Tough to be a horror film junkie these days. Can you even remember the last really good fright flick, the kind that electrifies an audience and leaves you begging for more?
All we’re left with are torture porn parades and remakes of bad ’80s slasher films. And when Hollywood cranks out a solid horror flick, the studio behind it buries it.
I chatted up some industry types on the topic for my latest feature in MovieMaker Magazine. Everyone I spoke to shared a healthy passion for horror, as well as a wish for better horror pics to come. I remain skeptical … but all it takes is one great monster movie to revive the genre.
UPDATE: A glimmer of hope in horror land?
(Photo: Where have you gone, Frankenstein’s Monster? The horror genre sure could use you right about now.)
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Perhaps it would be best to start with making a distinction between horror and splatter/torture porn films. They barely belong together, a horror movie is a film that is mostly horror with a little gore. A splatter film is a lot of gore with a little horror.
The worst thing that has happened to horror films is the filmmakers stupifying need to inject them with humor and sarcasm. The Exorcist still works to this day because of an unrelenting pulse of dread as we watch the daughter slowly deteriate and the mother desperately trying to find someone to help her. Blatty and Freidkin made the world of the film realistic with just enough oddness to make it disturbing. All the “gore” doesn’t happen until the last 20 minutes or so and is three times as effective because of the slow burn up to it.
More recently Silent Hill, while not a great film, did a good job of mixing the horror and gore and creating a disturbing atmosphere in the film. The much maligned Blair Witch Project was an excelent attempt at horror,(and marketing). A film I’d like to see remade with a tighter script.
Compare that with most any horror film out today, we have gore in the opening scene to set up the film. Then every ten minutes or so, like clockwork there’s some more gore. The whole thing is spiked with sarcastic characters and tacked on humor.
Well said, Opus. I suspect the “Scream” films opened the door wide for horror comedies, or at least those self-referential films that leaned toward the humorous side. But I think laughter is an uncomfortable side product of being scared … sometimes, we laugh to ease the tension.
The gore factor doesn’t bother me when handled well, but it’s often the safest way for a cheap scare, much like a fart joke is an cheap way to make an audience laugh. When you’re in the middle of a really lame comedy — just wait for the flatulence humor. It’s coming …
Scream I suppose I would give a pass because it was really the first of it’s kind and the style that everyone else has copied. The same as I would give the original Friday the 13th a pass because it was the first, or at least the most prominant film that started the whole killing teenagers who have sex films.
Humor I really don’t have a problem with if it’s like you mentioned, a by product of the situation, but most of what I’ve seen isn’t.
I like a good splatter film as much as the next guy, I loved the first Hostel. The sequel though,like most sequels sucked. But I have a difficult time including them in the same genre as horror. They should have their own genre.
Opus, the genre itself still gets so little respect, and the splatter fests make it even worse. If we could divide the two into separate categories, that would help, but I doubt it’ll happen, sadly.
Still, movies that use little or no gore but still scare us get extra attention – like “The Orphanage” and “Blair Witch …”