Wednesday, October 27, 2004
The horror...
Last night on Bravo, I got the privilege of watching the first installment of “Top 100 Scariest Movie Moments.” This means I didn’t get much studying done while it was on. These sort of countdown shows are a guaranteed distraction for me (for reference, see also I Love the 80’s). Thanksgiving may be my favorite holiday, but I adore Halloween just as much. Always have. It isn’t that I am a goth kid or anything. Yet every year I celebrate by watching some great horror movies. And, like most of my favorite pastimes, I have no one to share this with… except my brother (who I rarely have a chance to sit and see a movie with any more).
Anyway, my love affair with horror movies came along thanks to a combination of EC Comics and two local TV weekend staples; Twilight Zone reruns, and a show called Creature Feature. On the latter, a local man dressed up like a mad scientist (Dr. Sanguinary) and hosted the show from his lab. His side-kick was a hairy, gorilla like arm that was allegedly attached to a hideous monster (always just beyond site in a cell) that the Doctor had created (the monster’s name was Igor). This show was revived not too long ago, but in this day and age, there is no hope for ratings when cable and the internet are just a click away. For a short time, I totally ditched watching SNL in favor of The House that Dripped Blood, The Fiend Without a Face, Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires, Creature from the Black Lagoon, and Village of the Damned.
Now, I have never been one for gore. I prefer a psychological fright, like sending photos of a man’s children to him as a threat (ala One Hour Photo), to gory realism, like sticking a splinter into someone’s eyeball (ala Fulcci’s “Zombi”), any day… but often horror movies mix the two so well that they become unsettling fun. They are so often overly violent, gory, sexually exploitive, and rarely hold any sort of message. I think this is what I love most about horror movies; they are not redeeming in any level, yet they are so much fun. They truly are mindless self indulgence.
I was impressed at some of the stuff that Bravo included. Some was lame, yet some was rather “underground” in nature, and that was a very cool thing. Too often these sort of list-shows only pay lip service to things with household recognition (or that make good fodder for discussion). I realize they like to be clever and add silly things to break up monotony (like The Wizard of Oz as scary???), but I like these things to stay on task.
I hate to see them waste time on crap like Child’s Play. I’d like to see them do an answer list of lamest horror attempts. They could put all those remakes like The Haunting, House on Haunted Hill, and 13 Ghosts on the list, then fill in the blanks with feces like The Watcher, Bats, Stigmata, and The Hollow Man (and that isn’t even counting 80’s garbage like Hotel Hell and CHUD). I guess you should know better if it is a horror movie and it is based on a Stephen King novel, has Wes Craven’s name on it, has WB/UPN actors in it, or it stars Kevin Bacon.
Why do you think people like to be scared and thrilled? Isn’t it a weird phenomenon? In a way, I see it as a cousin to drug abuse, or masturbation. You are eliciting a response from your body artificially; in this case, horror. You are activating all those pumps and pathways that are usually reserved for life-or-death situations.
For instance: it is fun for me to peek through my fingers as zombies tear people apart in 28 Days Later. I feel the surge of adrenaline and feel my heart race for the same reason I would be able to run at top speed, even at depleted oxygen levels, if a lion charged at me from out of the tall grass. The response wasn’t meant for fun, it was meant for self preservation.
Another curiosity I have always had is why horror movies are so often tied to nudity and sex? Its all a heaping pile of exploitation… aimed at the sort of thing a particular demographic lusts for (aka teenage boys). But to me it seems intolerable that women are objectified and then brutalized in the same movie. It probably started in the 50’s drive-in culture. You show that even a “helpless” woman can be a victim, and all those sweater’d teenies will be cuddling up to Johnny Quarterback all night. Fast forward to 1980, and you have 17 year old characters being played by would-be adult film stars, stripping naked, performing a little soft-core porn, then getting stabbed through the neck with an ice pick. It is a very disturbing feature of these movies if you think about it. I’m not a big fan of sex/nudity in movies anyway, and mixing it with decapitation is too much. Just try and watch Cannibal Ferrox…
Anyway, here is a list of some of my favorite horror movies. There aren’t a lot of “good” horror movies, but there are a lot that are fun to watch! If you are interested in finding out more about them, cut and paste their titles into www.imdb.com
- Night of the Hunter. This would be my wife’s #1 scariest movie. I was glad to see it included, but it wasn’t nearly high enough on the list (in the 90’s?). A murderous preacher trying to kill children? That is scary! This movie is a must see for all movie fans. Sometimes the worst monsters are humans.
