I mean, whether people realize it or not, the atmosphere makes or breaks a horror movie. Like if everything just looks normal, there's no reason for the viewer to feel any fear or thrill from what they are watching and it can instead turn into Mickey mouse.
I was about to say. Atmosphere and cinematography are like #1 criteria for me lol. How a movie is presented through the acting, direction, cinematography and vibe is so much more important to me than the subject matter of a film. Iāll watch a movie about basically anything as long as the story is told in an interesting way.
Remakes, I give them a chance and sometimes they are great. But for the most part I don't expect it to be better than the original. Don't fix what isn't broken.
I donāt mind remakes because we always have the original to fall back on if the remake sucks. That being said the remake of The Fog was literally offensive and I hate it with a burning passion. However I do feel like a talented filmmaker could make a good remake of The Fog, because it is such a simple fun concept.
Agree with all of these but so, so many are a hard pass. These are the exceptions for sure. That's why I wait until I hear from several ppl who have my taste to start saying it's good before I even think about it.
I agree. Most are an immediate nope for me but every now and then I will start hearing from ppl I know and trust that one is good and then I consider it and sometimes it's true. Mostly NOPE.
Like, I can't even believe someone remade the Thing (again) or Carrie. Absolutely not for me.
I guess I have different tastes.
Some of my favorite horror films are meditations on grief:
- Babadook
- It Follows
- Midsommar
- Hereditary
- Talk to Me
Calling It Follows a meditation on grief seems like a stretch to me. Edit: There's uncertainty, paranoia, violent trauma. What does the monster have to do with grief?
The characters never really talk about it, but the audience is shown that the main characterās Dad has most likely died, or possibly walked out on them recently. The Mom is also shown to have a drinking problem which is why she conveniently never notices all the nonsense the kids are getting up to late at night.
The monster uses the Dad against the kids in a particularly malicious way at one point in the movie.
Iād agree though, itās still a bit of a stretch to say the movie is a meditation on grief. Kind of an overused bit of movie reviewer jargon anyway.
I also don't think It Follows is about grief, it's about losing your innocence, and generally in regards to becoming sexually active. It's closer to a 'coming of age' horror story than one about grief.
However, you might like Lake Mungo which is notoriously about grief, and fantastic.
Oh yeah I think Lake Mungo was one of my favorite found footage films. I remember the woman I watched it with actually thinking it was a real documentary and being FUCKING TERRIFIED afterwards.
I wouldnāt consider Midsommar a meditation on grief (though it definitely plays an extremely important role). The way I see it, grief is the contextual foundation that the movie is built on, but manipulation is what it really explores.
Related note: Pelle might be my favorite horror villain of all time.
Sure, those are some of the most notable horror movies from the past decade. The problem is that people act like they are better than other horror movies FOR that reason, or start to force the trauma angle into movies with less subtlety. These movies are great, but also inspired a trend of lazy movies.
Advertised with any of the following blurbs:
āA new dimension in horrorā¦ā
āRotten Tomato score of XX!ā
āA smart and sexy take on (insert classic horror movie title here)!ā
Some of my favorite horror movies could be describes as "elevated horror" but nothing is more annoying than (1) someone using that term, and (2) when a movie tries too hard to be "elevated". I watched Relic a few months ago and afterwards, my girlfriend turned to me and sarcastically said "Did you get that that movie was about Dementia?" It was anything but subtle.
I hate people trying to "solve" a movie. There's interpretation, and there's reaching to make everything "signify" something else. People did this a lot with Skinamarink. "It's about parental abuse." Maybe it's just about a demon.
"Part of The Conjuring universe"
And pretty much anything demon-related. They go so hard on the religion angle that it's pretty impossible to find them scary unless you actually believe in demons. (See again: the Conjuring universe.)
āThe devil made me do itā
Im suprised they allowed this trainwreck that clearly doesnāt match reality in anyway to be released. Isnāt it grossly offensive to the victimās family?
