Favorite Horror Movies

I love a good horror movie. The way I see it, anything that's telling you a story is going to try and evoke an emotional reaction from you, right? And the point of a horror movie is to be scary, right? So the more scared I am, the more fun I'm having. I LOVE being scared; it's why I love the Silent Hill video games so much, and why The Woman in Black is one of my favourite plays. :3 Alas, though, I haven't been scared by a horror movie in a really long time. I think The Woman in Black actually broke me - it scared me so badly that my body now just doesn't recognise fear as an emotion anymore. XD

Anyway. Generally, I prefer horror movies to have supernatural elements. It doesn't have to be anything complicated; I'm developing a strong affinity for zombie movies, and there's little as awesome as good old-fashioned haunted house movie. But a man in a mask with a weapon just isn't scary to me (being startled when something pops up unexpectedly is NOT the same thing as feeling real fear, no matter what the people who hate gunshots in musicals may say), and I'm not so hot on monster movies. Zombies and demons, sure. Werewolves and vampires, less so. Ghosts are probably my favourite. Something scary, intangible, inexplicable.

I do also have a bit of a sense of humour, which gets a little black at times, so it shouldn't really come as a surprise that my favourite series is the Evil Dead trilogy. However, I'm slowly (and prematurely?) coming to the conclusion that the best horror movies hail from Spain. Want a good scare? [REC]. Want something slow but unutterably creepy? The Others (hey, it counts as Spanish!). Want something a bit like The Others but kicked up about a zillion notches and just ridiculously brilliant from start to finish? The Orphanage. I love me some Evil Dead, but the finest horror movie I've ever seen is The Orphanage. There's a couple of moments that might let it down a little if you let them (there's a jump-out-and-say-boo moment, a shot of impending horror that made all the terrified audience members laugh uproariously when I saw it at the cinema, and some people - heartless, foolish people - believe there's a bit of oversentimentality going on), but even though it didn't scare me as much as I wanted it to (damn you, Woman in Black!), it's still one of the absolute best I've seen.

I also liked The Descent a whole bunch, actually. There's a real feeling of impending doom, that comes just as much from the setting as the film, and it probably isn't even a horror movie to start off with, but it's so frickin' atmospheric! Also, 28 Days Later was pretty awesome, but 28 Weeks Later pwns it RIGHT into the ground!

Sooo... American horror movies? Yeah, if Sam Raimi's not involved, I'm not interested. Come to the European side! We have cookies! *Scary* cookies!

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Updated On: 7/12/09 at 05:02 PM

I love horror movies. However, they no longer make REAL horror films. They make slasher films that want to gross you out, not scare you. This is why I LOVE the horror films of the 1930's,40's,50's,60's and even 70's. Universal horror films like Frankenstein or Creature from the Black Lagoon had a lot of atmosphere and you actually felt kind of sorry for them.I was lucky my Dad and my Uncle introduced me to the classic horror genre when I was very young. Where most parents would not allow their kids to watch scary movies my Dad was waking me up late at night and had me watch scary movies with him.

One of my all time favorites is ISLAND OF LOST SOULS with Charles Laughton. I am also a huge fan of the Hammer Films.I think the last film that came out that I really enjoyed and would call a horror film was Tim Burton's SLEEPY HOLLOW.Not sure if it counts, but SILENCE OF THE LAMBS is also up there. I think the original AMITYVILLE HORROR With James Brolin really terririfed me when I was a kid.Horror films today are geared only for teens(90% of the horror films are PG-13) and usually rely on those fast edits and CGI FX.John Carpenters ORIGINAL HALLOWEEN is an example of how good writing and a limited budget can make a flawless classic horror film. I think ROSEMARY'S BABY is probably my all time favorite horror film.I also remember the first time I saw FRIGHT NIGHT. I was laughing one minute and really jumping off the couch in the next scene.

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Updated On: 7/12/09 at 05:22 PM

It's still all about NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD for me.

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As everyone here knows, I am a horror fanatic. From the early German expresionism of such films as "The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari", through the most recent group of "how far can we go" shock theater.

I could get academic about how, as a genre, it metaphorically reflects the fears of society at the time, but ultimately what's important is, can you enjoy it as an entertainment.

