The Haunt Of Fear: ILX Top 100 HORROR Movies Poll Results Thread

Don't most credits scroll up?

Good point about Silence of the Lambs. I don't think it's properly horror, either, but I placed it on my ballot in accordance with its place in my heart.

I also told myself I wasn't going to care about whether something was horror or not, so pretend I didn't post what I posted about Se7ven.

Ebert on Bettis in May:

Bettis makes May peculiar but fully human. There are scenes here of such close observation, of such control of body language, voice and behavior, evoking such ferocity and obsession, that we are reminded of Lady Macbeth. It is as hard to be excellent in a horror film as in Shakespeare. Harder, maybe, because the audience isn't expecting it.

probably because it reeks of 1995

Things that aren't new suck so much!

Seven is the dark fairytale of the '90s that has some actual menace. So much better than that squishy Welshman hissing about the lambs.

i like seven more than silence of the lambs

Sesevenen, call it by its name.

The difference is Jodie Foster and that is a huge difference!

Agree with that--I think she's so affecting in Silence. (Also much prefer Hopkins to Spacey.)

I'm beginning to think that I overestimated the awesomeness of the ilx horror fan contingent.

Don't make me go Morbs on you all.

the only really great performance in silence of the lambs is Ted Levine.

Was he a great big fat person?

i know it seems insane to say this at this point but i think that my plucky little ballot is not going to place very many more things. which is ok! i just think that like 90% of mine only had a shot in the bottom rungs - we'll see tho.

(I made a promise to myself that I would avoid all editorializing that didn't involve puns until the results were entirely unveiled. It's KILLING me!)

hahahahaaa

you can just email me a running log of them if you like

Don't love seeing Cabin in the Woods here. Liked it a lot, but it's not a horror movie, right? There's nothing scary in it. Just icons of scare used for action & laughs & general smartness.

Love seeing Paranormal Activity here, though. The entire series is, to my constant surprise, top-notch. Interestingly, they are video-cam movies but work WAY better in a theater where you can hear every little tense whisper of white noise. Loses a lot of that through home viewing.

The opening credits of 7eve7 looked like what would happen if you tried to make a flipbook animation using nothing but old copies of Raygun magazine.

huh, thats interesting, because i never saw any of them in the theater, so maybe thats part of my sorta eh reaction to them. altho i stand by not liking 2, which felt a lot like those touchscreen bar games where you have to scan the screen to find whats different (oh shit did that chandelier just mov...oh nope) over and over again xpost

kinda surprised you put se7en above silence of the lambs, morbs. I find the latter to be a pretty charming and human film (has a lot to do w/ jodie foster's presence I guess), while se7en feels like a tale told by someone who listened to one too many NiN records.

plus silence of the lambs features the fall on the soundtrack so

I didn't vote for either of them but SOTL at least made the shortlist

Let's give 7e7e7 some credit: not a lot of us saw that box at the end coming. & Brad Pitt was never better than with that crew cut wrestling around with his dogs on the apartment floor.

Seven is the dark fairytale of the '90s that has some actual menace.

This movie totally belongs on this poll. I didn't think to vote for it, but it has as much or more horror in it than most serial killer movies. Very solid and well crafted. I never went back for a rewatch, though, because I felt that the droning unease seven evoked, which is it's strongest quality, would be lost in a repeat.

seven is the only one of these that made my ballot so far ... i had my doubts about it being horror, though.

tbh I don't remember much of anything about 777en aside from the overwhelming dudeliness of it

"Our next movie comes from the FAR EEK-ST, where at least SE7EN SAMURAI get ONIBBQ'ed!"

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7224/7209113624_c39f33965c_o.jpg

92. ONIBABA
Kaneto Shindo, Japan, 1964
(191 points, 7 votes)

“I’ve never seen anything really beautiful since the day I was born” is probably the only indispensable bit of dialogue in Kaneto Shindô’s 1964 horror classic Onibaba.

