls overboard leaving Willie behind locked away in the ferry’s underbelly. Upon Willie’s release, after ninety-five years, he goes off on a rampage killing and terrorizing anyone that he comes across. Willie’s violence is framed not just as horror, but as retribution—an eruption of neglected cultural memory finally freed from captivity.

The middle animation segment of Screamboat utilizes the public domain nature of Steamboat Willie by formally adapting something that was previously restricted by copyright. This unique passage during the film’s middle point sticks in the viewer’s mind, elevating the work a step beyond pure shock value. It instead evokes an iconic character to examine the legacy of copyright control. Through Willie’s violent acts, the film suggests that long copyright terms can turn cultural icons into imprisoned relics. Screamboat critiques the copyright maximalism that the Disney company helped enshrine, using one of Disney’s earliest icons. Together, Blood and Honey and Screamboat reflect two poles of public domain horror—one exploitative, the other expressive. But both are artifacts of a specific cultural and creative moment.

Placed in the context of this broader moment in filmmaking, public domain horror is not an aberration but a logical outcome. Despite this, the context that surrounds the films now will not always be in living memory. In many years, when reflecting on this particular filmmaking environment, these horror adaptations might be seen as an odd and quirky moment of filmmaking. In actuality, these films are emblematic of the cultural moment in which they were produced, highlighting an evolving landscape of intellectual property and creative voice. Ultimately, these films probably won’t reach the same cultural impact as adaptations of other public domain works like 1961’s West Side Story (Romeo and Juliet) or 1959’s Ben-Hur (Ben-Hur). Still, they will remain important and interesting cultural artifacts that inform future generations as snapshots and reflections of the conditions in which they were made. Looking back at the past through creative works informs us of the societal and creative mores of that moment, and helps to anchor us in a contextual reference point to our own moment. Maybe these films will be celebrated themselves when they inevitably enter the public domain… in nearly 100 years.

Screams in the Vault: Public Domain Horror in the Age of IP by Sterling Dudley is marked with CC0 1.0

Films entering the public domain will soon face a significant shift. In 2030, films governed by the Hays Code will start to enter the public domain. The Hays Code was a set of self-imposed industry censorship guidelines enforced from 1934 to 1968 by the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA), under the leadership of Will H. Hays. Designed to regulate morality in Hollywood films, the code dictated strict rules on depictions of crime, sex, and “immoral” behavior, shaping the creative boundaries of American cinema for decades.

In a comment on one of the Internet Archive’s social media posts, Bluesky user josiahwhite suggested an interesting idea: that due to the restrictions of the Hays Code “[t]he public domain will get a lot more boring.” While this idea might at first seem true, upon further examination it actually clouds the clever ways in which filmmakers of the time navigated the restrictive influence of the Hays Code to tell creative and compelling stories.

To illustrate this point, we shall explore three films—It Happened One Night, To Be or Not to Be, and Double Indemnity—each of which engaged with the Hays Code in distinct ways. Through these case studies, we will see that while the Hays Code imposed restrictions, it did not stifle creativity. Instead, filmmakers found ingenious and often subversive ways to work within and around these constraints, producing films that remain influential to this day.

It Happened One Night (1934): A Pre-Code Example

Being a pre-Code film, one might assume that Frank Capra’s It Happened One Night is hugely risqué, pushing the boundaries of obscenity and serving as a final burst of unfettered creative filmmaking. However, the reality is more complex. While the film includes suggestive moments—such as Claudette Colbert’s character, Ellie, showing some leg to attract passing vehicles, or mentions of gangster violence—it also adheres to many traditional moral expectations of its time. Opposite Colbert’s Ellie is Clark Gable’s character, Peter, a down on his luck newspaper man with a hard edge. Peter first meets Ellie when a man on their bus, Shapely, begins hitting on Ellie. Shapely attempts to endear himself to Ellie as “Fun on the Side Shapely,” flaunting his disregard for marriage vows. This denigration of marriage would not play well in the Hays Code, and the film itself seems to take issue with it as well, as Peter gets Shapely to leave by pretending to be Ellie’s husband. 

When Peter and Ellie are forced to share a cabin for the night, they construct a makeshift barrier—a sheet dubbed the “Walls of Jericho”—to maintain a sense of modesty. While there was no Code explicitly forbidding an unmarried man and woman from sharing a room at the time, the film nonetheless applies its own restrictions, anticipating the kinds of rules the Hays Code would later enforce. A deeper reading of these moral themes appears as the name, “Walls of Jericho,” references the religious story from the Book of Joshua, incorporating Judeo-Christian values that would later be emphasized under the Hays Code. 

The film ultimately concludes with Peter and Ellie getting married, affirming the cultural ideal of heterosexual marriage that the Code would later regulate as a fundamental norm. So what emerges from It Happened One Night is a blend of the unregulated era of Hollywood and the values that would soon be codified under the Hays Code. Despite the interplay of these influences, the film remains a masterwork. It was the first film in Academy Awards history to win all five major categories—Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Screenplay—an achievement that underscores both its artistic brilliance and its lasting appeal.

To Be or Not to Be (1942): A Satirical Challenge to the Code

By the early 1940s, Hollywood was firmly under the Hays Code’s influence and deeply entrenched in World War II. Ernst Lubitsch’s satirical comedy To Be or Not to Be follows a Polish theater troupe whose production of Hamlet is disrupted by the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939. At its core, the film actively mocks and ridicules the Nazis in direct contradiction to the Hays Code’s provision against making “willful offense to any nation.” Though, given that the target was the Nazis, it appears this rule was conveniently overlooked. 