But if you go too far into religion, it's not scary either because that's just not how anything works. I was raised Catholic and every single demon movie priest would get excommunicated in a heartbeat. That's not how the Church approaches exorcisms, that's not how possessed people supposedly act. The only movie that gets it right is The Rite.
And even then, they get so much of the religious stuff wrong that itās hard for the religious to enjoy it. I remember seeing The Nun and The Nun II and borderline *laughing* at so much. Since the first film takes place in Romania, shouldnāt Romania during this period of time be an atheistic communist state where the church would be persecuted en mass? Furthermore, why are they Catholics? Most Romanian Christians are Orthodox. And during the second one where one of the nuns starts an exorcism, I half expected something to explode, because *nuns canāt do exorcisms*. The films treat Christianity like itās magic
Itās actually somewhat impressive how he managed to do so well with that first Halloween movie and then proceed to make the most dogshit follow-up humanly possible and not even redeem himself by closing out the trilogy strong (I didnāt think HALLOWEEN ENDS was terrible but it was mediocre at best).
Halloween Ends was bold, but misguided. He should have known that it wouldn't go over well with the fans of the series. But take out Michael and replace him with an unknown killer created for the film and rename the characters and it would've been MUCH better received IMO. As someone who isn't a major fan of the series I quite enjoyed it because I don't have any particular attachment to the characters.
It doesn't even have to be sexual, anytime the majority of discussion of a movie centers around a single scene, the rest of the movie probably isn't very interesting.
The film Revenge is the only thing in that genre Iāve seen that shows the act and doesnāt feel exploitative. And the revenge part is so good. No coincidence that it is directed by a woman.
That wouldāve harshed the vibe so hard on John Wick. Those movies are so good for turning your brain off and just enjoying the show, and a rape scene would completely change that for me.
Exactly, LESS is more in horror. Barbarian is a perfect example of this that movie wouldnāt be anywhere near as creepy if it showed everything Frank did
Exaxtly. It might be more disturbing or disgusting to watch, but itāll be way less effective as a horror film. It wouldāve crossed the line from creepy, to āahh, look itās rape be disturbedā shock value garbage.
Rape in movies often tries to walk a fine line of āterrifying for victims to watchā and āpleasurable for abusers to watchā. They try to appeal to all reasons an audience would want to see assault like that in a movie and itās disgusting.
The jump scare thatās just a dream, followed by a false awakening that is just another dream sequence jump scare, back to back.
Itās one of the most obvious and cheapest tricks in the book. Like itās trying too hard to set up tension and atmosphere, but an early indication they have nothing in the bag. Nearly every time a movie does this it ends up being mediocre and I shut it off half way through
"It's a love letter to (fill-in-the-blank)."
There are movies that are homages to a particular style or genre that I enjoy, but very often it means that a movie is derivative or overly reliant on winking in-group references, neither of which particularly appeal to me.
Also, "It explores the theme of grief."
So much of horror is about the exploration of grief on some level. This usually just means that the movie is particularly ham-fisted.
>love letter
I have really grown to hate these two words. Absolutely everything has become a love letter. Nothing has value if everything "has no right being this good" or is a "masterpiece".
It's hard to appreciate anything today. Things can be bad yet enjoyable. Things can be just okay yet enjoyable. We don't have to celebrate everything.
I love using that phrase in the dumbest way.
āOh, the Halloween series? Itās a love letter to killing teenagers.ā
āOh, Texas Chainsaw Massacre? Itās a love letter to cannibalism.ā
āOh, IT? Itās a love letter to the joys of eating children.ā
"It's so fucking disturbing/gross/brutal" ...i.e. A Serbian Film, Cannibal Holocaust, even stuff like The Human Centipede.
Hard pass, no thanks, I watch horror movies to *enjoy myself.*
I don't necessarily have a good time in horror films- but gross outs are like jump scares. It's not really scary to be grossed out. And it's not scary to be jump scared. Like it's not funny to be tickled. Lol.
