Horror / Scary Films

[Royal Rother]

Prompted by Nat's (I think) view, on another thread, that The Shining was not scary I wondered what movies people have seen are considered scary?

I like decent scary films but there are so few of them around it seems to me. Mind you, I'm not really helped in my search for a good scare by the fact that Mrs RR is not exactly very brave when it comes to that sort of thing. (How can women have babies and stuff and then be frightened off by a film? ;) )

The Others was the best I've seen in recent years for sending a chill up the spine (Mrs RR disappeared after 30mins of that one) though it's not not horror of course.

I wonder whether anyone will cite Scream / I Know What You Did Last Summer et al as good horror....

Seriously what films have scared you guys?

[Harriet]

I watched Scream last night (I'm 15 by the way) and I was scared at the time, but I was only scared afterwards because I was on the phone to my friend Charlie, in the house on my own and I was describing to him a scary bit in the film, and he said 'Ok, well if you see anything like that, scream and shout'. And then my dad came home (without me realising) and I just saw his arm in the kitchen, and I SCREAMED and then he lept into the living room yelling RARRRRRRRR and I was SO SCARED. I wouldn't have been that scared if I hadn't just watched Scream, so I guess it did effect me in some way.

I watched I Know What You Did Last Summer with my cousins when I was about 8, and the same with Alien Resurrection (sp?) and neither of them scared me whatsoever, probably 'cos I didn't know what was going on.

A couple of days ago I saw Pet Semetary, and again, at the time I was scared, btu some of it was just funny because it was stupidly scary. I found that it wasn't really psycological, just gorey, and I personally don't find gore scary. I saw The Shining about a month ago, and there were parts that made me scream, but I just forgot about it afterwards. I think what makes a REALLY scary film is if afterwards it haunts you. I saw House on Haunted Hill a couple of years ago, and it was soooooooo psycologically scary, and even now if I wake up in the middle of the night I keep replaying scenes of it in my head and getting all scared, so that was a scary film!

This is gonna sound stupid, but the film that traumatised me the most was Signs. I KNOW it's stupid, but I'm really scared of aliens, and when you see the reflection in the TV at the end it scares me soooo much, more than any parts of The Shining or anything.

[My Friend Jack]

2 films I've seen this year - Signs and The Ring. Signs I thought was dreadful - it seemed to me to be a very low budget B-movie based on a stage play (maybe it was?).

The Ring, however, I did find quite scarey, although I ended up feeling that it was a slightly nasty film. The are are some films that can scare you in an enjoyable way ("The Fly" springs to mind), but I really didn't enjoy The Ring.

[Deinonychus]

A movie I rate very highly (and one that has lately fallen to some negative revisionism) is 'The Blair Witch Project'. It's a cracking little movie that utterly works because of the large amount of reading between the lines the viewer must do: obviously, it was a visual/production 'first' as well.

Scariest movie of all time? For me, 'Don't Look Now': I still shudder at the denouement. 'The Wicker Man' falls in there somewhere, as well...

You're right, 'Signs' was utter wiss.

[Lei-Lei Jayenne]

Still the scariest film for me is the first Poltergeist. I just can't watch it. See, gore and blood and monsters i love, but they don't scare me at all. Stick a creepy looking girl and a weird midget woman(was she in the first one?) in a haunted house and I'm done for.
I made the mistake of thinking i could handle Blair Witch, and watched it by myself, boy was I wrong, didn't sleep for days.
Oh, and anything with giant spiders (or tiny spiders for that matter) scares the living hell out of me.
Also, anything with shipwrecks involved, shipwrecks terrify me.

[Harriet]

Scariest movie of all time? For me, 'Don't Look Now': I still shudder at the denouement.

I didn't understand it, and that's probably why it didn't scare me at all. I was disappointed by the ending, I'd heard that it's meant to be the best horror film of all time.

[Deinonychus]

Really? Oh blimey, I'd better pick something else then..!

[Harriet]

Meh, it's just 'cos I didn't really understand it. A lot of the dialogue was in Italian, and not being fluent in Italian myself I couldn't understand it. And what was with the thing at the end randomly wearing a red coat? Did it somehow know that they had recently lost a daughter while she was wearing a red coat?

[Dream Weaver]

Maybe by the time of the 5th viewing you might understand the plot!

I think you need to watch it again - but not until you're 18.

[Harriet]

I probably will watch it again, but not for a while, like you said. I've been reading more about it since I saw it and I've understood how it could be scary, but I'll need to see it again. I've read how he uses lots of imagery and flashing images. I like the way that Venice was protrayed, but it's a bit odd that they hardly see any other tourists there. Even out of season, isn't Venice a very bustling place?

