The Horror List Discussion and Suggestions (Genre Project)

[bottled spider]

Calling it a horror movie is reaching, but check out the beautiful poster for Patrice Chéreau's La Reine Margot anyway (the spoiler tags are just for managing size):

Spoiler

Less debatable seems La jeune fille sans mains (Laudenbach, 2016), which I'm itching to vote for.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Siegel, 1955). Masterful pacing. Twenty minute in, you might wonder how the story got so far so fast. Yet the concise, accelerating narrative doesn't sacrifice the establishment of people and place, or the clear delivery of plot information.

Freeway (Bright, 1996). Rumour has it that the first time Anthony Hopkins met Reese Witherspoon, he peed his pants a little.

Blood: The Last Vampire (Kitakubo, 2000). Silly, crappy animé. The uneven animation, incoherent plot, and short duration suggest a television pilot that ran out of funds. Fun fact: even in Japanese horror movies, the black character gets it first.

[domino harvey]

Witherspoon is iconic trash perfection in Freeway — “Jeez Bob, look who got hit with the ugly stick!” Actually, given the zeitgeist, maybe Criterion will rescue this one?

[colinr0380]

I finally got around to Wicked, Wicked (Richard L Bare 1973), infamously presented (almost) entirely in split screen, and as you might expect from a film written and directed by the auteur of the Joe McDoakes shorts, this isn't exactly a powerhouse of horror. You'd think a comedic director would know how to heighten visual interest and exploit his gimmick (We can see the hotel killer stalk his victims AND the victims being stalked -- "Great" if you want that, but we don't even get that most of the time), but we get barely any ideas and the split screens often end up functioning either like shot-reverse shots in a single frame or as a way to represent cut-aways without cutting away-- not exactly a new film language here. You could imagine a director with real vision and creativity utilizing the possibilities of this gimmick, but Bare isn't it. Poor Arthur O'Connell and Madeleine Sherwood are a long way from their Hollywood heydays here. Far more memorable than anything seen on screen are the two songs warbled out by the lounge singing love interest, as they are without a doubt two of the worst songs ever written and her voice is, uh, not one upon which a career could have been built. Unfortunately I haven't been able to get the damn things out of my head ("Wicked wicked, that's the ticket..." - please kill me now, hotel murderer)

I have only ever seen the trailer for Wicked, Wicked so far, and found the song unforgettably catchily awful even just from the brief snippet of it there! The organist appears to be working overtime too!

[domino harvey]

I think it’s hilarious that the trailer is so concerned with not “spoiling” the split screen but has no problem spoiling every scene in the finale! Also, believe it or not, the other song is even worse (“I’ll be myself...” belted out in 70s Epic Torch Singer Empowerment mode)— and we actually see the organist in the film‘s split screen, unrelated to anything in the plot, belting out what’s revealed to be the original organ track for the silent Phantom of the Opera, though this film’s only connection to that legacy is that the killer hides out in the same location he kills people

[therewillbeblus]

And surely the strangest film I’ve seen in years is La vie lointaine (Sébastien Betbeder 2009)...

There is a five minute span in this film that contains no less than three of the strangest fucking things I’ve ever seen in a movie

Having just rewatched this, I’m curious what these three things were for you. There are more than three crazy things in this movie but I can’t think of the specific block of time you’re referring to (which, in such a short runtime, only speaks to how insane the entire film is!)

I’m still working to find the horror arc to define how to place this on my list (there are obvious signifiers but the film is so obscure I haven’t even unpacked how the horror affects me). Its disorientation is like Upstream Color with less strands of hope for possible explanation. The best I can come up with is that it’s an existential conundrum that reduces agency by confusing the participants, but disrupts reality in enough ways to stretch any surrogate experience beyond any one character to a collective disorder. What halts this from being horror for me is that there seems to be a lack of anxiety and a step of acceptance from several characters, though the end signals that perhaps this lack of fear is from ignorance of truth, which suggests a new kind of anti-horror in increasing our objective horror from studying their subjective dismissal of horror in wake of some pretty horrific shit.