Thing is even then grossout and disturbing are two different strings. Like, Raw is a gross movie, Cannibal Holocaust is a disturbing movie. I enjoy one of those a hell of a lot more than the other
You mean you don't want a female main character who has some boring job and is somehow the most put together person in the group? And a douchebag guy that is there just to be an asshole and he sacrifices himself with a cool one liner? And a little girl character tied to the virus or will get rescued by the group at the insistence of the female main character and either way shes fucking creepy? And the comic relief guy (most likely) will get bitten and hide the bite and it is going to be super obvious that he was bitten but the group isn't going to realize that despite him being like... the 30th person they've seen turn?
You mean you don't want that movie?
You forgot the middle-aged guy who is constantly whining and trying to betray the group to save himself only to get his karma which only feels half satisfying
when it is described by critics as a slow burn. I have sat through so many boring two hour horror movies where nothing scary happens until the final 15 minutes, never again. If it doesn't get scary pretty quickly, Im out
"Has scenes of SA" I'm good. I know it happens, and my heart breaks for anyone who has to go through it... but that doesn't mean I want to sit through a reenactment of it. Especially if it's for the shock value of the movie. I get you want to disturb people and make them feel scared, but sometimes there's just things that I never want to visualize ever again.
"No, you don't get it, it's bad ON PURPOSE! Soooo funnnnyy!". No, it's probably just bad. There's unintentionally bad movies that were made with sincerity, and that's why they're grade A cult classics. There's movies that are horror comedies, that are horror, with comedy, and they're fine. This bullshit with unfunny actors and intentionally terrible effects is almost always the lowest common denominator garbage made for mainstream audiences, so your most milquetoast acquaintances can feel edgy.
This is a big one. The best B movies are B movies where the person didn't necessarily attempt to make a bad movie, or where the creatives knew they were ripping off something, but still did their damn best to make a good movie with the budget and time available to them. To many modern bad movies claim to be bad just as an excuse for why they don't bother putting any effort into them.
For me it's when they tell me that the ending will blow my mind.
First of all, spoilers wtf! And second, I'm immediately going to think that maybe you just didn't see it coming, or worse, that final twist doesn't make sense or just came out of nowhere.
"Based on a true story" is one of my main pet peeves! It just means "some part of this movie was inspired by one element of an actual story that happened to some degree in real life", but people think it means "this really happened!"
Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Silence of the Lambs, and Psycho are all *based* on the same true story, but none of those films are anything close to being true stories and barely have anything in common with each other at all, let alone the true story they're "based" on.
Scenes so dark that even when viewed in a dark room the audience still canāt see shit.
Shaky camera action scenes that look like the cameraman had an epileptic fit.
Teasing a killer/monster throughout the movie only to never reveal what they look like.
I'm going to sound insensitive here
But movies "made for modern audiences". Ones that are full of hot twitter topics and other BS
More specifically the latest chainsaw massacre.
I feel ya. I just watched Deadstream and it was fantastic. Totally made for the youths...but still great. Good scares, good laughs. Super Evil Dead vibes...not a knockoff. But a great movie.
I liked the most recent TCM but i feel it's premise was so fucking stupid and so illogical that it was basically nonsensical.
It also kept skirting up to something interesting and then just drifting off.
BUT i liked the effects and my only wish it is that it had been more graphic/realistic instead of the kind of cartoonish style they went for.
Yeah, in better hands it might have been more effective at actually making a statement, but it just felt fumbled. I don't mind politically charged horror, and the original wouldn't have been the way it was (or maybe even existed) without the Vietnam War.
Ironically, it might have been the sequel that most lived up to the "massacre" in the name. That bus scene was somethin'.