- 28 Days Later. This movie proved to me that the horror genre was not dead. It is intelligent and frightening. About as well-made as a horror movie can be. Like most people have commented, the truly haunting aspects of the movie are its possibilities. The ending sort of got stupid (with the soldiers), but most of us horror buffs recognize a huge nod to George Romero (namely, Day of the Dead).
- Night of the Living Dead. As far as I am concerned, this movie brought horror into the mainstream (it was no longer a genre of low-budget, make-out movies), and then broke the mold. Nothing has ever been filmed that is more gut-level and perfect than this movie. I find myself scared from beginning to end every time. Probably my favorite horror movie of all.
- Audition. This movie is unsettling, to say the least. Again, it is scary in a “real” way. A woman simply will not stand for being objectified by men any longer. I can’t say any more, or I will ruin the movie. A great film by Miike, a controversial Japanese director.
- Ju-On. The Japanese movie that recently was remade in the US as The Grudge. Much like The Ring, it is creepy and atmospheric. A test of a good horror movie is if it sticks with you. And this one definitely stuck with me. As if I needed more worries about seeing things… the scene where the boy ghost and the shapeless wisp are hanging around the girl’s bed… I tell you, that messed me up. I jumped everytime I saw so much as a shadow out of the corner of my eye for months!
- The Ring. A good remake of the Japanese phenomenon. In Japan, there was a novel, TV series, manga, and movie sequels. The movie was also remade in Korea. Anyway, the US version is really good. It draws its strength on the Nine Inch Nail video-esque imagery. The acting is bad, and there are a few plot holes, but for the most part it is original and full of great scares.
- Poltergeist. It seems cheesy now, but the very subtle things in it that kill you. The clown scenes alone ruined my life. I was shocked to hear that one of the commentators said after seeing it, he would run and jump into bed to avoid the clown reaching out and getting him. That is exactly what I did for years!
- Psycho. Hitchcock owns the world. Everything from his controversial screenplay to the way he marketed the movie was sheer perfection. Perkins played his role so well that it pretty much ruined him for all other acting gigs. People make a big deal over the shower scene, as they should, but that is missing so much more psychological undertones that are going on. I mean, this movie was based on Ed Gein for goodness sake! He made a few horror flicks (like The Birds, for instance), but Psycho is the scariest by far.
- The Fog. John Carpenter made a minimalist ghost movie, and it is fantastic. The funny thing is, the so-called “director’s cut” was awful, and the changes he added at the last minute at the request of the studio made it the great movie that it was. Without fail, every scene that I thought was clever, every noise I thought was well placed, and every prop that was placed so masterfully was added late in production.
That’s all I care to waste space on for now. I could go on and on. I mean, I didn’t even talk about how clever the concept for The Others was, or how What Lies Beneath wasn’t as awful as I feared it would be. I didn’t give the list of shame (it’s way too long). Nor did I mention other goodies like Jaws, Old Boy, Halloween, The Exorcist, Memento Mori, The Shining, The Vanishing (the foreign version), Nang Nak, Silence of the Lambs, The Sixth Sense, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Carnival of Souls, Jacob’s Ladder, Brotherhood of the Wolf, The Evil Dead, Rosemary’s Baby, Puppet Master, and on and on and on. And then there’s the Thriller video…
Oh, and as a post script… well, a pre-script post script, I hated Scream, and I to this day do not see what everyone was so giddy about. And House of 1000 Corpses was way too much for me… Okay, I’ll quit.
