Horror movies: discuss away

Just watched Devil's Pass (good to see Renny Harlin is still working). I normally hate found footage, but this one really worked for me. Snow, Russia, Cold War, some genuine suspense, and a great twist.

I'm 14 movies into my annual October horror marathon, and I FINALLY got around to watching Rosemary's Baby after having it on the to-do list for like twenty years. Loved it. The ordinariness of evil is chilling.

Stitches is a hilarious horror comedy in the vein of Dead/Alive or My Boyfriend's Back. If you like laughs with your over the top gore, it's a hoot.

I also just got around to the ABCs of Death. A few mis-steps, but I'd give it 85%. The good was so good it far outweighed the few that were meh. I will never forget L is for Libido or the overweight woman's solution to her woes.
 
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cayman shen said:
Just watched Devil's Pass (good to see Renny Harlin is still working). I normally hate found footage, but this one really worked for me. Snow, Russia, Cold War, some genuine suspense, and a great twist.


I also just got around to the ABCs of Death. A few mis-steps, but I'd give it 85%. The good was so good it far outweighed the few that were meh. I will never forget L is for Libido or the overweight woman's solution to her woes.
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Gonna check out Devil's Pass. For some reason I'm a sucker for found footage films, all obviousness and nausea aside:lol.

Glad to hear that about ABCs of Death. I just saw a trailer for that tonight and thought it looked interesting. Def gonna watch it now.

I love horror movies and getting scared, feeling tension/hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Love leaving/finishing a movie and being creeped out by it for hours after. Not so much a fan of goreporn flicks.
 
Solos blaster said:
Gonna check out Devil's Pass. For some reason I'm a sucker for found footage films, all obviousness and nausea aside:lol.

Glad to hear that about ABCs of Death. I just saw a trailer for that tonight and thought it looked interesting. Def gonna watch it now.

I love horror movies and getting scared, feeling tension/hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Love leaving/finishing a movie and being creeped out by it for hours after. Not so much a fan of goreporn flicks.
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I watched a movie called Extraterrestrial the other night. It's kind of a half-cinematic and half-found footage movie about alien abductions.Turned out to be much better than I was expecting.

In that same vein, there is Alien Abduction, another found-footage movie which cleverly sidesteps the ever-present question of "why are they still filming" by putting the camera into the hands of an autistic 14-year old that uses the camera as a coping mechanism. It was quite good as well.

Then there was The Frankenstein Theory, another good one, in my opinion.
 
Solos blaster said:
Gonna check out Devil's Pass. For some reason I'm a sucker for found footage films, all obviousness and nausea aside:lol.

Glad to hear that about ABCs of Death. I just saw a trailer for that tonight and thought it looked interesting. Def gonna watch it now.

I love horror movies and getting scared, feeling tension/hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Love leaving/finishing a movie and being creeped out by it for hours after. Not so much a fan of goreporn flicks.
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Devil's Pass does a good job avoiding excessive shaky cam. So you shouldn't get too nauseated!
 
During October Turner is running all the old Hammer Mummy films on Saturdays at noon. Caught the first one with Cushing and Lee, who always are fun to watch, and today watched The Mummy's Shroud, which was horrendously bad and cheap looking even for Hammer. The script was awful and nobody in it could act worth a damn. The mummy also was a guy in a jump suit; there was a shot from behind him, and you could see the zipper running up the back, and his face was just a cloth over his head with a mouth and cheeks drawn on it. I can have fun with a bad B movie, but this was too much of a stinker.
 
Finally saw the original Vincent Price version of the Fly. I LOVED it. Price just oozes charisma. Of course, as a child of the 80s the Goldblum remake still owns my heart, but I'm really glad I have the 50s version under my belt now. Up to 15 movie in my October horror marathon :D
 
bigtrev503 said:
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...What I love about the "classics" (Freddy, Jason, Child's play, Hellraiser, chainsaw, etc)...



Wait a minute. The Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th, Child's Play, and Hellraiser movies are classics now??? Jebus, I'm old.
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I doubt there are many out there that would qualify any of those films as "classics." That doesn't mean you shouldn't enjoy the hell out of them. Guilty pleasures make the world go round.

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The Freddy, Jason, Michael, Leatherface era of horror are what I refer to as "Classic Slasher" films.

Dracula, Frankenstein, et al? "Classic Horror"

There is a distinction.
 
Okay, so I was just crackin' wise in post #87, but I did a little research on the ol' Interwebz and it appears there is no set criteria for determining whether or not a specific movie can or should be considered a "classic". Most of what I read indicates there is some universal consensus among the so-called experts, i.e. that a movie should be noteworthy in some way, that it should be "re-watchable", that it should be "of lasting worth or timeless quality", that it must have been "universally praised and admired by critics and audiences alike", and so on, but even those "criteria" are subject to an individual's tastes and opinions. So, while it still makes me feel old to think that a movie like Friday the 13th which is less than 35 years old could be considered a classic, I have to concede the fact that some people might consider it as such.
 
