I really want to read a Geoffrey O'Brien review of this.
There are prob. tons of essays which dwell upon "the horror genre as a necessary ritual", but I keep flashing back to his chapter in The Phantom Empire, re: horror as a genre where quality may be welcome but simply isn't necessary - as long as certain rules are adhered to, the genre's central ritual has been performed well.
― "Fourvel - it's like Fievel, but one less." (R Baez), Monday, 16 April 2012 15:49 (twelve years ago) link
otm, and it helps explain horror fandom's happy acceptance of the most wretched drek, so long as it's "done right".
important to keep in mind that this isn't really unique to the horror genre, though. action movies, thrillers, sci-fi, comedies and even romances are similar. all that's really important is that the right sort of spectacle or reward is offered. this is even more apparent in genre fiction, where the production costs are lower.
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Monday, 16 April 2012 15:55 (twelve years ago) link
Though horror films are the only ones that specifically trade in sadism and blood. Those aspects are ancillary to action flicks and rom-coms and whatever. In a lot of horror films (most horror films?) the promise of blood and death is the draw. I mean, tons of action films are violent, but the creative kills scenes themselves are not the specific draw. Hence the advent/rise of torture porn, wherein the elaborate, prolonged, horribly graphic kills are the main attraction, much as explicit sex is the main attraction in conventional porn.
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 16 April 2012 16:02 (twelve years ago) link
Like, there are "rituals" to all these genre works, sure, in the form of cliches or whatever, but I'd suggest the rituals in horror films reflect the most poorly on the audience.
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 16 April 2012 16:04 (twelve years ago) link
Yeah - you could extrapolate it to pretty much every genre, though it does resonate specifically w/ horror; I don't know any rom-com fanatics who spend every Saturday with three nigh-random dvds...
― "Fourvel - it's like Fievel, but one less." (R Baez), Monday, 16 April 2012 16:14 (twelve years ago) link
oh yeah, horror fandom is intense. it's like metal fandom that way. but sci-fi fandom is v similar, and that doesn't typically revolve around death/killing at all.
my point was that it's a little to easy, imo, to get caught up in the specialness of horror's "sacrificial offering". lots of popular genres exist to provide a certain type of reward (or punishment, perhaps).
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Monday, 16 April 2012 16:20 (twelve years ago) link
edit: "a little too easy"
"horror as a genre where quality may be welcome but simply isn't necessary - as long as certain rules are adhered to, the genre's central ritual has been performed well"
Yes you'd think the Old Ones (as genre aficionados) might have decided against bringing on the apocalypse, given the undeniably spectacular upside to their ritual going wrong.
Maybe the Old Ones just really hate that whole Lovecraft thing.
― Neil Willett, Monday, 16 April 2012 19:32 (twelve years ago) link
Meantime:
http://io9.com/5902424/everything-you-didnt-know-about-cabin-in-the-woods
― Ned Raggett, Monday, 16 April 2012 21:41 (twelve years ago) link
Though horror films are the only ones that specifically trade in sadism and blood.
r e e a l l l l y? -- 'sadistic' always used to be in the top three adjectives used to negatively describe crime fiction and spy fiction; i think maybe it's a thing lost sight of in the later progress of those genres but there's so much of it buried on some level. how i hate sex murderers, thought morse.
I mean, tons of action films are violent, but the creative kills scenes themselves are not the specific draw.
hm.
Hence the advent/rise of torture porn, wherein the elaborate, prolonged, horribly graphic kills are the main attraction, much as explicit sex is the main attraction in conventional porn.
think about the work 'as' is doing here
― thomp, Monday, 16 April 2012 21:51 (twelve years ago) link
"hence the advent/rise of fx porn, wherein the lovingly crafted computer-generated effects shots are the main attraction, much as explicit sex is the main attraction in conventional porn"
― thomp, Monday, 16 April 2012 21:52 (twelve years ago) link
That's fine, if you want to split hairs. The only reason there's no real dismemberment in movies is because it's illegal, but the simulation is not so inaccurate as to preclude the comparison. I mean, if you used animatronic dummies, squibs and prosthetics to graphically simulate porn-sex, it'd be close enough to porn to count as porn. But most movies don't bother, because the real thing is a real, real cheap alternative.
r e e a l l l l y? -- 'sadistic' always used to be in the top three adjectives used to negatively describe crime fiction and spy fiction; i think maybe it's a thing lost sight of in the later progress of those genres but there's so much of it buried on some level.