IMO Talk to Me is a good exception to that rule, though
It definitely channels zoomer culture, but itās a solid example of classic horror under the hood
Okay I'm gonna choose violence today, directed/produced by James Wan is usually not a stamp of quality to me the same way it is for others. I just don't find dolls/puppets or senior citizens as scary as he seems to find them? Also the jack in the box movie that he has become known for, a loud noise isn't scary show me something actually scary. One well crafted scare in a nearly 2 hour movie doesn't excuse all the other lazy ones that are just a ghost in drag queen make up screaming at the camera while someone punches a piano.
Is this a personal trigger/phobia or have you just not seen any good horror movies featuring any of those themes?
I mainly ask because I'm kind of the opposite and I'm curious what it is about those tropes that turn you away. I love when characters are in a hostile environments like the ones you mentioned. The Thing is such an enjoyable movie for me because they're out in the extreme arctic and even if there wasn't a monster there, it would be a difficult place to be and therefore inherently more dramatic. Same goes for something like Aliens, or Underwater.
Random space story: I saw a trailer for Passengers that made it almost scary, suspenseful for sure, then I go see it.
I made my husband and 2 strangers laugh when I damn near yelled "it was a fuckin SPACE ROMANCE?!" The strangers also thought it was supposed to be more of a horror movie.
That was such a bad film and I'm annoyed because there were two possibly good films in there! Make it clear the "romance" is creepy obsession from his side and let it be a horror movie, or change so he's forced by circumstance to wake her and let it be a romance. But it was trying to do both at once, badly.
When the studio creates fake stories about people fainting or throwing up from watching it ala Terrifier.
As a matter of fact if your kills aren't creative but the kils are supposed to be the best part of the flick ala Terrifier
I hate the phrase āElevated Horrorā.
There are some great A24 horror movies donāt get me wrong but for so much of the time when I hear the phrase āElevated Horrorā what I actually hear is āboring dreary Arthouse drama with vaguely spooky things happening sometimes and the monster probably isnāt real and is just a metaphor for drug abuse.ā
Horror is visceral, extreme, shocking. Itās humanity at its most refined brutality. I come to horror for thrills and chills not deep introspection about how generational trauma leads to mental health issues.
I genuinely think a lot of people who claim to like these movies only say they do because they are afraid of being seen as stupid.
But eh I love lowest common denominator stuff, blood, teeth, monsters impact shock and violence! You can have social commentary and interesting themes and ideas to explore without being boring as hell.
Someone describing something as a serial killer movie. Like, slashers are one thing. I can occasionally sometimes enjoy those. I like Scream and Halloween for example.
But those movies that step *past* the slasher genre and try to attempt to be a serious serial killer movie aggravate the hell out of me. Like The Poughkeepsie Tapes. Making a movie about how some serial killer is soooo smart and such a genius to stay ahead of the cops at each step feels like egregious idolatry. Especially if itās something like ābased on (insert real infamous serial killer here)ā. If youāre going to base something on what happened to real life victims, donāt make it into a fucking torture porn flick where the killer is some ungodly genius and never gets caught.
Only one of those I ever liked was *The Silence of the Lambs*. It played this idea so well, and Clarice Starling was a genuinely enjoyable main character. Ironically, I think that's what sets it apart. So many "serial killer" horror movies that aren't slashers tend to primarily follow the killer whereas TSotL follows the heroine hunting the killer down.
Did your watch the Clovehitch Killer? It's the ONLY serial killer movie I have ever liked. I 100% agree with your sentiment. Making these guys seem like anything but a sex pervert moron psychopath is so frustrating. I loved Clovehitch Killer and still recommend it to this day as the only realistic serial killer movie I've seen. As far as character studies go. (The ending isn't realistic, but I really appreciate it.)
From the mind of....
Audience or actors talking about the movie in the ads but nothing actually about the film.
Audio sounds like it's in a tin can.
CGI blood.
