Comments on: Why we love horror movies

By: Elijah

Elijah — Tue, 12 May 2009 11:01:53 +0000

Particularly movies that don’t have a well thought beginning are the ones you can tell right away will be boring. Horror movies keep you on the edge of your seat all the time!

By: Big_Dave_T

Big_Dave_T — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 16:42:01 +0000

Horror movies are great escapist fare. Besides being a roller coaster of thrills and chills, if the movie is good, it lets you forget real-life problems if only for a couple hours. Remember, Universal had great success with horror movies during the Great Depression. Folks could escape the problems of their everyday world inside a darkened movie theatre. And they might even think, “Hea, there’s worse things than being broke and out of a job. I could become one of the living dead.”

By: Ronn

Ronn — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 23:21:20 +0000

This is a hard question to answer and believe me i have been asked this question many times especially by my mother in law who doesn’t get why anyone would want to watch people getting hacked up or watch films about unspeakable evil. My first introduction to horror was watching the Friday the 13th films as a kid in the 80’s my dad and we would rent them everytime a new one came out. i was probably a little young to be watching them but i like to think i turned out alright. The thing i love about the horror genre is that i can watch just about any film and it will suprise me or i can watch something that is formulaic like a slasher film for instance. No matter how bad they are they are still entertaining and take to a place that is the complete opposite of everyday life. The simple answer to this question is that we like to be scared and escape into a different world for about 90 minutes. some of my favorite horror films are Carpenter’s ‘Halloween’, Suspiria,Deep Red, any Hammer horror film,original dawn of the dead,Fright Night, texas chainsaw massacre 1 and 2,evil dead 2,sleepaway camp,friday the 13th

By: cftoto

cftoto — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:32:13 +0000

You, my friend, are the exception. But what I’m referencing is that fact that most people work five days a week, pay the bills, mow the lawn, etc. Their lives aren’t like Shia LaBeouf in “Eagle Eye” or any such Hollywood claptrap.

By: Chase

Chase — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 18:45:33 +0000

“Our lives tend to be bland, or at least uneventful” … Hey, speak for yourself, haven’t you ever read my blog??

By: cftoto

cftoto — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 00:13:13 +0000

Opus … really well put.

One more note. I did a story a little while ago for MovieMaker magazine about horror movies (I linked to it here at WWTW – just enter ‘moviemaker’ in my site’s search engine — the post is called ‘te horror, the horror’). All the story’s sources were folks working in the genre — each and every one spoke with such elegance – and passion – on the subject. It was great to hear.

By: opus

opus — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 00:02:57 +0000

I think the majority of horror movies are morality tales. A sort of Grimm’s Fairytale before it’s cleaned up for kids.

If I were to add to the list I think they also allow us, on some level to live out the vicious part of our nature. The only difference between a comedy and a horror film is the amount of blood, in both genres we derrive our pleasure from the suffering of the characters.

Horror movies are more original than the average film, even if the horror film stinks, odds are you’re going to see something you’ve never seen before and as Bo reference, it will stick with you.

Like no other genre of film a horror movie can contain elements from every other genre. They can have humor, a love story, it can take place in space, modern day or the old west, but it’s still a horror movie. Put any amount of horror into any other genre and it ceases being a comedy, a timeless love story or a western. It becomes a horror movie.

My favorites, The Exorcist and the original Omen, two films that all these years later give me the creeps.

By: cftoto

cftoto — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 21:02:14 +0000

Ironically, I won’t get anywhere near a roller coaster … and I’ll never sky dive unless a Bond villain makes me do so at gunpoint. That’s not fake scary … that’s real scary to me.

Favorite horror movies? “The Omen” from my childhood, “The Descent” from the last two years. “28 Days Later” too ..

By: Tink in Cali

Tink in Cali — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 20:44:10 +0000

I guess that is the difference, then, the liking to be scared. Maybe it is hard wired – I don’t like to be scared because I wake up in the night, thinking the zombie/vampire/backwoods maniac is in my bedroom about to attack. When I was single, I would counter act this by sleeping with the light on. My husband does NOT enjoy that experience (jeez, it has only been twice) and so I do not watch the scary ones. He doesn’t like them either, so it is pretty easy to avoid them in household.

I have seen some of the classic ones (Exorcist, Carrie, etc.), which are your favorites?

By: Bo

Bo — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 17:25:45 +0000

I think you pretty much hit it on the head. In particular, the nugget in horror films – I remember seeing a film called “The Dead Hate the Living” that was horrible… except for one scene where a victim is dragged into a dark hallway by his recently aired-out intestines. That image hung with me, despite the lackluster film. Moreso than any other genre, horror can work in moments surrounded by forgettable stories and characters.