I figure the genre is due another massive dry spell at some point sooner than later. It certainly deserves it. With all the remakes, sequels that ignore past sequels, parodies, throwbacks and dozens of shark and Amityville movies being made each year, the oversaturation and quality being so few and far between, is probably only leading to an overall decline in interest.

40 or 50 years from now though? I'm thinking the state of cinema would be the least of our worries by then.

The films of Herschell Gordon Lewis would be a good example of that. He was able to have gore in those early ones (1963-67) like Blood Feast and Color Me Blood Red only because nobody ever thought to make rules against it, but also on the condition that the films contained no nudity or profanity. Aside from the obvious, they all come off very squeaky clean and are definitely towing a line. Fast forward to 1972 with the release of The Gore Gore Girls, and we got titties, profanity, vulgar humor, and an all around trashy tone never seen before. Even The Wizard Of Gore from 1970 seemed to be still towing that line. Strangely, Gore Gore Girls is my least favorite of all those gore movies, although it's a shame he threw in the towel just as things were getting trashy.