I get it, but here I am being literal. Horror films, at least in the golden years of gore and beyond, are by and large about someone or something doing physical or mental harm to someone. In other genres, said harm is often incidental, not the be-all. That is, no action movie is literally just about some guy blowing things up, though that happens. But many gory horror films are about people getting killed. Like, that is the plot, basically. That's what I mean by sadism; we watch to see horrible things happen.
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 16 April 2012 21:59 (twelve years ago) link
sure, but there are degrees of sadism
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Monday, 16 April 2012 22:00 (twelve years ago) link
Of course! But I can't think of any genre other than horror where watching people get killed is the whole point. That's what makes, I dunno, "Ten Little Indians" not horror but a who done it.
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 16 April 2012 22:04 (twelve years ago) link
That's certainly true of certain subgenres within horror, and for the last few decades has often been true of the genre as a whole.
Nevertheless, his tangent grew out of my attempt to make the point that people put up with sub-par filmmaking in other genres, too, so long the films in those genres provide their expected rewards. I agree that horror is somewhat unique in its dedication to death and bloodshed, but it's not unique in offering a reward to the faithful.
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Monday, 16 April 2012 22:11 (twelve years ago) link
"this tangent"
And I agree! I was just stressing that the reward in horror's case is often sadism, which is why it reflects more poorly on the audience than, say, sub-par romantic comedies, sports movies and other films that trade entirely in routine and cliche. It doesn't say anything bad when some plops in a movie, craving nothing more than two attractive people getting together, or the underdog team overcoming the visitors. it does when someone plops in a DVD hoping for just a few creative kills. And maybe a couple of boobs in the process.
And by reflect poorly, I really do mean this in the abstract. People watch movies for all sorts of reasons.
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 16 April 2012 22:27 (twelve years ago) link
i watch horror in part for the gore, transgression and titillation. perhaps this does reflect badly on me, but c'est la guerre, it's by far the least of my faults and vices
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Monday, 16 April 2012 22:30 (twelve years ago) link
also, i'm not sure why such things should "reflect badly" anyway. genres such as the war film, the thriller, the action movie and the murder mystery play to similarly macabre, brutal and/or bloodthirsty interests, and no one seems to have a problem with that.
ironically, i'm very vocal about the fact that i draw the line at prolonged depictions of helpless suffering, which i see as unbearably sadistic. perhaps i'm trying to excuse my own base appetites by condemning them in others. and perhaps we all draw a similar line somewhere, i dunno...
― BEMORE SUPER FABBY (contenderizer), Monday, 16 April 2012 22:46 (twelve years ago) link
I hold that onscreen violence/gore is one of the few (or only) instances where a filmmaker has to create something that exists irl, but that s/he's likely never seen. Aside from other dramatizations. (Unless there's a secret vault of filmed decapitations at Horror School)
― poxen, Monday, 16 April 2012 22:58 (twelve years ago) link
i don't think anyone i've ever known who has been into deeply over the top and horrible horror film has been into it for reasons of sadism ... ?
(or, okay, none of them have gone 'man, i really enjoyed watching that man's head be sliced open like a cantaloupe with that machete. it just did it for me, it did')
& going from my own experience of watching ... any horror movie ever, my feelings at scenes of on-screen violence are way, way less likely to be pleasure-at-another's-pain than feelings associated with on-screen violence in a cop film or an action film -- the audience is invited to empathise w/ james bond's sadism more than it is jigsaw's. whatever that means -
― thomp, Tuesday, 17 April 2012 01:20 (twelve years ago) link
also josh you kind of completely missed the point about why the porn comparison doesn't work, but i'm assuming that's because you hate women
― thomp, Tuesday, 17 April 2012 01:22 (twelve years ago) link
I am SO seeing this again. There is so much detail in the third act that you can't catch it all in one sitting.
― Tantrum The Cat, Tuesday, 17 April 2012 17:59 (twelve years ago) link
I don't mean that people (like me) who watch horror movies are literally sadists, though I'm sure some (like me) totally hate women and need to see them transgress and then get punished. It keeps the Ancient Ones at bay.
Elucidate your porn point, please. Because yeah, I missed it.
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 17 April 2012 19:12 (twelve years ago) link
― poxen
let me tell you about ogrish.com ...
― the late great, Tuesday, 17 April 2012 19:16 (twelve years ago) link
actually i think the new popular one is called "bestgore.com" or something like that
also i am pretty sure people saw some pretty gory shit in WWII, korea and vietnam so maybe as horror got more and more graphic some people weren't just working from imagination
― the late great, Tuesday, 17 April 2012 19:17 (twelve years ago) link
Doesn't Tom Savini say he drew on his experiences in Vietnam for inspiration?