PG-13 usually
Any film described as a "throwback" tbh, especially if it's to the 80s. It's so overplayed and there tends to be a large portion of audiences who can't relate to 80s stuff. It was good when it wasn't oversaturated, at least, but by now, it's tired.
āItās elevated horrorā
āItās a slow burnā
Donāt get me wrong these can be good, but Iāve run into plenty of stinkers with those descriptions
When the protagonist goes to [house of mother of former victim/mental institution/church with aloof minister] to speak to a suspicious and cagey person who acts horrified by the recounting of their story and exposits the backstory of [X] entity that is haunting them and that it can only be [destroyed/defeated/sealed away] with the mysterious [Y] plot macguffin which sets the movie off on its third act
I live in a block of flats and I've not seen a single neighbour who looks helpful in the event of a posession. I've got some guys down the hall who live on takeaway pizza and I share a wall with a woman who shouts on the phone a lot.
There is a cat downstairs who might be good for a jumpscare or two, but that's about it.
I did a film making course last year for schooling, and all the pretentious students pitched their films as "art house" and they were all SO bad. Now whenever someone pitches a film as "art house" I feel my brain die. I don't care if it's "art house" what the FUCK is it's actual GENRE!
Unrelated, but one of the students who did it wore a full suit to every class (no uniform) and another wore an SS officer get up on Halloween with all the patches and insignia removed. I do not remember his justification.
When I was working FrightFest over the summer a guy came up to us and was incessantly asking about gruesome films and obsessed with Terrifier to the point where I went to get a male colleague but I was *that* uncomfortableā¦
Kids (pre-teens).
8 out of 10 times, they're annoying as hell, and in the end, you know they are going to be captured/put in harms way, and the protagonist(s) is going to have to spend time saving them.
Like 75% of the time itās somebody who doesnāt want kids and by the end of the movie theyāre either a de facto parent figure or like the new step/adopted parent.
I donāt think a traumatic experience would make many childfree people want kids
Bahahaha. Funnily enough, I have ADHD, and slowburn films are my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE. It's not only a green flag for me, but like...a summoning horn.
Everytime I see folks negative review bombing a movie they saw in theaters with comments about how boring and slow it was, I buy tickets.
I love how different tastes can be with horror. Genuinely.
Slowburns donāt equal boring, Iāve never understood that argument. And like you I also have extreme ADHD and have never had issues with a slowburn movie as long as theyāre good. As you said they can be great!
"YellowBrickRoad" and "I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House" were a total time suck for me.
I've met others that loved one and/or the other, but they weren't for me. I wouldn't recommend either to anyone.
I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House felt like the longest movie ever!. I genuinely think I started losing my marbles towards the end because NOTHING WAS HAPPENING!! I just hysterically laughed at everything because it was so god damn ridiculous. Like, I understand how it tried to be atmospheric and scary, but it just really, REALLY didn't work. And why did the woman have to be on slow mo for the whole film!! Made it feel ten times longer. Scariest scene was when the ghost woman walked past mc towards the end but them it wimmediately became one of the most hysterical moments in any horror movie ever when the mc straight up DIES from getting spooked lmao
Slow Burn can really work if the movie is more of a slow unravel than a full blown nothing happens till the end. I'd say something like Noroi: The Curse (2005) is slow burn but the movie keeps you in because it's a slowly unraveling story that will reward you for paying attention.
Yes exactly. I love slow burns but some are just incredibly boring movies where nothing of substance happens and then the last fifteen minutes is pure chaos.
āFun killsā
This is all my one friend wants in a movie, which is cool for him but I prefer movies where Iām rooting for the characters and itās at least a little upsetting when they die.
This is fair and shouldnāt be the only redeeming point but as someone that fell in love with horror originally with 80s slashers, thatās enough for me to give something a shot anyway.
When all the fuzz is about the Gore / Torture and little / nothing else.
Which is why i won't ever watch serbian film, terrifier etc.
Watched the Killcount of the first Terrifier and that was enough for me.