Zombie_61 said:
Okay, so I was just crackin' wise in post #87, but I did a little research on the ol' Interwebz and it appears there is no set criteria for determining whether or not a specific movie can or should be considered a "classic". Most of what I read indicates there is some universal consensus among the so-called experts, i.e. that a movie should be noteworthy in some way, that it should be "re-watchable", that it should be "of lasting worth or timeless quality", that it must have been "universally praised and admired by critics and audiences alike", and so on, but even those "criteria" are subject to an individual's tastes and opinions. So, while it still makes me feel old to think that a movie like Friday the 13th which is less than 35 years old could be considered a classic, I have to concede the fact that some people might consider it as such.
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I was just about to post more or less the same thing...for instance, The Big Lebowski isn't that old at all, but it's definitely a classic :D I admit though, I typically WOULD consider age to be a criteria. But age is relative...I was born in 1975. To me, Friday the 13th is a classic. If I was born in 1950, I might think of it as the new kid on the block. Having said that, it's a classic TEEN SLASHER movie, which was a very new genre back then. It doesn't go back later than the mid-70s, in fact. So for the genre, it doesn't GET more classic that F13, Halloween. NOES and Child's Play are definitely in the second wave (and Child's Play isn't a teen slasher, so I'd disqualify it in this argument). Still, NOES is hardly a RECENT movie, and it was a milestone in the genre. On the other hand, I wouldn't count Scream. Too new, too late to the game, too derivative and...bad.
 
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Watched The Mummy's Hand this morning. Made in 1940, I think it was the first follow-up to the Karloff original. It's mostly a buddy movie with the mummy finally appearing about 40 minutes in (it's only 65 minutes long). The first half was slow and the last half felt rushed. Still, a fun enough film. Hadn't seen it in years. Tom Tyler, the guy who played Captain Marvel and a bunch of cowboys, was the mummy. Great make up.
 
cayman shen said:
...for instance, The Big Lebowski isn't that old at all, but it's definitely a classic :D...
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I love The Big Lebowski, and I'm not sure I consider it a classic. It's definitely a cult film, and it certainly made an impact on some people, but it flopped at the box office and it most definitely isn't universally praised and appreciated to this day.

Probe Droid said:
Watched The Mummy's Hand this morning. Made in 1940, I think it was the first follow-up to the Karloff original. It's mostly a buddy movie with the mummy finally appearing about 40 minutes in (it's only 65 minutes long). The first half was slow and the last half felt rushed. Still, a fun enough film. Hadn't seen it in years. Tom Tyler, the guy who played Captain Marvel and a bunch of cowboys, was the mummy. Great make up.
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You are correct, The Mummy's Hand (1940) was the first sequel to Karloff's The Mummy (1932), followed by The Mummy's Tomb (1942), The Mummy's Ghost (1944), The Mummy's Curse (1944), and, loosely considered a sequel, Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy (1955).

Until Universal released them all in their Legacy Collection DVD set in 2004, I'd only seen The Mummy, which is the only one in the franchise that tries to be a serious horror movie. The sequels aren't intentionally comedic, but they all have essentially the same plot: a high priest of some sort tells an underling to revive the Mummy with a brew made from nine Tana leaves--only nine--the underling ignores his instructions, dumps a truckload of Tana leaves into the brew, and havoc ensues. I had a lot of fun watching them for the first time, even though the Mummy has to be the slowest moving villain in Universal's roster of monsters.
 
Followed up today with The Mummy's Tomb, a sequel to yesterday's The Mummy's Hand. Vastly superior. Loads of mummy (Lon Chaney taking over for Tom Tyler) action in this one. Sucker strangled everyone--woohoo! Still, the mummy is walking (if you can call it that) all over a small Massachusetts' town and nobody sees him even when they're looking for him.

It was roughly 62 minutes with the 1st 11 being a recap of the previous film with reused footage narrated by the lead character (Dick Foran made up to be old), so once you >> through that, the film is about 50 minutes long, so lean and mean. Fun.
 
cayman shen said:
The Mummy is the only one of the big Universal monster movies I didn't care for. I love the rest of them.
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My enjoyment of The Mummy comes mostly from Karloff's performance. Otherwise, the slow pacing makes it seem longer than it really is.

The one classic Universal horror/monster movie I don't care for is Dracula (1931). Bela Lugosi, Edward Van Sloan, and Dwight Frye are very good, but overall the movie suffers from awkward stage direction and blocking (the movie was based on the 1927 Broadway production, not Stoker's novel), some unusual editing, and a weak "hero" (David Manners) that is more effeminate than the female lead.
 
Third day in watched The Mummy's Ghost. Despite lots of Kharis action it was an awful stinker. Surprised to see John Carradine and Barton Maclane, who had been in A-listers. A job is a job I guess.
 
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