Favourite Horror Flick?

[BegintheBeguine]

Shadow of the Vampire: Oh, I liked it. One of the few new movies that didn't let me down. Not scary, though.

 

[K.D. Lightner]

Elaina -- Glad to know that someone else felt sorry for that poor big gorilla.

I forgot to mention the movies Val Lewton, a golden age director of scary films. There are scenes in Cat People and The Leopard Man that will have you holding on to your chair. And the curious thing -- you never see guts or gore or even people being attacked by whatever is stalking them.

I have Lewton DVD collection (got it off eBay) that has the two films mentioned above, plus I Walked with a Zombie, The Curse of the Cat People, The Ghost Ship, and several with Karloff in it: Isle of the Dead, The Body Snatcher, and Bedlam.

How's that for keeping you awake at night?!

I haven't seen some of these, am looking forward to it.

karol

 

[Fletch]

I'm with karol. I actually feel the same way about horror and violence that scolds and prudes feel about sex: less is more. I physically cannot take large doses of lifelike brutality - they seriously screw with my mood - so my appreciation of horror (and crime) films is limited to the old style.

 

[WH1]

agree with both of you about the gratuitous violence in today's horror movies. Three of the scariest movies of all time the Jaws, the original Halloween and Hitchcocks Psycho used music and the elements of the act to incite terror rather than showing the actual act and a lot of blood. How effective were they in inciting terror in their audiences. Well I know my mother wouldn't take a shower if she was home alone for over 20 years after seeing Psycho and an entire generation of americans still look over their shoulder for the fin anytime they to go in the water. Pretty good terror.

 

[K.D. Lightner]

Yes, I think the gore actually distracts from the real terror. Stephen King once wrote (in Danse Macabre) that the highest form of the horror story is terror -- and you don't really need a ghoul fest in order to scare people witless. Remember in The Shining when the little kid is out among the topiary animals and they start to move -- that scene gave the reader/movie goer a sense of terror.

Next comes horror -- when you suddenly see the thing behind the door. Remember the shock we felt in Psycho when Vera Miles turns the rocking chair around and there is the .... (won't reveal it in case a few of you out there haven't seen it). And was the famous shower scene any less scary because you did not see a disemboweling? Or gobs and gobs of blood? What is left to the imagination is what is really scary.

Last is what King calls the lowest form of the horror story, the gross-me-out stuff, i.e., green worms slithering out of the skull, flesh falling off the undead thing, pea soup being hurled, zombies dismembered, etc., ad nauseum. I have a strong stomach and can tolerate looking at that stuff, but, truthfully, it does not scare me and, after awhile, it bores me.

Curiously, King seemed to have violated his own premise, as many of his later horror books and movies were gore fests. I much prefer his non-horror fiction now, which still may have a few terrifying moments here and there.

karol

 

[Lee Lynch]

Yes, I think the gore actually distracts from the real terror. Stephen King once wrote (in Danse Macabre) that the highest form of the horror story is terror -- and you don't really need a ghoul fest in order to scare people witless. Remember in The Shining when the little kid is out among the topiary animals and they start to move -- that scene gave the reader/movie goer a sense of terror.

Next comes horror -- when you suddenly see the thing behind the door. Remember the shock we felt in Psycho when Vera Miles turns the rocking chair around and there is the .... (won't reveal it in case a few of you out there haven't seen it). And was the famous shower scene any less scary because you did not see a disemboweling? Or gobs and gobs of blood? What is left to the imagination is what is really scary.

Last is what King calls the lowest form of the horror story, the gross-me-out stuff, i.e., green worms slithering out of the skull, flesh falling off the undead thing, pea soup being hurled, zombies dismembered, etc., ad nauseum. I have a strong stomach and can tolerate looking at that stuff, but, truthfully, it does not scare me and, after awhile, it bores me.

Curiously, King seemed to have violated his own premise, as many of his later horror books and movies were gore fests. I much prefer his non-horror fiction now, which still may have a few terrifying moments here and there.

karol

This is why I thought the Blair Witch Project was so great. It did so much with so little.

 

[lindylady]

LOL gosh no, it's the voice!

RIGHT! That voice is spectacular! It's amazing how many nuances there are to it. That man had looks and tons of talent.

 

[Pink Dahlia]

I love Sleepaway Camp and Evil Dead. Both are late 70's early 80's films, which happen to be my favourite time period for horrors. The special effects are unmatched in my opinion. Plus this time frame also holds the so bad they are good horrors.

Bruce Campbell lover!

 

[Pink Dahlia]

My favorite horror flick is the Japanese version of Dark Water. (Do not see the miserable piece of American trash. It doesn't even compare.)

(Japanese) Dark Water is so damn scary I think I peed myself.

As for Suspense/Thriller it would have to be Vertigo. Hands down.

 

[Elaina]

But even Stephen King also realizes that all forms of the horror genre are just as valid, and each reader/viewer will like different things.

I like psychological horror., and probably is my favorite subgenre of horror. I write alot of it, but I've also been known to write the gore (my sense of humor.) I started reading horror the summer I turned 12, thanks to my dad, his broken back, boredom and the book "Thinner". In 2 years I worked my way through all his classics. Then I discovered "Rose Madder", "The Talisman" and "The Stand". Scary, you betcha. Why? Because two of the three could happen.

Nothing scarier then the story that's just off enough to know it can't happen, but spot on enough to figure it COULD.