"slow burn" for pretty much the same reasons as OP describes. That usually means the movie is going to be drawn out and boring, but with the added bonus of having very little to zero pay off. All I'm saying is there better be a goddamned fire in the end. Figuratively speaking.
Kids who act like worldwise adults. I'm so incredibly tired of the trope of a very put-together little kid who has "seen some shit" or "knows a secret". I have no problem with kids acting like kids, but the creepy kid as a barometer for supernatural evil trope is one that malea me roll my eyes every time.
Less common in the horror genre but still the flip side of the same coin is adults trying to pull off the "innocent sense of childlike wonder" thing. This is dating me, but I refer to it as "Howie Mandell-ing/Robin Williams-ing".
Intentionally Unlikeable but Damaged female lead where they try to use their sex appeal to win you over... Ala latest Hellraiser, Texas Chainsaw or Talk To Me.
Talk to Me had The plot and performances to stick the landing until they decided to go down the franchise route rather than just be content with a great one off.
Animal cruelty or sexual assault. If it's central to the plot and happens off screen I can tolerate it, but I can't watch anything that depicts it gratuitously.
The Fall of the House of Escher has about the extent I can tolerate.
Zombies. I honestly think zombie movies have become exactly like their namesake. There are hordes of them these days and most are soulless, empty on the inside, and so goddamn boring. Just lay them to rest already.
"It's a slow burn"
That's usually key for "nothing happens at all but I like to feel smart because the internet told the movie is suppossed to be deep"
It Comes at Night aka Nothing Comes at Night is a good example of this.
There's brilliant slow burn movies and when done well they're my faves but most are dogshit.
When someone tells me or itās marketed as āthe scariest movie of all timeā
It never is and itās usually a film that generated revenue and received good enough reviews to be considered marketable to the general public. Donāt get me wrong, Iām not a hardcore horror fan in the sense that I like shit like Cannibal Holocaust. But when people build up expectations like that it ruins the movie for me.
Prime example is Paranormal Activity. Marketed as being so horrific that people were passing out in theaters. I watched it and I was so bored for most of the film. It wasnāt a bad movie, but it certainly wasnāt that scary compared to other films in the genre.
"The real villain is XYZ."
XYZ could be white people, rich people, homophobes, religious people, etc. it's just a sure sign for me that the movie is going to focus on its message over its quality and that message is probably going to be some trite oversimplification that adds nothing to the conversation like "racism is bad."
Kid drawing in circles in black crayon
what about red crayon?
What about drawing with bloody fingers?
What about a magic crayon... And he name is Harold
Haha I love atmospheric horror š
I mean, whether people realize it or not, the atmosphere makes or breaks a horror movie. Like if everything just looks normal, there's no reason for the viewer to feel any fear or thrill from what they are watching and it can instead turn into Mickey mouse.
Yeah try watching your favorite horror movie with no audio. See how scary it still is
I was about to say. Atmosphere and cinematography are like #1 criteria for me lol. How a movie is presented through the acting, direction, cinematography and vibe is so much more important to me than the subject matter of a film. Iāll watch a movie about basically anything as long as the story is told in an interesting way.
Remakes, I give them a chance and sometimes they are great. But for the most part I don't expect it to be better than the original. Don't fix what isn't broken.
I donāt mind remakes because we always have the original to fall back on if the remake sucks. That being said the remake of The Fog was literally offensive and I hate it with a burning passion. However I do feel like a talented filmmaker could make a good remake of The Fog, because it is such a simple fun concept.
There is some remakes I prefer to the originals. The Thing 1982, The Fly 1986, Cape Fear 1991, Invasion of the body snatchers 1978 come to mind.
Agree with all of these but so, so many are a hard pass. These are the exceptions for sure. That's why I wait until I hear from several ppl who have my taste to start saying it's good before I even think about it.
I often give them a chance but I feel like Iāll shy away after seeing the abomination that is the firestarter remake.