[domino harvey]

Unless I’ve messed the order up in my head, I was thinking

Spoiler

Talking life size teddy bears —>Unexpected Parachutist —> UFO on lawn

[therewillbeblus]

Spoiler

That was my guess, but I guess I didn’t think the parachutist was that odd compared to the rest- though it could be a revisit distilling the weird against weirder! The talking bears, disappearing gunman, and ghost sex are all pretty great, but it’s the barely recognized information that our protagonist is dead, underlying the film through a few direct addresses yet shoved in a corner, that really makes this one creepy.

[domino harvey]

Spoiler

The parachutist’s entrance is probably the most unexpected and delightful moment of the whole film for me! Such a beautiful haymaker after the bears to remind you as a viewer that yes, your suspicions are correct and all bets are indeed off, and from any direction too!

I think this film’s legacy above everything else is how it completely baffles and frustrates conventional causality without ever turning into just Rando Weird Stuff Happenin (my least favorite horror genre) because there’s no doubt that there’s some kind of well-considered throughline from the filmmakers guiding everything we see, however cryptic. This kind of movie is extraordinarily hard to make well

[therewillbeblus]

I had the exact same reaction regarding your favorite part, and especially this watch it provided a giddy warmth. I guess I was just looking for more unsettling ‘weird’ from your earlier statement, but I got that same effect- this is indeed nearly impossible to pull off because it can so easily revert to camp, but when it clicks like here we get to enter this world that defies narrative and physical laws and expectations along with the characters, and take our reaction seriously. I expect it to place quite high on my own list, and hope more people seek it out (it’s only ~50 minutes if time management is an issue/incentive).

[knives]

Don't Breathe (dir. Alvarez)
This at first seem like a lean Panic Room-esque attempt at a basic horror premise before getting into much more disturbing on its face concept that seems inevitable to allow our heroes to be heroes. It also does this in a slim fashion with quick characterization and descent into horror. It might not be as morally muddled as it thinks it is, but this was super satisfying in a quietly super trashy way all the same. I can 100% believe a certain plot reveal at the end will have people running away disgusted, but it's transgressive enough and forces both parties to be morally disgusting as a Almodovar joke that I think it works.

Halloween (dir. Green)
This is a very DGG film and really suffers from it. His aesthetic makes this much longer than the script suggests to the point of burden. It also undermines atmosphere quite a bit. The film kind of works when it's just a character drama of a young girl dealing with her family's history of trauma, but is melodramatic in a stupid way whenever horror or Myers enter into the picture. DGG simply doesn't know how to stage this kind of terror and spends too much time in it. If this was 90 minutes of small town Skins and 10 minutes of being a bad slasher I'd probably like it, but instead those numbers reverse.

The movie also doesn't really know what it wants to be in relation to the franchise. Is it undermining the series' tropes or is it playing them up with vigor. In the story presented there's nothing about Myers that is notable. He's just a crazy guy and it only makes sense of Laurie to treat him as this super boogieman. There's not even that familial connection to give a purpose to this supposed connection. This makes the shift to this 63 year old, scrawny, comatose patient turning into superman with a series of fetishes (why would anyone think the mask is special) laughable.

Misery (dir. Reiner)
This is pretty good with a good scary feeling that also embodies King's type of sarcasm fairly well. Honestly I haven't disliked any of Reiner's films so I don't know why I'm always so hesitant to watch a new one. Bates of course steals the show, but she wouldn't work without Caan's exhaustion to play off of. The way he just gets finished with this nonsense really gives the film this mad energy I loved. It's also funny how all of these King adaptations set up a savior for the hero and laugh at that idea almost identically.

[therewillbeblus]

Don't Breathe
I can 100% believe a certain plot reveal at the end will have people running away disgusted, but it's transgressive enough and forces both parties to be morally disgusting as a Almodovar joke that I think it works.

I like this comparison a lot and probably explains why I was extra amused at this one in its crescendo after a marginally above-average programmer ride.

As for DGG’s Halloween, I admire you for being so charitable re: new generations feeling family’s trauma, but I thought everything in this film was terrible including this “theme.” The film is trying so hard to be safe that it winds up tedious, unimaginative, and completely lifeless. I rarely contemplate leaving a theatre midway through a film but I was squirming throughout this movie last year. Even the subplots like the one with the boyfriend wind up fizzling into complete nothingness with twists we have no stake in. I may be misremembering but I don’t think even the worst of the sequels took the easiest path like this one does. It was my least favorite movie from last year and would probably make my all time bottom-list of horror.

