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

the lead performance really transforms starry eyes from gross whatever into really skin-crawling gross whatever

thanks to shudder and my roommate i ended up watching deadgirl recently, i think that may be the worst movie i've ever seen

Oculus - despite being quite different and even having a spooky moment or two, it just didn't leave much of an impression.

when animals dream - patient, somber and hypnotic take on lycanthropy. i guess comparisons to 'let the right one in' or 'a girl walks home alone at night' seem kinda inevitable, tho 'ginger snaps' would be the most obv prescient. coming of age.

ooh, that sounds good to me.

Has any body else seen The Visit? I watched it last night and was very unsettled but it. At first I thought it was going to be old people weird habits viewed by kids, but it became a lot more brutal that I expected. I think it's one of his better movies.

yeah, it's decent. good for him to strip down and make it simple compared to his over-the-top shenanigans of the last decade

there is no TWIST: confirm / deny?

i might watch it if there's no twist.

there is, but it's not as egregious as his others. it's more like, "oh ok, that's what's up, yeah."

well... ok i'm underplaying it a little bit. but it sure as hell isn't "water kills the aliens thanks to god!" level

Yeah the twist was more a reveal that for me made the whole plot more terrifying.

it's good. it's just that the whole movie you're thinking, well, something is wrong, and then you get to that point and it's like, oh a twist that makes sense, solid.

For an opposing view, I thought The Visit was absolutely dire - tho' the nadir isn't reached until right at the end, when the obnoxious grandson (who uses the names of pop stars as swear words) raps about having a shit-smeared diaper rubbed in his face(an effective metaphor for this mess.) The whole film is contrived in such a way as to make the twist 'work', but even so, as soon as you start picking away at it, the plot pretty much falls apart. The 'found footage' schtick is pretty tired by now, but it's so flagrantly abused here as to make it an especially redunant filmmaking choice.

a shit-smeared diaper rubbed in his face(an effective metaphor for this mess.)

An improvement on Lady in the Water then.

Finally watched Sinister last week, and while it has some good scares, some intermittently interesting ideas and a great hook in the Super 8 movies, I got really ticked off that nobody's behavior in the movie made a single lick of sense, and it left far too much for the audience to assume without at least alluding to it. (Did he really have to move his entire family to write this book, rather than, say, stay in a hotel or B&B, visit the crime scene and conduct interviews? Did his publisher not give him an advance? I guess it's implied that they couldn't afford their old house, but he makes a promise to the daughter that they'll move back if things don't work out. I guess he's just a bad father.)

The nonsense with the older son, too. Use a previously-unmentioned psychological condition for a couple of cheap scares, and when you're done, drop the kid off the map entirely until you need his unconscious body in the closing scenes. If the screenwriter and director don't care how many kids the family has, you shouldn't, either!

The 8mm movies were really good, though. And the soundtrack.

the leadup was so good but then it got hella dumb towards the end

love love the 8mm stuff, and making a 70's ranch home creepy was p impressive

the scary figure in those 8mm movies was legit scary

"thanks to shudder and my roommate i ended up watching deadgirl recently, i think that may be the worst movie i've ever seen"

No. A million times no.

CRIMSON PEAK

You may have heard Del Toro talking about how he does more commercial films to fund his personal projects (apparently the 3 Spanish language ones) and how he absolutely despises making compromises on films he's directing. Pan's Labyrinth was nearly a decade ago, so I thought this might be one of his passion projects. After seeing it I'd be shocked if it was because it feels very compromised.

The plot could have been serviceable but there's so many clichés layed on and things that stand out as quite silly (the father insisting his daughter have her heart broken, the spoon scraping really loudly against the plates in an attempt to increase tension).

Normally Del Toro's films use cgi far better than most but here you'd think they had a large quota to meet because it's used so many times unnecessarily. I constantly have this complaint but here I'm really surprised by the sheer amount of bad judgements. Most of the ghost appearances are far more cgi than they are actors/makeup/wax/plastic creations and it ends up looking too videogamey.
I'm less sure about the dog because I was struggling to guess when it was real but it often seemed like it was moving too fast and seemed fake when it barked and yawned. They must have wanted the scenes timed precisely with the dog's actions but it wasn't worth it looking that unnatural (again, I'm not totally sure but it often looked false to me).

It also seemed like it was partially tailored to Tom Hiddleston fans.

What I actually liked was predictable: the set designs, the costumes, scenery, great colors and Mia Wasikowska looking great. The English mansion looked particularly good and the details about the winds was one of the few nice evocative things in the story. Not so different from what I take from gothic Hammer and Corman films.