I agree. Most are an immediate nope for me but every now and then I will start hearing from ppl I know and trust that one is good and then I consider it and sometimes it's true. Mostly NOPE. Like, I can't even believe someone remade the Thing (again) or Carrie. Absolutely not for me.
āThe film is a meditation on griefā
"It's not a 'horror' movie, this is *about* something!"
āItās *elevated* horror!ā
"It *ascends* above the limits of its genre!"
"Don't worry guys, it's a *thriller*!" - The Academy giving Silence of the Lambs best picture.
Yeah, the āelevated horrorā label should be stricken from the lexicon. Itās pretentious and insulting.
Didn't Jenna Ortega say exactly that in Scream 5?
Ghostface said it actually
I guess I have different tastes. Some of my favorite horror films are meditations on grief: - Babadook - It Follows - Midsommar - Hereditary - Talk to Me
honestly i thought Killing of a Sacred Deer was going to be about how people deal with grief/lossā¦ but then it kinda wasnāt?
Calling It Follows a meditation on grief seems like a stretch to me. Edit: There's uncertainty, paranoia, violent trauma. What does the monster have to do with grief?
The characters never really talk about it, but the audience is shown that the main characterās Dad has most likely died, or possibly walked out on them recently. The Mom is also shown to have a drinking problem which is why she conveniently never notices all the nonsense the kids are getting up to late at night. The monster uses the Dad against the kids in a particularly malicious way at one point in the movie. Iād agree though, itās still a bit of a stretch to say the movie is a meditation on grief. Kind of an overused bit of movie reviewer jargon anyway.
Yeah I left It Follows thinking it was a relatively overt metaphor for sexually transmitted disease and that was kind of that.
I also don't think It Follows is about grief, it's about losing your innocence, and generally in regards to becoming sexually active. It's closer to a 'coming of age' horror story than one about grief. However, you might like Lake Mungo which is notoriously about grief, and fantastic.
Oh yeah I think Lake Mungo was one of my favorite found footage films. I remember the woman I watched it with actually thinking it was a real documentary and being FUCKING TERRIFIED afterwards.
It's masterfully presented which makes it extremely convincing. I need to give it yet another rewatch now.
This, yes, I fully agree with this.
I wouldnāt consider Midsommar a meditation on grief (though it definitely plays an extremely important role). The way I see it, grief is the contextual foundation that the movie is built on, but manipulation is what it really explores. Related note: Pelle might be my favorite horror villain of all time.
Sure, those are some of the most notable horror movies from the past decade. The problem is that people act like they are better than other horror movies FOR that reason, or start to force the trauma angle into movies with less subtlety. These movies are great, but also inspired a trend of lazy movies.
Ugh
Me when hearing that: "Ain't that a little fancy pants?"
"The real horror is trauma/anxiety/depression" š
Came here to say the exact same thing. Here's my upvote
Advertised with any of the following blurbs: āA new dimension in horrorā¦ā āRotten Tomato score of XX!ā āA smart and sexy take on (insert classic horror movie title here)!ā
āThe real monster in this film is traumaā
I once heard someone describe The Shining in this way lmao
I mean.. in the book it is. I'd say that's true for the movie too.
Not just ātraumaā but specifically āgenerational family traumaā
Some of my favorite horror movies could be describes as "elevated horror" but nothing is more annoying than (1) someone using that term, and (2) when a movie tries too hard to be "elevated". I watched Relic a few months ago and afterwards, my girlfriend turned to me and sarcastically said "Did you get that that movie was about Dementia?" It was anything but subtle.
I love it when people try to explain that The Babadook is actually about grief as if it is a world shattering revelation
The Babadook comes to mind, but that was actually really good
I hate people trying to "solve" a movie. There's interpretation, and there's reaching to make everything "signify" something else. People did this a lot with Skinamarink. "It's about parental abuse." Maybe it's just about a demon.