[knives]

It definitely fizzles and doesn't really live up to the threads it introduces. I could definitely see a more engaged filmmaker taking the same basic ingredients and making something great out of it though.

[therewillbeblus]

Sure, and that’s the uneven curiosity of Green for me- I never know when he’s going to phone it in with an ambivalence-as-apathy to the material, or if he’s going to put the energy and effort into the right places. I think he does try, or thinks he’s trying, but only clicks occasionally. George Washington, All the Pretty Girls, and Pineapple Express have a lot of talent behind the camera, but everything else lives on a wide range of good to terrible, and I haven’t even seen that Jonah Hill Sitter movie that I hear is worse than Your Highness.

[knives]

I've only seen one of your good movies and I'm even fairly ambivalent to that. I feel Green is a much better producer than writer given the gold Nichols and Hill have produced.

[domino harvey]

I didn't hate Your Highness even though I found it not at all funny. But as a fantasy film I thought it worked better than I expected. It would have been interesting to see a version that cut out all the lame sex jokes and played it less jokey, though I get that the incongruity is already "the joke" and the film's raison d'être

[therewillbeblus]

I feel Green is a much better producer than writer given the gold Nichols and Hill have produced.

I agree that Hill’s tonal balance and Nichols’ dramatic knack have both given far better, consistent, and more interesting output than Green, but those first two features carry a rawness neither of the others quite hit and the Stoner comedy is somehow filmed in a way that is subliminally designed in its structure as the process of being stoned with witty energy slowly deteriorating into a hazy mindless action and a final burnout scene that’s as fresh out of ideas as the guy who needs another toke. It’s brilliant.

[nitin]

Wow maybe I should give Pineapple Express another go then, I’ve only ever liked George Washington and All the Real Girls. Also need to see Undertow.

His Halloween was incredibly dumb in parts, but once again that is a noticeable problem only because the movie has this ridiculously self serious tone to it.

Don’t Breate is definitely good trashy fun.

[swo17]

I actually just rewatched PA and thought it felt a lot more like a Judd Apatow movie than what DGG & co. were going for in, say, Eastbound & Down. Beyond his first three films, I do think Prince Avalanche and Joe are modest successes.

[therewillbeblus]

I really liked Joe too.

Wow maybe I should give Pineapple Express another go then.

I’ll admit to coming up with that reading over a decade ago in not exactly the most lucid of states but I watched it again recently and both the film and analysis held up. Also one of the funniest theatre experiences of my life seeing this on opening night when the entire crowd let out a collective gasp when the bong broke, and after the movie got out seemingly everyone in attendance lit up cigarettes in the parking lot creating the image of a trashy candlelight vigil.

Alright back to horror..

I might write more about them as I continue to go through Manoel de Oliveira’s filmography but I feel like a case could be made for The Convent and Benilde or the Virgin Mother as fitting for the genre. While The Convent hits on the kinds of existential horror that I find so appealing, others may warm more to its inclusion based on the signifying content of the devil character and Faust storyline. I already posted some scattered thoughts in the Manoel de Oliveira thread here and here, but it's a lock for my list.