Not Coming To A Theater Near You

I don't think I could argue too strenuously that se7en is not a horror film. obv it's a police procedural but the crimes are designed to horrify, general feeling of unease and dread permeates, doesn't shy away from gory details, evil wins, etc. it ain't dirty harry.

silence of the lambs is great, so's se7en. i'd vote for both in thriller poll, but like most responding here, i don't personally consider either "my kind of horror film".

that said, i agree that se7en belongs here, mostly due to it its massive and obvious influence on the saw franchise, "torture porn" and the cinematic vocabulary of 90s/00s horror in general. it's the godfather of distressed fonts & scratchy noises, grim and gritty filth pit mise-en-scene, and elaborate yet rusty torture implements.

agree w scott seward about the sensibility on display in fincher's early films, but i think se7en pulls it off. and SOTL is full of great performances.

yay for art-snobbery i voted for onibaba.

oniwhatwho

Yay Onibaba!

jjjusten it's good you should see it

onibaba my #40

I've told this story a couple times on ilx, but my first viewing of onibaba is colored by the memory of my wife walking in during the conclusion and observing "you watch some weird shit, man"

oh ha i just looked it up and i have walked past that film like 1000 times at my local library because i just assumed it was another 8 hour samurai epic

that said, i agree that se7en belongs here, mostly due to it its massive and obvious influence on the saw franchise, "torture porn" and the cinematic vocabulary of 90s/00s horror in general. it's the godfather of distressed fonts & scratchy noises, grim and gritty filth pit mise-en-scene, and elaborate yet rusty torture implements.

I never traced Saw et al back to 77777, but this seems pretty otm

first thing I voted for that has placed. my #45. it's very grim. xp

itt thread a david fincher movie becomes a boredoms song

Now hoping that having filled the word, stray 7s will start appear7ng in other posts throughout this t7read...

my queue grows

onibaba is a fairy tale told in a savagely brutal way, with beautiful cinematography. desperately in need of a blu-ray release.

http://s3.amazonaws.com/ink_prod/photos/0232/5254/n1208885751_30710694_785503.jpg

I never understood why ppl started writing the title as Se7en, fuck the credits.

Will endeavor to watch Onibaba when I have time (mebbe 3 years).

i have never seen onibaba. get it confused w kwaidan, which is lo7ely but rather dull.

it's almost a given that art-house Japanese films from the early/mid 1960s have stunning cinematography ... the woman in the dunes (which i debated including on my ballot) is also stunning in that regard.

i always confuse onibaba/kwaidan/jigoku. I've seen none of them.

i have never seen onibaba. get it confused w kwaidan, which is lo7ely but rather dull.

I much prefer onibaba to kwaidan

"The CURSE of the CAT PEOPLE was the CURSE of BLOOD!"

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7243/7209113742_f5a95f25eb_o.jpg

91. CURSE OF THE CAT PEOPLE
Gunther von Fritsch & Robert Wise, USA, 1944
(200 points, 5 votes)

did any other film of its era deal with a child's POV so effectively?
― J.D., Friday, January 18, 2008 1:26 AM (4 years ago)

I love Curse for many of the same reasons I love Night of the Hunter. It doesn't read as "horror" as well to those who didn't enjoy the thrill of horror as kids.
― michael assbender (Eric H.), Thursday, October 13, 2011 1:40 PM (7 months ago)

I really find it hard to believe that anyone prefers Curse to the original Cat People film.
― The New Dirty Vicar, Thursday, October 20, 2011 11:40 AM (6 months ago)

i'm the opposite ... i prefer kwaidan to onibaba.

Hip hip hooray for Onibaba. Great great film. The rustling grasses, the thundering storm, the cautionary tale of lust, the deep dark depths of the pit of despair.

curse is a very good film, but i see it as more of a ghost-story than a horror film.

Got Onibaba around 2005, viewings since: 0. Places highly on my phantom list of "Sure favorites if i'd only come around to actually watch them".
I feel a bit awkward having voted for (most probably) far inferior stuff in the lower ranks of my ballot for the sake of "not cheating".

onibaba goatse