To pgenre's list of Giallo directors Argento and Bava, I would also Lucio Fulci.

"Audition" is, as I have posted many times, one of the most brilliant and completely disturbing films I have ever seen. It ranks in my top 5 to be sure.
Other Asian horror worth checking out is the Korean "Art Of The Devil" series. And if you like monster movies, don't miss "The Host", also Korean.

For American horror, I love "The Night Of The Living Dead" by Romero, "Alien", "Rosemary's Baby", and of course the all time grandaddy of horror, "The Exorcist".

But for my money, the most innovative and truly scary stuff can be found on the indie circuit. Check out some of the After Dark Horrorfest titles. I've seen 'em all and there's not a loser in the bunch. They usually get dismissed as derivative and cliche, and this is true. But you don't need to reinvent the wheel to make a good horror flick. You need to understand *why* there are certain elements that are always present and explore them with style.

Finally, a personal favorite of mine is "Behind The Mask:The Rise Of Leslie Vernon". It's a blast of a film that completely deconstructs the genre conventions and then rebuilds them in a totally new way.

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It's really not fair to lump HOSTEL and CABIN FEVER with the vast majority of other horror out there. Eli Roth, much to his reputation's dismay, is an incredibly good director in the tradition of Argento, Bava, Fulci, etc with a dash of Miike. His films continue a tradition set forth by those men and if you've seen their canons you can see what the homages are and how his films fit into that pantheon and what he has added to it.

The American pantheon of horror (70s on) is essentially just rip-offs. HALLOWEEN has so much Argento in it he should have credit and Carpenter freely admits that inspiration. I've already mentioned the major others. Most American horror films of the past thirty years are poor recreations of European horror and the American horror films post-SCREAM until today ape Asian horror. Asian horror just depends more on mood than slasher films did so it's harder to force them to be scary which is why they are less effective. It says a lot that in the marketing of the Hollywood-ized Asian horror triple feature 3 EXTREMES, pointed out as exceptionally scary earlier in this thread (THE BOX is about the theatre, btw, and the best!), they billed the director of THE BOX as "MIIKE TAKASHI". If you know Japanese you understand the mistake, but it's still no excuse for the BILLING of the DIRECTOR.

I loved all those slasher movies when I was a child but now that I've seen so much of what they truly plagiarize, it makes them a lot less entertaining. I guess I read too much FANGORIA!

:)

P


P.S. THE BOX and SHUTTER ISLAND, based on their shooting scripts, are really pretty great achievements for two of my favorite directors, Kelly and Scorsese. The trailers have me really excited! Am I the only one who likes CAPE FEAR and/or SOUTHLAND TALES?

Halloween
Alien & Aliens
The Exorcist (Not billed as a horror movie I don't think. But I agree is the granddaddy of them all)

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Updated On: 7/13/09 at 05:36 AM

Another great horror film is Black Christmas with Margot Kidder and Olivia Hussey. It has so many frightening moments. I also like When a Stranger Calls.

I do enjoy Friday the 13th (original) as there is a fun game of cat and mouse happening and a great performance by Betsy Palmer.

Of the oldies I do enjoy Cat People, Vampyr, Psycho and Night of the Living Dead.

Horror films starting after Scream have been dull and pointless with no sense of fright and fun. I love watching the oldies.

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Lol, I've seen my favorites so many times that they aren't scary any more!

anyway, thinking back to the first time I saw these two films, I have to rate them high on my list.

1. Rosemary's Baby - the baby itself wasn't as frightening as the plot twists.

2. Nosferatu- Schreck was more animal-like as a vampire than human. When I saw this for the first time, just looking at him was enough.

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Updated On: 7/13/09 at 10:11 PM

My favorites are IT & Nightmare on Elm Street.

good calls jeniferpatricia!

The original Happy Bday To Me (there was a straight to DVD remake which was awful) and Sleepaway Camp are classics of 80s slashers.

And both have great surprise endings.

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Oh, how could I forget Silence of the Lambs? Definitely one of the best films ever made, besides being pretty scary.

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Spider, I actually consider REAR WINDOW to be Hitchcock's most suspenseful film. PSYCHO is a masterpiece but to me nothing comes close to WINDOW.