Jump to content

What's Your Favorite Scary Movie?

Reluctant Daddy

By Reluctant Daddy
in The Lounge

This topic is 2751 days old and is no longer open for new replies.  Replies are automatically disabled after two years of inactivity.  Please create a new topic instead of posting here.  

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 72
  • Created
  • Last Reply
AdamSmith Grand Master

AdamSmith

Posted
Posted

For mindfucking the audience's expectations shaped by conventions of the genre, of course nobody went farther out there than Stanley.

 

 

Some criticize the movie for draining the life out of the book's plot. But I think Kubrick went above and beyond the usual strategy of imparting terror, etc. through the narrative line. On top of that, he added twists that I think work more directly to create fright and anxiety in the viewer by violently breaching and disrupting storytelling norms for this (or really any) genre. Examples:

  • Scatman Crothers gets a telepathic image of Danny Lloyd's vision of being in peril, then hurries to the rescue through a long sequence of going to the airport, taking a cross-country airline flight, driving a Snowcat up to the snowed-in resort, entering the building -- then, with no buildup or fight or anything, just suddenly being axed dead by Jack.
  • The troublingly ambiguous way the ghost bartender is introduced, and you are forced to see Jack's recurrent alcoholism from inside his own hallucinatory, magical-thinking viewpoint.
  • In the climax, instead of the family dynamic being restored by having Crothers survive and take Jack's place as father figure, Danny and Shelly Duvall go off together, alone, a subtly shocking Oedipal scene.
  • Etc.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
maninsoma Grand Master

maninsoma

Posted
Posted

Perhaps Rosemary's Baby? Even though the story isn't something I can believe as a rational person, the film is so well done that I find myself believing every moment of it as I watch it. The Exorcist is largely a comedy to me, but Rosemary's Baby is truly a horror movie.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
actor61 Community Regular

actor61

Posted
Posted
Perhaps Rosemary's Baby? Even though the story isn't something I can believe as a rational person, the film is so well done that I find myself believing every moment of it as I watch it. The Exorcist is largely a comedy to me, but Rosemary's Baby is truly a horror movie.

I agree with you 100%. Rosemary's Baby terrified me so much that I slept with a light on for the next 10 yeas, and had nightmares about being raped by a demon - not in a good way!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
longtime lurker Mentor

longtime lurker

Posted
Posted

 

It may not have been that scary, but I consider this the classiest horror film of the eighties in a decade over-run by horror films. In fact, I think roughly a third of what was shown on theater screens at that time were of the horror genre. Horror certainly drove the VHS boom as much as porn did. Maybe its release in 1981 was early enough before so many became parodies of each other. What amuses me most about this particular film is that it trivialized all of the paranoia about anything "alternative". We have the punk look on the subways looking more threatening than any werewolves, the porno theater in Piccadilly seeing mass bloodshed and even our hero in a telephone booth with scratched graffiti of the popular punk and new wave musical groups of the era. Also the key victim in the subway is a businessman all dressed in his soon-to-be-labeled-yuppy get-up, being representative of Thatcher Era's "normal" British citizens.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Rod Hagen Grand Master

Rod Hagen

Posted
Posted
Perhaps Rosemary's Baby? Even though the story isn't something I can believe as a rational person, the film is so well done that I find myself believing every moment of it as I watch it. The Exorcist is largely a comedy to me, but Rosemary's Baby is truly a horror movie.

Saw a sold out screening of Rosemary's Baby the other night; it still holds up. Brilliant film. When the knife enters the frame to still the rocking crib, I lose it. And of course Ruth Gordon is, well, Ruth Gordon. Steals every scene she's in.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
marylander1940 Grand Master

marylander1940

Posted
Posted
It may not have been that scary, but I consider this the classiest horror film of the eighties in a decade over-run by horror films. In fact, I think roughly a third of what was shown on theater screens at that time were of the horror genre. Horror certainly drove the VHS boom as much as porn did. Maybe its release in 1981 was early enough before so many became parodies of each other. What amuses me most about this particular film is that it trivialized all of the paranoia about anything "alternative". We have the punk look on the subways looking more threatening than any werewolves, the porno theater in Piccadilly seeing mass bloodshed and even our hero in a telephone booth with scratched graffiti of the popular punk and new wave musical groups of the era. Also the key victim in the subway is a businessman all dressed in his soon-to-be-labeled-yuppy get-up, being representative of Thatcher Era's "normal" British citizens.

 

Yes but I haven't seen a movie able to "scare" me in a long time...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.

Contact Info:

The Company of Men
5834 C. North Kings Hwy #4343
Alexandria, VA 22303

Email: moderators@companyofmen.org

Help Support Our Site

Our site operates with the support of our members. Make a one-time donation using the buttons below.

$10 $25 $50 $100 $200

Make a recurring donation

Additional Resources

×
×
  • Create New...