See ya!
Oh, and what is up with Phantasm II? I watched it for the first time on AMC’s Monsterfest (it’s an awful movie), and there are cannibal Jawas in it! George Lucas should sue somebody! :`(
Anyway, my love affair with horror movies came along thanks to a combination of EC Comics and two local TV weekend staples; Twilight Zone reruns, and a show called Creature Feature. On the latter, a local man dressed up like a mad scientist (Dr. Sanguinary) and hosted the show from his lab. His side-kick was a hairy, gorilla like arm that was allegedly attached to a hideous monster (always just beyond site in a cell) that the Doctor had created (the monster’s name was Igor). This show was revived not too long ago, but in this day and age, there is no hope for ratings when cable and the internet are just a click away. For a short time, I totally ditched watching SNL in favor of The House that Dripped Blood, The Fiend Without a Face, Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires, Creature from the Black Lagoon, and Village of the Damned.
Now, I have never been one for gore. I prefer a psychological fright, like sending photos of a man’s children to him as a threat (ala One Hour Photo), to gory realism, like sticking a splinter into someone’s eyeball (ala Fulcci’s “Zombi”), any day… but often horror movies mix the two so well that they become unsettling fun. They are so often overly violent, gory, sexually exploitive, and rarely hold any sort of message. I think this is what I love most about horror movies; they are not redeeming in any level, yet they are so much fun. They truly are mindless self indulgence.
I was impressed at some of the stuff that Bravo included. Some was lame, yet some was rather “underground” in nature, and that was a very cool thing. Too often these sort of list-shows only pay lip service to things with household recognition (or that make good fodder for discussion). I realize they like to be clever and add silly things to break up monotony (like The Wizard of Oz as scary???), but I like these things to stay on task.
I hate to see them waste time on crap like Child’s Play. I’d like to see them do an answer list of lamest horror attempts. They could put all those remakes like The Haunting, House on Haunted Hill, and 13 Ghosts on the list, then fill in the blanks with feces like The Watcher, Bats, Stigmata, and The Hollow Man (and that isn’t even counting 80’s garbage like Hotel Hell and CHUD). I guess you should know better if it is a horror movie and it is based on a Stephen King novel, has Wes Craven’s name on it, has WB/UPN actors in it, or it stars Kevin Bacon.
Why do you think people like to be scared and thrilled? Isn’t it a weird phenomenon? In a way, I see it as a cousin to drug abuse, or masturbation. You are eliciting a response from your body artificially; in this case, horror. You are activating all those pumps and pathways that are usually reserved for life-or-death situations.
For instance: it is fun for me to peek through my fingers as zombies tear people apart in 28 Days Later. I feel the surge of adrenaline and feel my heart race for the same reason I would be able to run at top speed, even at depleted oxygen levels, if a lion charged at me from out of the tall grass. The response wasn’t meant for fun, it was meant for self preservation.
Another curiosity I have always had is why horror movies are so often tied to nudity and sex? Its all a heaping pile of exploitation… aimed at the sort of thing a particular demographic lusts for (aka teenage boys). But to me it seems intolerable that women are objectified and then brutalized in the same movie. It probably started in the 50’s drive-in culture. You show that even a “helpless” woman can be a victim, and all those sweater’d teenies will be cuddling up to Johnny Quarterback all night. Fast forward to 1980, and you have 17 year old characters being played by would-be adult film stars, stripping naked, performing a little soft-core porn, then getting stabbed through the neck with an ice pick. It is a very disturbing feature of these movies if you think about it. I’m not a big fan of sex/nudity in movies anyway, and mixing it with decapitation is too much. Just try and watch Cannibal Ferrox…
Anyway, here is a list of some of my favorite horror movies. There aren’t a lot of “good” horror movies, but there are a lot that are fun to watch! If you are interested in finding out more about them, cut and paste their titles into www.imdb.com
- Night of the Hunter. This would be my wife’s #1 scariest movie. I was glad to see it included, but it wasn’t nearly high enough on the list (in the 90’s?). A murderous preacher trying to kill children? That is scary! This movie is a must see for all movie fans. Sometimes the worst monsters are humans.
