ok lets all shit our pants to something new: post 2005 horror film thread

it's not so much the conception of the pope punching Satan in the mouth or whatever that bothers me as it is this assumed, completely ahistorical view of the church. yup, nothin but good folks working there for the past 2000 years - no murderers, rapists, lechers, sadists, greedy bastards involved there nope not a one. as long as all they all had some magic latin and crosses the Devil was runnin scared!

I wanna see more movies where they bring in the priests to deal with the supernatural crisis and they just fail completely.

Like.... the Exorcist?

haha yeah that is one of the better twists in the Exorcist

xp

More movies. More.

I don't know, maybe I'm watching the wrong (for which read right) films or just making up endings in my head after the fact, but I can't think of any where priests/religious types *do* win.

Maybe I just don't watch very many "priesty man kill demon" horrors?

When did a horror film ever portray the whole history of the Catholic church as always good?

There's a good Manly Wade Wellman story about a travelling folk singer fighting a singing demon but it really shitted all over the story when he summoned George Washington to beat the demon. It was appealingly odd, but why did it have to be a guy like Washington?

When did a horror film ever portray the whole history of the Catholic church as always good?

the portrayal is implied in films like the Conjuring and the Exorcist. the Devil's the ultimate evil, what can possibly fight the Devil? why, the Catholic Church of course!

it's the implied faith in the Church as an ahistorical institution, a counterweight to evil whose power is in its liturgy and rituals

Just watched the original Amityville Horror for the first time the other night. Everyone affiliated with the church was rendered completely ineffectual pretty much right off the bat and they took the brunt of the supernatural punishment.

the lawsuits around Amityville Horror are pretty fascinating/lolzy

this is making me want to dig into some Satanic panic research-type books

Not enough pagan apocalypse going around.
pagans don't need the apocalypse to be scary -- they're scary enough as is ;)

strongly recommend debbie nathan's book about the satanic panic

Ghostbusters is pretty non-denominational demon, too, right?

The best bit in the first Paranormal Activity movie is when they call in the first spiritual housecleaner, who walks into the house and is immediately basically, wow, this is so above my paygrade I need to leave right now, good luck with your demon.

It's true, pre-EXORCIST there used to be tons of impending pagan apocalypse of the HOUSE OF THE DEVIL sort. Lots of Hammer films featured various pentagrams upon which corseted bosoms would heave and ornamental knives would slash and demons would (almost) erupt.

That Paranormal Activity thing reminds me of Dan Akroyd as a Ghostbuster in Casper

I basically want the group of kinky weirdos from the ritual scene in Curse of the Crimson Cult to be behind all evil doing in all films

Any views on the 2011 Coppola film Twixt? I've mostly heard it wasn't good.

It has some fans.

those fans are wrong

one of the worst things ive seen in a long long time

on the other hand, in the netflix shovelware because otherwise you'll miss it category, "Mine Games" (yeah, I know) is surprisingly effective, falls somewhere between Baghead and Triangle. I really really enjoyed it. the basic concept gets all kind or ropey and confusing but they pull it off quite well.

this is making me want to dig into some Satanic panic research-type books

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/demons-of-the-modern-world-malcolm-mcgrath/1012496645?ean=9781573929356

This fascinating discussion of modern demonology focuses on our ability to differentiate the physical world, with its mechanical laws, from the inherently less predictable psychological realm of thoughts and beliefs. McGrath points out that this ability was a hard-won historical development, and today must be learned in childhood through education. Because of this historical background and our rich fantasy life in childhood, each of us unconsciously suspects, or fears, that supernatural forces may break through the borders of our everyday commonsense order at any time. Indeed, at times of personal stress or societal crisis, the modern boundaries between fantasy and reality begin to slip, and then a magical world of demons and other phantasms can come flooding back into our disenchanted reality.

Through this innovative thesis McGrath goes a long way toward explaining both our fascination with fantasy entertainment, such as horror stories and films, and bizarre crazes such as witch-hunts, Satanism scares, and even claims of alien abduction. Despite our demystified culture the lure of childhood's magic kingdom with its monstrous shadow realm remains strong.

