American Movie Classics began broadcasting on October 1st, 1984. At first it was a pay cable channel, but in 1987 it switched to basic cable. During the 80s and 90s AMC featured classic films from the 1950s and earlier in their unedited, commercial free formats. In the late 90s, programming began to shift its focus to movies from the 50s and 60s. 2002 saw a drastic format change for the AMC network. It changed to a generalized movie channel, showing films primarily from the 1970s and beyond. AMC also began showing advertisements in between and during their movies. The full name "American Movie Classics" has been downplayed due to the programming changes.
In 1993, AMC founded the Film Preservation Festival, a movie marathon highlighting movies never before aired and "lost" movies. From 1997 through 2008 AMC featured a week long marathon of horror movies called "Monsterfest." Also, every Friday night, AMC runs a horror film double feature called "Fear Friday." Monsterfest was replaced with the new and improved "Fearfest" in 2008. As we anticipate the premiere of Walking Dead it is interesting to note that AMC has already been highlighting the horror genre for almost two decades!
John Byrne
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