One of the most striking aspects of To Be or Not to Be is its subversion of the Hays Code’s depiction of marriage and fidelity. The film centers on Joseph and Maria Tura, a married couple who lead the Polish theater troupe. Maria, played by Carole Lombard, is heavily implied to be unfaithful to Joseph, played by Jack Benny, which the film often underplays for laughs. Her admirer, a young Polish pilot named Stanislav Sobinski, regularly leaves the audience during Joseph’s delivery of Hamlet’s “To Be or Not to Be” monologue to secretly meet with Maria backstage. Joseph is frustrated that his performance is being disregarded, while not at all aware of the deeper intentions behind the disturbance. Sobinski and Maria’s relationship continues to the point of Sobinski suggesting she divorce her husband to marry him, very much in line with the code. He additionally suggests she retire from acting to become a housewife. However, Maria proves reticence to do either, thus subverting the infidelity in one regard, and pushing back on the normative gender roles that the Hays Code sought to uphold. Sobinski’s relationship with Maria is cut short when he is called to war following the Nazi invasion. 

The plot is propelled forward when he returns to Poland and uncovers a Nazi spy masquerading as a Polish professor who plans to root out the Polish resistance. The film plays with its Code subversion through humor, such as a memorable gag in which Joseph returns home to find Sobinski sleeping in his bed, suggesting further infidelity. While nothing improper has actually happened—Sobinski was given refuge after parachuting from his plane into Poland—the physical staging of the scene suggests Maria’s attraction to Sobinski remains unresolved. 

In the film, the Nazis take Maria hostage just as Sobinski returns. Throughout the film, she skillfully leverages their desires for her attractiveness by navigating herself and others out of danger, and taking some Nazis down along the way. Ultimately, Joseph and Sobinski reconcile, but the film’s final scene reinforces Maria’s continued infidelity—just as Joseph delivers his monologue again, another young man rises and exits, mirroring Sobinski’s earlier actions. 

While the film cannot be as explicit about its themes due to the Hays Code, it remains sharp and subversive. The humor is relentless, the jokes land with precision, and the script is exceptionally tight. Despite the Code’s restrictions, To Be or Not to Be stands as one of Hollywood’s most defining satirical films about the Nazis—proof that even under strict censorship, filmmakers found ways to push boundaries and craft enduring works of comedy and social critique.

Double Indemnity (1944): Adaptation Under the Code

Here we have an interesting example of adaptation and the Hays Code. In 1935, the original story was submitted by author, James M. Cain, to the Hays Code Office for use in a film script. The Office rejected it for “being a blueprint for murder” (Hoopes, 1982, pg. 268, 331). Since printed works were not governed by the standards of the Hays Code, Cain serialized the story in Liberty magazine during 1936. Following its success as a compiled book in 1943, the story eventually underwent adaptation to a motion picture in 1944. 

The best known version of the story, the 1944 film, was directed by Billy Wilder, and worked with a Code slightly less sensitive to crime. Yet it still had to adhere to a more restrictive set of rules for the film. The plot remains quite consistent in overall story beats between the mediums. An insurance salesman, Walter, falls in love with a client, Phyllis, and the two commit insurance fraud and murder, killing Phyllis’ husband. Following the murder, the two fall apart and grow distrustful of each other. Seeking to get revenge for putting him through the ordeal, Walter seeks to kill Phyllis by surprise. The two diverge in this encounter.

In the film version, Walter and Phyllis mortally wound each other in a shootout. Phyllis dies during the shooting, but a mortally injured Walter gets away. He returns to his office, and there he recounts the entirety of the plot into a dictaphone before succumbing to his injuries. 

The film’s ending places much more emphasis on finality for both characters. While the Code had loosened up on crime films by 1944, it still desired to show the consequences of crime. In its initial 1935 rejection of the story, the Office believed it was depicting “an adulterous relationship” where the criminals “get away with the crime” (Hoopes, 1982, pg. 268, 331). By ensuring the film reinforces the Code’s moral stance against adultery and murder, eliminating the ambiguity present in the book’s ending.

Neither Phyllis nor Walter die in the shootout. Instead, Walter recovers, and escapes on a boat to Mexico. While aboard the boat, Walter runs into Phyllis. After briefly reuniting, the two are implied to be contemplating suicide by jumping into the water right as the book ends.

Even with these adaptational changes, the film is highly entertaining, constantly building suspense through the imagery, editing, and narrative twist. In the end, the restrictions of the Hays Code don’t actively harm the tale, but rather creates a different interpretation of the events. 

Conclusion

In looking at It Happened One Night, To Be or Not to Be, and Double Indemnity, we can see how the Hays Code shaped Hollywood, and had creative filmmakers navigate its restrictions in ways that often led to ingenious results. The argument that public domain works will become less exciting as we enter the Hays Code era is not hard to envision, but it overlooks the reality that creative expression persisted and thrived under constraint. Just as filmmakers worked within the boundaries of the Code to create powerful, lasting stories, we should approach the films entering the public domain each year with curiosity, nuance, and appreciation for their historical contexts. As we anticipate Hays Code-era films entering the public domain in 2030, we should also celebrate the wide array of pre-Code films still making their way into the public domain—such as Frankenstein, All Quiet on the Western Front, King Kong, numerous Marx Brothers films, and many more inventive short cartoons. The public domain continues to expand, and with it, our opportunity to rediscover and reinterpret the works of the past.

This post is published under a CC0 Waiver dedicating it to the public domain.