There's really no need for the lurid dustjacket; McGrath's analysis of the Satanism and recovered-memory scare of the 1980s, as well as many people's continuing insistence on the reality of alien abductions and other frightening phenomena, is chilling all on its own as a lesson on the dangers such beliefs still pose to society centuries after the witch trials. McGrath (doctoral candidate, political philosophy, Oxford U.) traces the origins and manifestations of the "strange fear," which is built into Western civilization: "that somewhere on the edges of our reality there is a world of demons that is trying to break into our world and wreak havoc." His history examines why such myths persist and how lives have been destroyed by them.

Sorry for butting in, esp. with walls of text. I enjoy this thread and have used it to navigate the flotsam-strewn swamps of modern horror movies (I doubt I would've looked into Magic Magic without having read about it here, for instance). It's also fun to see how my impressions match up against those of the other posters. Anyway, Demons of the Modern World was something I found at my local library and did not want to return. Pretty fascinating. I couldn't help but think about it while watching The Children, actually. The idea that our children can represent this horrifying "other" world, or maybe act as emissaries from it, thanks to our own vaguely supernatural outlooks as one time children ourselves, outlooks we've spent years shoveling over, is one that has stuck with me ever since reading it. You can probably find it cheap somewhere.

I watched NZ comedy/horror Housebound tonight, funny as fuck in places but not as good as People Under The Stairs, which it rips.

The Taking Of Deborah Logan is on US Netflix at the moment, despite a supposed 2015 release date, and is much better than you'd expect from a low-budget direct to VOD title.

Irish driving-about-in-the-dark thriller In Fear and Vincenzo-Natali-produced Canadian portmanteau / vignette series Darknet are both on Netflix now, and both watchable.

Years after the litmus testing in this thread, I finally dipped into PONTYPOOL last week and ... I'm fully with jjjusten there. Well, maybe not quite fully. I thought the movie was pretty fantastic for the first half, and almost wish that it hadn't been a horror movie at all in the traditional sense but had, instead, stuck with the absurdism of its initial situation, small town reporting from inside a bunker with no actual confirmation of the big world event happening outside.

Once it went all semiotics lesson, the movie became a total lost cause. NOTLD had messages too, but they never became the text itself.

Wonder if that sequel is really happening.

Man, you make me want to watch it again. And again. I love that text itself (as such) is the vector, and semiotics the way the virus spreads! Just genius. When the professor breaks in, talks a bunch, and then escapes out again (iirc) ... so funny.

Eric otm. Its great until the 2nd half and then it becomes ridiculous and unwatchable.

Of all the crap we all big up on this thread, I love that Pontypool is the one that gets branded unwatchable. ;)

Speaking of which, anyone shocked how few of the usual suspect franchises are available to stream on Netflix, esp. c. Halloween? Is it because this is there bread and butter time to be bought/screened/paid for? Virtually nil when it comes to "Friday the 13th," "Nightmare on Elm Street," "Halloween" or the like on Netflix or Amazon Prime.

Lots of things get labelled unwatchable, it just happens to be the one w the most strident defenders

Xp

I thought p much nothing of quality was availabke on netflix streaming. Perpetua even wrote a buzzfeed listicle abt it

Must be true then.

Lol

If it helps, I didn't much like The Innkeepers either.

Not sure if that was among the big upped.

LOVED The Taking of Deborah Logan. Great acting and pretty damn scary.

Yes, i think i underplayed how much i enjoyed it. It's definitely worth catching.

I think I big upped the Innkeepers quite a bit. Pontypool on the other hand.

Mr. Jones on streaming is a better than expected little diversion I thought. Suffers a bit from creeping "surreality will disguise that our ending isn't nearly as clever as we think it is", but I enjoyed it a bunch. Been digging a lot of the Darknet stuff, pretty impressive as anthology tv horror goes. THX CANADA!

The only way I'd watch a Pontypool sequel is if it's a silent movie.

not even then

Just dropping in to say I watched 'Tampopo' last night and the food + sex scenes are more disturbing than any horror movie.

Two thirds of The Babadook were really great but as so often the final act unravels and I left disappointed.

That's practially become a formula for near-classic horror movies these days (e.g. The Descent, House Of The Devil). Work on your endings, filmmakers!

Struggling to name one that doesn't fit the pattern, Absentia jumps to mind but beyond that...

I'm one of the few who liked the ending of The Strangers.

Another measure by which Inside emerges as one of the recent greats.

Seriously?