- 28 Days Later. This movie proved to me that the horror genre was not dead. It is intelligent and frightening. About as well-made as a horror movie can be. Like most people have commented, the truly haunting aspects of the movie are its possibilities. The ending sort of got stupid (with the soldiers), but most of us horror buffs recognize a huge nod to George Romero (namely, Day of the Dead).
- Night of the Living Dead. As far as I am concerned, this movie brought horror into the mainstream (it was no longer a genre of low-budget, make-out movies), and then broke the mold. Nothing has ever been filmed that is more gut-level and perfect than this movie. I find myself scared from beginning to end every time. Probably my favorite horror movie of all.
- Audition. This movie is unsettling, to say the least. Again, it is scary in a “real” way. A woman simply will not stand for being objectified by men any longer. I can’t say any more, or I will ruin the movie. A great film by Miike, a controversial Japanese director.
- Ju-On. The Japanese movie that recently was remade in the US as The Grudge. Much like The Ring, it is creepy and atmospheric. A test of a good horror movie is if it sticks with you. And this one definitely stuck with me. As if I needed more worries about seeing things… the scene where the boy ghost and the shapeless wisp are hanging around the girl’s bed… I tell you, that messed me up. I jumped everytime I saw so much as a shadow out of the corner of my eye for months!
- The Ring. A good remake of the Japanese phenomenon. In Japan, there was a novel, TV series, manga, and movie sequels. The movie was also remade in Korea. Anyway, the US version is really good. It draws its strength on the Nine Inch Nail video-esque imagery. The acting is bad, and there are a few plot holes, but for the most part it is original and full of great scares.
- Poltergeist. It seems cheesy now, but the very subtle things in it that kill you. The clown scenes alone ruined my life. I was shocked to hear that one of the commentators said after seeing it, he would run and jump into bed to avoid the clown reaching out and getting him. That is exactly what I did for years!
- Psycho. Hitchcock owns the world. Everything from his controversial screenplay to the way he marketed the movie was sheer perfection. Perkins played his role so well that it pretty much ruined him for all other acting gigs. People make a big deal over the shower scene, as they should, but that is missing so much more psychological undertones that are going on. I mean, this movie was based on Ed Gein for goodness sake! He made a few horror flicks (like The Birds, for instance), but Psycho is the scariest by far.
- The Fog. John Carpenter made a minimalist ghost movie, and it is fantastic. The funny thing is, the so-called “director’s cut” was awful, and the changes he added at the last minute at the request of the studio made it the great movie that it was. Without fail, every scene that I thought was clever, every noise I thought was well placed, and every prop that was placed so masterfully was added late in production.
That’s all I care to waste space on for now. I could go on and on. I mean, I didn’t even talk about how clever the concept for The Others was, or how What Lies Beneath wasn’t as awful as I feared it would be. I didn’t give the list of shame (it’s way too long). Nor did I mention other goodies like Jaws, Old Boy, Halloween, The Exorcist, Memento Mori, The Shining, The Vanishing (the foreign version), Nang Nak, Silence of the Lambs, The Sixth Sense, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Carnival of Souls, Jacob’s Ladder, Brotherhood of the Wolf, The Evil Dead, Rosemary’s Baby, Puppet Master, and on and on and on. And then there’s the Thriller video…
Oh, and as a post script… well, a pre-script post script, I hated Scream, and I to this day do not see what everyone was so giddy about. And House of 1000 Corpses was way too much for me… Okay, I’ll quit.
See ya!
Oh, and what is up with Phantasm II? I watched it for the first time on AMC’s Monsterfest (it’s an awful movie), and there are cannibal Jawas in it! George Lucas should sue somebody! :`(
Comments:
Post a Comment