Last Great Horror Movie

I'm a big fan of An American Werewolf in London.

Wait, whoa, hold up there!

Your wife writes too?!!!!!!!

My GOD, how'd you manage that?!

I can just see the changes that would happen in my life if my hubby wrote as well.

"Gee honey, the sink is full of dirty dishes. Been a good writing week huh?"

"Hey baby, check out this sex scene I wrote."
"That's great. Now you be Brad Pitt and I'll be Jolie and we'll see if the dialog plays smooth."

Er,

can I um, scratch that last line, and would you all kindly forget that I ever wrote it?

Deal.

The last movie that really scared is "Darkness Falls"

Probably more thriller than horror, but the original The Hitcher...

Misery....but again, maybe not 'horror'.

While they may not be your typical 'horror' movie, in both, the antagonists always seemed to be many steps ahead of the protagonist - in an almost omniscient way - up until the very end. There was a definite sense that maybe, just maybe, there might not be a 'happy ending' (and in both, the viewer has a sense that the protagonist has been changed in a very permanent and negative way.)

Good luck to you and your wife.

I really enjoyed The Others (Nicole Kidman) and The Mothman Prophecies (Richard Gere). Scary.

I like many of the choices here, but The Exorcist is the only movie that ever actually scared me.

There's a scene in the Exorcism of Emily Rose where the priest is walking and looks back at the building and sees a shadowy figure. I have a big church next to my building and when I am walking the dog late at night I can't help but look up to the bell tower to see if the shadowy figure is there.

John Carpenter's The Thing.

Carpenter's The Thing has got some of the best damn dramatic acting I've seen. For a horror flick that is. Wilfred Bremly (Sp?) almost copped the show for me. Almost.

Last one was Wicker Man. Awe, crap. I don't know what to say about this one. I think it's the only time when a tragic ending just didn't work. There's too much discovery, heroics, investigation and work put into solving this one--I mean, a herculean effort by Cage. Only for the viewer to be left with NO cotton-pickin' payoff whatsoever. I was waiting, nail-biting, wondering when the calvary was going to ride in and mop up those beotches. What do we get? The pagan cult wins and...uh oh, I'm spoiling. Forgive me.

Cage, I like you buddy. But you have enough pull in the industry to where you might have re-written this sad, unfullfilled ending to this story.

It stank!!!

Tri

Ray, have you reviewed this one yet?

The Entity scared the crap out of me when I was a kid.

The last great horror movie was THE DESCENT.

This was a truly creepy film.

tourdeforce said:

The last great horror movie was THE DESCENT.

This was a truly creepy film.

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Brilliant film. Actually the best new Horror films are British. 28 Days Later also comes to mind.

I don't watch a lot of movies, but I liked The Ring.

Audrey Rose.

ooh

Ooh, The Shining is classic. And It. Those really scared me as a kid. The last movie that I saw that really freaked me out was The Ring. Not sure why exactly. But you're on edge the entire movie, and that little girl is creepy!

The Ring's okay, not really that scary. And the others were just boring or gory.

I think the Cube was really scary.

That said, 28 Days Later and the remake of Dawn of the Dead were both very good, even though they were gory.

maestrowork said:

The Ring's okay, not really that scary. And the others were just boring or gory.

I think the Cube was really scary.

That said, 28 Days Later and the remake of Dawn of the Dead were both very good, even though they were gory.

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What makes a great horror movie? Gore? Frightening story? The characters? Tension? All of the above? Some of the above? I haven't watched any of the "Saw" movies, but they seem popular.....are they purely 'gore'? (Someday I may actually watch these so beware 'spoilers' - if there are any....)

Are there great 'gore' horror movies vs great 'scary' horror movies?

Sorry - trying not to take away from the OP question....just curious what the general thoughts are on what makes for a great horror movie.

To me (anyway), a truly scary horror film should shake me to the core and not just because it's disgusting or tense, but because it feels real and it touches something very dark and deep in our psyche. Not to say gore or anything visceral is not scary -- they are visceral! But to me that's just cheap thrills -- and you come out of the theater laughing about it. To make me say "great," it has to really makes me start to question the realities around me, long after I came out of the theater.

The films I've listed all did that to me.

My-Immortal said:

What makes a great horror movie? Gore? Frightening story? The characters? Tension? All of the above? Some of the above? I haven't watched any of the "Saw" movies, but they seem popular.....are they purely 'gore'? (Someday I may actually watch these so beware 'spoilers' - if there are any....)

Are there great 'gore' horror movies vs great 'scary' horror movies?

Sorry - trying not to take away from the OP question....just curious what the general thoughts are on what makes for a great horror movie.

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It is a huge genre with plenty of room for 'all of he above'.

I can appreciate and enjoy different forms of horror from classics like DRACULA to B-movies like THE BLOB to slashers like HALLOWEEN to schlock like NIGHT OF THE DEMONS to pop horror like GREMLINS to mood pieces like THE OTHERS to gore-fests like SAW.

There is a time and a place for all and there are great films in all these categories (and plenty of crap too).

Ideally, you will have a great story, well formed characters, the requisite drama, tension and scares. Gore is optional, as you see fit.

28 days later
Nightwatch (the Danish version - not the bad American remake with Nick Nolte and Ewan McGregor)
Pet Sematary (haven't seen it in a decade though...)
Lars von Triers Kingdom (again, not the bad American remake)
And Fahrenheit 9/11...

Been debating whether The Descent is worth renting, think I'll rent it tonight.

Anyway, my favorites are The Thing and Pumpkinhead. But the film that scared the crap out of me was The Grudge.

What makes great horror film is where you're living at the time you're watching it. I was living at my mother-in-law's house at that time, and the place is basically a tin shack mixed with cement blocks. The windows are square holes in the walls, and the place is out in middle of no where. The toilet is outside in the wood so you can imagine when I had to go out there at night to do my business after watching that film. Oi...

Rainy Night said:

What was the last great horror film that was so good you almost couldn’t watch it

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I've only seen one horror film like that (despite having seen a LOT of horror), that film was Evil Dead.
But I'm with you on modern horror, there are a few gems, but all this PG-13 bollocks is giving the genre a bad name.