TORONTO — Each night around 11 p.m. at the Toronto International Film Festival, after the Oscar-bait wannabes and acclaimed documentaries have called it a day, 1,200 filmgoers line up outside the Ryerson Theater for the likes of “Yakuza Apocalypse” and “No One Lives.”

These aficionados may shy from the elaborate costumes and other geek-chic signifiers of Fantastic Fest or the various ComicCons. But they know their horror, their kung fu and all the other disreputable genres that draw the Toronto festival’s liveliest audiences — certainly the only ones that bring inflatable beach balls to the screenings.

“This is the Super Bowl of genre festivals,” said Robert Mitchell of Bloomington, Ind., who met his wife, Sarah, in line for “Jennifer’s Body” in 2009.

That tale of high school demonic possession went on to a negligible performance at the box office, but several other Midnight Madness titles have played a crucial role in horror’s newfound clout in mainstream culture. “It Follows,” “Raw,” “What We Do in the Shadows” —each has helped fuel a reconsideration of the genre that has led some critics to champion “post-horror,” small films that use horror conventions in the service of broader (and ostensibly nobler) purposes.