I also enjoy the campy, gross stuff, ala Nightmare on Elm street. "The Saw" (first one) is probably one of the best I've seen in recent years.

 

[John in Covina]

"Silence of the Lambs" is well made with actually minimal gore. The time that a shocking scene or violence is on the screen is fairly short, but the lead up to it makes it all the more horrific. 'It places the lotion in the basket.'

I love the 50's sci-fi and monster pictures so much and still think that after the original version of "The Thing" one of the best for building and rebuilding tension even after seeing the monster is the movie "THEM" yes the one with the giant ants. Plus there are lines in this movie that are the best.

Lady Dr. Medford says they need to make sure the nest is saturated with cyanide gas. The FBI guy (Arness) says: "When this is all over I'm going to show you how saturated I can get."

Lady Dr. Medford notes how the walls of the nest are held together with saliva. Highway patrol sarge (Whitmore) quips, "Spit, huh? Well spit's all that's holding me together."

And who can forget: "Make me a sargent in charge of the booze!"

One of the great aspects of the Japanese picture "Rodan" is the narrative that always pulls me in to the film.

The Haunting and the Haunting of Hill House are pretty good. Ghost Story is good too and the ghost story with George C. Scott is pretty good.

The movie Poltergiest, the expanding hallway scene is remeniscent of trying to run in a dream and you can't. "They're Here!"

In the Alien line up: #two - "Aliens" was one that when I saw it in the movies my legs ached because i wanted to get up and run.

Seeing "Jaws" in the movies the scene where the dock gets pulled apart and the guy falls in while "fishing" for the shark. I actually stood up because of the tension when he is trying to swim back before the shark gets him.

 

[Lee Lynch]

King is may favourite modern horror author, hands down. I started reading him when I was 12 and did not give up on him till I got bored with The Tommyknockers. I think 23 of his books in all, for me. He has such a great talent for character development balanced with a moving plot. I loved The Stand and The Talisman (Straub was also great, and the co-authoring was pretty seamless if you ask me). It's interesting how King can have events of serious terror within a story, but include elements of very deep love and family.

As for the long-dead, Poe and Lovecraft are of course among my favourites. Readers with a taste for vintage AND horror who have not yet picked up Lovecraft are missing out. His writings were in the 20's and some were set earlier, and I find them well written and interesting. I picked up my copies of his stories on Amazon for just a few dollars.

John in Covina,

I'm glad you mentioned Silence of the Lambs. Great series of movies!

 

[cooper]

The Changeling with George C. Scott. 1980 was a great ghost movie.If your looking for horror without the monsters this is it.
Psycho
Excorsist
The original Fly
Invisible man
Every twilight zone
The ghost and Mr. Chicken
The amazing colossal man and the sequel the amazing colossal beast.
What was the puppet movie with Anthony Hopkins?
Does anyone remember Feep on the old Sci-fi theater?

 

[Photomuse]

This thread intrigues me because there is not a movie scary enough for me yet! So when I turn on a horror movie I challenge it, come on, scare me!


These scared me at the time:
The Omega Man
Salem's Lot

All original versions

You are my long lost twin! I'm the same way. I love, love horror, I love being scared.

To this day there are two movies I can't watch because they scared the heck out of me as a kid - Salem's Lot (I can forever hearing that scratching at the window) and The Exorcist

For my camp... I love the Evil Dead series and Hellraiser
For fear... give me something Japanese (even their haunted houses scare the heebees out of me!)

Kristin

 

[K.D. Lightner]

My favorite King book is The Stand and I thought the miniseries was fairly good, too.

My second favorite was his novella, The Mist, which has never been made into a movie. Also, another favorite novella was The Reach.

King called Lovecraft The Master. I would say he was that in the early 20th century, but, since the mid-70's and beyond, it has been King.

karol

 

[Bogie]

H.P. Lovecraft, in my opinion, was directly responsible for the birth of the horror pulp genre as well as creating one of the most
terrifying and hidieous monstrosities ever known: Cthulhu. Whenever I can, I buy his books.

I adore his writings, and I love it when King sticks in little references in his work here and there.

The sad thing is that on cold days I will wear my 'Miskatonic University' hoodie to school, and no one gets the reference.

Anywho, my favourite horror movie would have to be Eraserhead...it is just so bizarre and surreal.

Anyone who enjoys abstract or existentialist horror and has not watched it yet...you really don't know just what you are missing.

 

[czack]

The original Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

 

[BegintheBeguine]

Where's my pen?

The Changeling with George C. Scott. 1980 was a great ghost movie.If your looking for horror without the monsters this is it.
Psycho
Excorsist
The original Fly
Invisible man
Every twilight zone
The ghost and Mr. Chicken
The amazing colossal man and the sequel the amazing colossal beast.
What was the puppet movie with Anthony Hopkins?
Does anyone remember Feep on the old Sci-fi theater?

Ah. Magic. I read the book, then saw it in the theatre when it came out. Now I own the VHS. And, you are another Changeling fan! Twilight Zone movie was good too, don't you think? Shocking to admit I haven't seen The Ghost and Mr. Chicken yet. Where was I that Saturday afternoon? That goes on the list to get from the library.

 

[Feraud]

What was the puppet movie with Anthony Hopkins?

Magic.

 

[jazzzbaby]

Count me in on anything Vincent Price ~ I am a huge fan of his
and own the majority of his films.