I hope Del Toro makes plenty of self-indulgent films soon and leaves At The Mountains Of Madness well alone(the script looks bad, the budget will probably ensure crappy elements and Lovecraft is doing just fine), Frankenstein too.

At the cinema there was a bunch of bad trailers with varying amounts of horror and the overall effect was very bleak.

Oh! and the serious injuries didn't do remotely realistic damage.

But is the movie any fun? That's the saving grace of so much Hammer etc., just reveling in its cut corners and fake mist and stuff.

I heard this movie only cost like $50 mil or something, which implies almost everything but the actors might be fake. Man, what it up with Del Toro? It seems like he keeps talking up all these cool passion projects, then in between makes compromised/half-assed expensive movies no one really want, like Pacific Rim (and I liked Pacific Rim). Meanwhile time passes on, and "Pan's," "Hellboy" et al. were so long ago... Maybe we can blame Jackson for breaking him.

Pacific Rim > Pan's Labyrinth

To quote Klaus Kinski: "Fun? There is no fun"

I don't find any Hammer films fun, even the ones I quite like. Crimson Peak has a surprising amount of action and violence but really, it's all about the style. There is actually a seamless integration of a giallo murder though.

I'm not actually that into Devil's Backbone but I think Pan's Labyrinth and Cronos are definitely his best films. I do kinda like the Hellboy and Pacific Rim films but it's difficult to care about the drama in them. Still never seen Blade 2, not that interested. Nor the directors cut of Mimic.

I have no idea what sort of project Pinocchio will be but it's comparatively promising to other adaptations of classics because it's harder to imagine in Hollywood fairy tale mode.

Hmm, Tale Of Tales coming in March. Can't think of anything else on the horizon.

Bought The Lords of Salem on Blu-Ray - am watching it for the first time now. It's definitely the best-looking Rob Zombie movie to date, and the one with the least egregious stunt-casting. Plot-wise, not sure yet.

Lords of Salem is the best thing Zombie has ever done

Yeah, I don't know. It's definitely exactly what you think it is, no surprises, but there are some really interesting beats that keep it a little ... offbeat. Plus, some nice feelings of apocalyptic dread. Not sure I saw Halloween 2, but I didn't like his Halloween or his first movie. Really liked "Devil's Rejects," though, which captured something ugly in what I thought (iirc) was a sort of novel way. Been years since I saw it, though.

looooove Lords of Salem. So fkin good

Just finished it. I've found his previous movies literally unwatchable (tried to revisit Rejects the other day and lasted about 20 minutes, which is about as far as I got into Halloween 2), but this one is great. 75% of it is stolen from Kubrick or Ken Russell, but it's really meditative and beautiful, and the trio of elderly present-day witches are hilarious. I also liked the relative lack of explicit gore and jump scares.

yeah it's that atmospheric horror like all those creepy ass British movies from the 70's

Yeah, I did love Lords of Salem. I only remember one jump scare, in a ... kitchen? Hallway?

Anyway, want to say Rejects is worth getting through, if only to see the bad guys get ... not quite sympathetic, but something changes. Also, "Freebird."

best thing about Devil's Rejects is the soundtrack

The Scream TV series is fitfully entertaining but suffers from the main problem you'd expect from a long-form slasher story, in that if you make it abundantly obvious half way through who the killer is (partly because they are a terrible actor) you have four more hours, rather than 40 minutes, to sit through with no suspense. It has its moments but it's not a patch on the excellent Harper's Island.

Anyone else see Macbeth? It looked pretty nice but I felt the Shakespearean dialogue with the quiet naturalistic acting was an awkward mix. Generally okay but I wasn't very engaged. Kind of bizarre when Fassbender makes a whooping sound.
I thought I saw a lot of walking out the cinema, not that that's a measure of the film's quality, but I'd imagine a lot of people thought they'd be getting something faster and louder. I wondered if this would drag in the patriotic crowd (they'll surely complain about the accents but I didn't care much).

Not seen the whole of House of 1000 Corpses or Devil's Rejects (maybe 70% of both to the end) but I felt both tried to make you feel involved as if you're having a great time with the lovable crazy hicks. Found the "Freebird" bit quite cringey. Didn't want to see anymore. Unless there was hundreds of corpses at the start that I missed, House of 1000 Corpses didn't really deliver much of the title, I know the film was severely cut and apparently the missing scenes are lost or destroyed.