[My Friend Jack]

DW - ya made me chuckle! :D

[kimindex]

The Wicker Man is excellent (trivia - Rosie in Eastenders was Rowan Morrison in that film).

Also, Dead of Night. Black and white and very good. :)

[Purity]

Maybe by the time of the 5th viewing you might understand the plot!

I think you need to watch it again - but not until you're 18.

I also didn't find it scarey, in fact I almost fell alseep in the middle! I can see that the dwarf was kind of freaky but apart from that it left me bored :( (and I'm well past 18 too ;) )

[tinminer]

Just rewatched one of my all time favs on TCM - 'Village of the Damned' - the 1960 original, not the appaling remake.

It still sends a shiver down the spine - I think it is because you see a quintisential English village descend into a hellish nightmare.

Okay, it is in black & white and mono, and there are no particularly amazing special effects, but the film is faithful to the book, and it is a great tale.
What would we do to these children if it happened today?

[tinminer]

The Wicker Man is excellent (trivia - Rosie in Eastenders was Rowan Morrison in that film).

Also, Dead of Night. Black and white and very good. :)

Kimindex (hello, haven't we met somewhere before???!!!),
The Wicker Man is particulaly good. Christopher Lee is reputed to have said it is the best film he has ever made (and that includes LOTR!).

[Slowreader]

The original version of 'The Haunting' from the early 60s - you never actually get to see anything horrible, thats what makes it still such an effective film today. Anybody seen the remake, and if so, how does it compare?

[Harriet]

I saw The Others the other night (no pun intended....) I was expecting to be terrified but apart from a couple of parts that nade me jump it wasn't that bad. I thoroughly enjoyed it though, I loved the ending! It was really different....

[Aixelsyd]

I have to say that Titanic is one of the best horror movies ever.

Also, I recently saw Frogs, an old horror movie. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Bad, in a good way.

[Rootytootytoo]

Have to agree on the Titanic!

I think the scariest film I've seen is called 'Prince of Darkness'... so scary when I first saw it that I needed to be accompanied to the loo. I've seen it since and thought - 'huh?'..

[Lei-Lei Jayenne]

I went to see White Noise recently, it wasn't scary at all...

[tinminer]

The original version of 'The Haunting' from the early 60s - you never actually get to see anything horrible, thats what makes it still such an effective film today. Anybody seen the remake, and if so, how does it compare?
Saw 'The Haunting' on TCM the other day - great film. Haven't seen the original though.

[tinminer]

I saw The Others the other night (no pun intended....) I was expecting to be terrified but apart from a couple of parts that nade me jump it wasn't that bad. I thoroughly enjoyed it though, I loved the ending! It was really different....

I think the soundtrack in The Others is very scary - especially if you watch it on the DVD in surround or 3D sound. The banging noises upstairs really do sound like, well, upstairs. Creepy.

...of course useless if you live in a bungalow
:D

[Harriet]

...of course useless if you live in a bungalow
:D

This is true....and I watched it on a tiny tv in a mobile home somewhere in Chicester!

[Ian]

3 years since the last post, so we must have some more films to go on here - recently I saw 1408, which was quite scarey in a non-scarey way (I know what I mean). But 'scarey' is relative to an individual's outlook, history and disposition surely.

'The Blair Witch Project' will always be there amongst my favourites too.

[Hazel]

3 years since the last post, so we must have some more films to go on here - recently I saw 1408, which was quite scarey in a non-scarey way (I know what I mean). I know what you mean. I found the run up to Cusack actually being in the room was terrifying and thereafter was the traditional shock tactics that long since stopped being scary. But enjoyable still.

But 'scarey' is relative to an individual's outlook, history and disposition surely.
Absolutely - what scares you is such a personal thing. Wolf Creek was my line in the sand. Hubby? The childcatcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

'The Blair Witch Project' will always be there amongst my favourites too.Me too - was scared rigid by the first viewings of that.

[Elfstar]

My viewing of Blair Witch was ruined by watching with my 14 year olds who found it funny. (They think the new series of Heroes is a bit scarier and as for Derren Brown.....)

Generally this is a genre I avoid so no other comments.

[lucyb]

Derren Brown is a psychic alien. All this talk about hypnotism and sleight of hand is just a front...

I get scared far too easily to watch anything but the mildest horror films. MOH keeps trying to get me to watch the original version of The Ring, but I'm steering well clear. The X Files was about as far as I could go.