Benilde may be a little harder to sell. This was one of the most captivating film experiences in recent memory (well, both were) with so much intensity in a stage-play format (simultaneously involving and yet artificial by design). Similar to The Convent but a bit more straight, this appears to be a profoundly spiritual film about faith, but underneath it's really about the characters' inability to grasp this intangible circumstance of a modern biblical Mary, pitting humanity's reasoning and emotional turmoil against faith. By holding the camera in an objective perspective of the skeptic, all characters (including the priest!) doubt and retreat to their comfortable beliefs to help explain the unexplainable. The priest quickly recovers from his own doubtful skepticism and turns to faith, but a close eye into his process is important because part of him clearly does not want to believe her but he only does because his position must align with his comfortable beliefs rooted in faith, and so his support comes at least in part from a selfishly human ego place rather than a faithful surrender. The rest of the characters do and say all in their power to challenge this enigma, as it rots their philosophical and pragmatic comprehensions of life. Instead of being hailed or seen (by characters in the film or MO's camera) as a saint, Benilde is seen as a personification of dark magic, an unsettling force that exudes a monotonous delivery of cryptic words that is so unrelatable and elusive that we get chills as we're sent into our own crisis of faith. The concept of an angel becomes a demon from this viewpoint and even when we are able to objectively forfeit some of that resignation, we're still left in a milieu that cannot retreat to comfortable tangible comprehensions, void of tools and trapped in our own horror as a result of incomprehensible faith. I was uncomfortably glued to the screen as the spiritual wrestled with the logical and emotional safety within me as much as with the characters and camera.. I mean, the brother even fabricates an admission to a heinous crime in front of their family to attempt to restore order to his comfort of logical reality! It's not easy to take an idea that is so positive and optimistic in support of God and Miracles and transform it into existential and psychological horror, but Manoel de Oliveira did just that for me, and reminded me of how frightening a surrender from logic can be, and how that calamity can send our own emotions into pandemonium in the wake of an enigmatic disruption to our sense of order and personal worldviews.

[knives]

I actually just rewatched PA and thought it felt a lot more like a Judd Apatow movie than what DGG & co. were going for in, say, Eastbound & Down. Beyond his first three films, I do think Prince Avalanche and Joe are modest successes.

I like those two as well, but they're a great example of how even at his best he's bested by other filmmakers (e.g. Mud and Leave No Trace)

[swo17]

I don't disagree

[bottled spider]

The Virgin and the Beast (Panna a Netvor) (Herz, 1978)
For the first half hour, this is legitimately a horror film: suspense, dread, creepiness, some mild jump scares, and a healthy pour of blood. Unlike the Cocteau and Disney versions, the beast is genuinely abhorent. But as the film progresses, it turns from horror to fantasy, becoming a straight fairy tale almost suitable for children. Which would be fine if Beauty and the Beast weren't so stultifying. It's extraordinary how many times this tale has been adapted. Whatever is the appeal?

That aside, this is warmly recommended for its sheer beauty. I discern a fellow pyromaniac in the surfeit of torches, candles, hearth fires, and a couple narratively superfluous conflagrations thrown in for the joy of it. One pretty moment: cut to the father sitting at table, contemplating a flute of golden amontillado, which is so aligned with a candle behind it that the flame appears to float inside the glass, even tilting as the glass tilts, a curious optical effect I haven't seen before.

Kuroneko (Shindo, 1968). I wish Shindo had sought my advice about movies, I could have given him some pointers on how to make a good one.

Spoiler

Begin, in media res, with the first samurai killing, exactly as filmed. What the women are, and their intentions, emerge as the scene unfolds, but who they are and their motive remain unknown. Proceed with a series of killings, a bit more concisely than in the existing film, and then introduce Gintoku on the battlefield. Deviating from the existing script, let Gintoku encounter Shige by the roadside on his journey home, before learning of the death of his mother and wife, or hearing about the ghosts. They don't initially recognize each other because Gintoku is plastered with mud and Shige is demurely hiding her face. Gintoku is lured to their lair like the other samurai, recognition and revelation ensue, tears all around. At dawn, he carries on to the governor for his hero's welcome, where he is tasked with destroying the ghosts. Et cetera. Kuroneko as filmed is so linear and explicated that there's no mystery.

Anyway, I the main thing I liked in this was the kabuki dance performed by Yone.

The Blackcoat's Daughter, AKA The Devil's Daughter (Perkins, 2015). I liked this well enough, but felt it relied too much on tension music. The delayed comprehension and opaque characters are intentional, but risk viewer investment. I initially mistook Emma Roberts' character for the girl Rose confided to earlier, which didn't help.

[domino harvey]

Still counts as a W, Blackcoat’s Daughter retains title as the one movie everyone here likes

[Finch]

Wasn't it also known as February at the very beginning? I could have sworn the French Blu-Ray carries that title.

[therewillbeblus]

Yep, it toured some festivals in fall 2015 with that title and was changed sometime in early 2016 (and then remained unreleased to the public until 2017)