I made it through Devil's Rejects once, when it was newer; this time out, it just seemed like Zombie wanted to rub as much grime and hickoid-ness in the viewer's face as possible, and I wasn't in the mood. Plus, the dialogue was overwritten to the point of wretchedness - it sounded like a heavily caffeinated, sociopathic teenager had written it.

Do wonder if Zombie watched Texas Chainsaw Massacre and thought "I want to make films like that dinner scene and thoroughly enjoy their company".

Lords of Salem is part of a growing pantheon of recent movies that are amazing, slowly-expanding balloons of horror until they ultimately let all the air out in the most irritating fashion imaginable.

I never saw the film but I think the novel version was made to show what he would have done if he had more freedom or a bigger budget.

I don't think Lords of Salem suffered from lack of budget so much as lack of suspense. Was it supposed to be a metaphor for drug addiction? Were you ever once supposed to believe what was happening is not happening? The brilliance of "Rosemary's Baby," its most obvious influence, is this crazy vibe of "this can't be happening!", which of course dovetails with the weirdness and horror of pregnancy. But maybe it's the flashback that gives it all away at the start (iirc), but Salem goes exactly where you expect it to, and in fact its total lack of development is its biggest surprise. Don't think it really hurts the film at all, since it is generally so chill and the Kubrick side of things succeeds far more than it should. But it's kept me from going back.

I need to revisit Rejects. I do think it's interesting how many upthread have only seen part of it but don't want to see the rest. It has been years, and the movie is most certainly unpleasant, but it's not nearly as ugly or insufferable as something like Martyrs or Insides or that kind of stuff. I think you're on to something (xpost) that he wanted to make a Texas Chainsaw more from the perspective of the family. If anything, I want to say it reminds me of Chainsaw 2 in that regard.

Reading through the news on RueMorgue site, I don't know how seriously to take the film development news because these sites are known to extensively report things that never get out of development hell. But Richard Stanley is supposed to be making an adaptation of Color Out Of Space (an interesting choice). Also a Suspiria remake set in Germany with a strong focus on the generation divide in the 70s, with regards to WW2.

Suspiria has been rumored for years, right? What a stupid idea for a remake. It'd be like remaking 2001.

I have these to watch soon: Dark Places, Contracted Phase II, Hidden and Time Lapse. Any thought on these without giving away spoilers?

saw Crimson Peak last night. hugely disappointing. some nice setpieces and acting, but totally let down by OTT CGI, some terrible plotting, more clichés than you could shake a stick at, and general hamperedness all round.

Crimson Peak wasn't remotely scary, but it was constantly beautiful. I'll take that.

i finally saw the guest last week. it is the best movie ever

Went to an annual horror marathon this weekend at a local theater, and it included a screening of the upcoming horror/comedy The Scout's Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse. It was neither horrifying nor funny, but did include the greatest "a zombie getting its dick ripped off and thrown in another zombie's mouth" scene I've ever watched.

(Directed by Michael Landon's son and has, in a small role, Arnold Schwarzenegger's son. What a world, what a world.)

Finally convinced (tricked?) my wife into watching "The Descent" tonight. Then I thought, man, I wish Roger Ebert had reviewed this, he would have loved it. Then I thought, wait, he probably did review! And indeed, he did and did love it: http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-descent-2006

Wait! Wow, apparently despite the byline that review is ... not by Ebert? Jim Emerson? Mysterious.

"I have these to watch soon: Dark Places, Contracted Phase II, Hidden and Time Lapse. Any thought on these without giving away spoilers?"

Curious about Dark Places, based on a decent enough novel by the Gone Girl lady. Surprised that it didn't get a bigger release esp. with this cast hmmn maybe not a good sign actually... Wow critics hated it.

Original Contracted has a really unpleasant premise also descriptions of some of gross out bits--"maggots falling from vagina"--from first film are really (o_O)--not sure if that's too spoilery. Can't imagine sequel is worth watching here.

Time Lapse is decent Twilight Zone-ish fare. Not really much horror at all.

Just finished it. I've found his previous movies literally unwatchable (tried to revisit Rejects the other day and lasted about 20 minutes, which is about as far as I got into Halloween 2), but this one is great. 75% of it is stolen from Kubrick or Ken Russell, but it's really meditative and beautiful, and the trio of elderly present-day witches are hilarious. I also liked the relative lack of explicit gore and jump scares.

― the top man in the language department (誤訳侮辱), Friday, October 16, 2015 10:18 PM (4 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Huh guess I need to watch this now. I have never seen corpses but I think Rejects is fun and I love the ending. I watched his Halloween last weekend and it . . . wasn't good but I don't know why he would have wanted to touch that anyway.