[David]

Derren Brown is quite remarkable. I've been a fan for years and he just knocks my socks off every time (I daresay he's got them attached to a hidden wire...).

I'm not a great horror fan, though. I'll watch decent films that have horrific elements, such as 28 Days Later (not Weeks, though - pants), but not the films that are there simply to be horrific.

[Radders]

I love a good horror film but I can't say that I've seen any in recent years that really scared me. When I was a teenager I saw a film called Catacombs, never seen it since or even heard about it anywhere else since but it scared the **** ot of me at the time!

I guess I should watch the original version of The Ring - I've jest never got around to it.

[lucyb]

I guess I should watch the original version of The Ring - I've jest never got around to it.

Apparently very scary - my friends are all confirmed horror movie watchers - the scarier the better and even they found it scarier than a very scary thing. Consequently I've put it in the same category as the Exorcist and am never planning to be caught within two rooms of any tv showing it. Even in daylight.

[Jeremy DEagle]

I love horror movies but good ones are hard to find.

I love the Blair Witch, its so tremendously creepy and scary and the final bit in the house is superb.

I didn't overly understand Don't Look now but think I will watch it again tonight.

The Exorcist is hilarious and not at all scary. Some of the quites are hilarious, though probably not repeatable here.

I like The Omen and find that quite disturbing. I do enjoy religous type horror such as this, the Exorcist is another that I should find scary but for reasons stated above don't.

I enjoyed the Ring a great deal, both the American and Japanese one. The Eye is also good (the original), I've not seen the remake.

I'm advised that Eraserhead is very scary and I have been meaning to watch it.

[hamed_u139]

my opinion is scream 1 is very horror movie

[Ian]

Just remembered 'Creep', it's a little far fetched (I hope), but it is set in familiar surroundings to me which gives it a little edge.

Each time I'm at a tube station late at night and feeling a little weary............

[Hazel]

This upcoming horror flick has left me completely speechless -

Teeth4 stars (cert 18)

Peter Bradshaw
Friday June 20, 2008
Guardian

Sex and the City was supposed to be the movie that divided the sexes. Not as much as this one, it didn't. Leaving the cinema, women in the audience laughed and grinned and trilled a merry tune. I, on the other hand, attempted to leave and catch a bus home while remaining at all times hunched over with my legs tightly crossed. It is the debut feature from actor-turned-director Mitchell Lichtenstein, son of pop-art colossus Roy: a comedy-horror satire about the Christian right's chastity-abstinence cult. Jess Weixler gives a terrific performance as Dawn, the Joan of Arc of the True Love Waits circuit, giving inspirational campus speeches about the vital importance of the unpopped cherry. But Dawn has a secret: her vagina has two rows of fiendishly sharp teeth, which the various men who make attempts on Dawn's modesty discover to their considerable cost.Lichtenstein has cleverly created a knockabout comedy with touches of Russ Meyer, Gore Vidal and the Hammer horror movies. Importantly, it is all played absolutely straight, and Weixler resists any temptation to camp it up. Hidden socio-sexual meanings are there in plenty, but as Sigmund Freud might have said: sometimes a cigar is just a cigar and sometimes a hideously severed penis is just a hideously severed penis. Good clean fun.

When I first saw the trailer, which only hints at what is involved, I was a little taken back, and thought "Nah...it can't be what I am thinking..." and yet it was exactly what I was thinking.

Part of me reels at the thought of seeing it, but the other part of me is desperate to watch it. I feel conflicted. And sick.

[Hazel]

Billy Bob Thornton (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000671/) will star as Freddy Krueger in a new Nightmare On Elm Street movie.

The 53-year-old actor will take on the chilling role in a remake of the 1984 original.

Robert Englund (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000387/), who played the part in eight films, revealed that Thornton will star in the horror films and is an "excellent choice" for the role.

He adds, "A big budget should mean the film will look a lot better than some of the old movies."

Is this good news or not? I was a huge fan of the first 3 films - 2 still has the honour of having one of my favourite lines "There's a Jesse on the phone for you" - and I loved Englund as Freddy. But I am intrigued and a little excited to see what a modern remake would be like. BBT as Freddy? Well, he was pretty scary in U-Turn, so I am not objecting to that casting.

I have to take issue with Englund though saying that a budget will make the remake look better than "the old movies" - they looked fantastic. Maybe apart from the scene when Heather's mum gets pulled back through the tiny door-window. But other than that - they were great.