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 17 April 2012 19:18 (twelve years ago) link
btw there is actual sadism that you act on, and then there is the thing where we can't help but want to peek inside the body bag or crane our neck to see a better view of the auto accident
i remember reading something when i used to read critical theory (maybe sontag?) on the popularity of things like weegee and "faces of death" being about a basic human need: when we see others destroyed, it reinforces our own sense of solidity and wholeness
is that part of sadism? i dunno.
― the late great, Tuesday, 17 April 2012 19:21 (twelve years ago) link
ha ha I am totally not going to either of those sites! thank you though! and it's not just "i myself have seen an arm sliced" but "this is how i'm going to film a slicing of arm".
― poxen, Tuesday, 17 April 2012 20:19 (twelve years ago) link
Stuff and things:
http://io9.com/5902873/the-secret-firefly-easter-egg-in-cabin-in-the-woods
Including:
They're not ruling out a sequel. Just because the ending is pretty final doesn't mean you can't come back from that, because with these kinds of comedic films, there's always a way, says Goddard.
― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 18 April 2012 00:42 (twelve years ago) link
Also, one of Goddard's favorite monsters was Kevin, a sweet-looking guy who seemed like he might work at Best Buy — until he dismembers people.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 18 April 2012 01:10 (twelve years ago) link
Really loved this and thought, aside from the lulz, that it was well-plotted. We see the force-field at the beginning, but that didn't tell me that he was going to hit it - I expected them to have him run out of gas in the bike at the last second or something and defy expectations there; thought there was a possibility they'd kill the Fool only to have it turn out he was the Virgin or something like that, too.
― Kiarostami bag (milo z), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 03:20 (twelve years ago) link
the four suited people in the ceramic masks - is that a Japanese horror myth? it seemed really familiar but I couldn't place it.
― Kiarostami bag (milo z), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 03:22 (twelve years ago) link
dunno. it reminded me both of brazil and something grant morrisson would write.
― yuppie bullshit chocolate blogbait (contenderizer), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 03:29 (twelve years ago) link
Probably Japanese. Only A PAGE OF MADNESS, from way back in 1926, leaps to mind though.
― "Fourvel - it's like Fievel, but one less." (R Baez), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 03:39 (twelve years ago) link
something grant morrisson would write.
Quimper, from The Invisibles?
― "Fourvel - it's like Fievel, but one less." (R Baez), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 03:51 (twelve years ago) link
i was thinkin' Professor Pyg and his creepy army
― Nhex, Wednesday, 18 April 2012 03:52 (twelve years ago) link
^ yeah, that's what i was thinking of
― yuppie bullshit chocolate blogbait (contenderizer), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 04:39 (twelve years ago) link
lolled again at the thought of v. serious monologue about the virgin interrupted with "tequila's my lady!"
― Kiarostami bag (milo z), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 05:05 (twelve years ago) link
haha that was the fucking best!! TUH TUH TEQUILA
― Nhex, Wednesday, 18 April 2012 05:36 (twelve years ago) link
kind of want to create a kickstarter for the telescoping bong
― Kiarostami bag (milo z), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 06:23 (twelve years ago) link
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-4zqSfqj-MQs/TxdG852ZKUI/AAAAAAAAFf4/1vcBewWk9Vk/s1600/the-strangers-_3.jpg
― Number None, Wednesday, 18 April 2012 11:14 (twelve years ago) link
this was lots of fun!
― zubaz fupa (elmo argonaut), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 13:04 (twelve years ago) link
i am definitely not enough of a horror fan to have caught all the references, though. anyone have any idea as to what jenkin's character was referring to in the beginning when he says they "haven't had a glitch since 1997"?
― zubaz fupa (elmo argonaut), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 13:15 (twelve years ago) link
or 1998, something like that?
― zubaz fupa (elmo argonaut), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 13:24 (twelve years ago) link
Isn't that when Scream came out?
― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 18 April 2012 13:27 (twelve years ago) link
96. I've seen some people speculate that it refers to the Roland Emmerich's Godzilla
― Number None, Wednesday, 18 April 2012 13:29 (twelve years ago) link
I thought it was just a line to show that this has been going on for some time. Sometimes a cigar is just a etc.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 18 April 2012 13:57 (twelve years ago) link
i can't believe it was just an expository line, especially from whedon
iirc the '98 glitch was on the chem department -- who later fails to account for the effects of marty's weed smoking -- so maybe they are referring to the faculty? recreational drug kills monster, and the kids all survive at the end
― zubaz fupa (elmo argonaut), Wednesday, 18 April 2012 14:09 (twelve years ago) link
i've been about that one wondering myself. what else came out in '98?
― Nhex, Wednesday, 18 April 2012 14:56 (twelve years ago) link