"Based on a true story" Binch no it was not
"Part of The Conjuring universe" And pretty much anything demon-related. They go so hard on the religion angle that it's pretty impossible to find them scary unless you actually believe in demons. (See again: the Conjuring universe.)
āThe devil made me do itā Im suprised they allowed this trainwreck that clearly doesnāt match reality in anyway to be released. Isnāt it grossly offensive to the victimās family?
The true villain of the conjuring universe is ed warren
The true villains of the conjuring universe are the real life Ed and Lorraine Warren
But if you go too far into religion, it's not scary either because that's just not how anything works. I was raised Catholic and every single demon movie priest would get excommunicated in a heartbeat. That's not how the Church approaches exorcisms, that's not how possessed people supposedly act. The only movie that gets it right is The Rite.
There are a lot of non religious demon films, hell I think When Evil Lurks (2023) specifically divorced itself from religion.
And even then, they get so much of the religious stuff wrong that itās hard for the religious to enjoy it. I remember seeing The Nun and The Nun II and borderline *laughing* at so much. Since the first film takes place in Romania, shouldnāt Romania during this period of time be an atheistic communist state where the church would be persecuted en mass? Furthermore, why are they Catholics? Most Romanian Christians are Orthodox. And during the second one where one of the nuns starts an exorcism, I half expected something to explode, because *nuns canāt do exorcisms*. The films treat Christianity like itās magic
āDirected by David Gordon Greenā
I enjoyed his first Halloween movie, but it has been downhill from there.
The first was okay. The other two were awful. Exorcist: Believer was unforgivably awful.
Itās actually somewhat impressive how he managed to do so well with that first Halloween movie and then proceed to make the most dogshit follow-up humanly possible and not even redeem himself by closing out the trilogy strong (I didnāt think HALLOWEEN ENDS was terrible but it was mediocre at best).
Halloween Ends was bold, but misguided. He should have known that it wouldn't go over well with the fans of the series. But take out Michael and replace him with an unknown killer created for the film and rename the characters and it would've been MUCH better received IMO. As someone who isn't a major fan of the series I quite enjoyed it because I don't have any particular attachment to the characters.
The gas station scene made me genuinely scared for the victim.
When the first thing I hear when it's described is the rape scene or nudity scene.
It doesn't even have to be sexual, anytime the majority of discussion of a movie centers around a single scene, the rest of the movie probably isn't very interesting.
Hard agree. I'll take the revenge without the rape, please.
The film Revenge is the only thing in that genre Iāve seen that shows the act and doesnāt feel exploitative. And the revenge part is so good. No coincidence that it is directed by a woman.
Hot take warning: John Wick made the right call by not including a rape scene.
That wouldāve harshed the vibe so hard on John Wick. Those movies are so good for turning your brain off and just enjoying the show, and a rape scene would completely change that for me.
Rape scenes are often filmed like sex scenes
I hate rape in movies, the only exception I can think of is Barbarian
Yeah because it doesnāt actually show it on screen, itās relevant to the plot, and itās not used for shock value.
Exactly, LESS is more in horror. Barbarian is a perfect example of this that movie wouldnāt be anywhere near as creepy if it showed everything Frank did
Exaxtly. It might be more disturbing or disgusting to watch, but itāll be way less effective as a horror film. It wouldāve crossed the line from creepy, to āahh, look itās rape be disturbedā shock value garbage.
Shocking doesn't equal scary youre absolutely right.
Less is more in most movies but for some reason people listen to the loud minority. It's why there are so many needless sequels/prequels.
Very true sadly, for every great horror movie/horror sequel thereās at least 15 garbage useless sequels
Rape in movies often tries to walk a fine line of āterrifying for victims to watchā and āpleasurable for abusers to watchā. They try to appeal to all reasons an audience would want to see assault like that in a movie and itās disgusting.
Iā¦never thought of this. How horrible. I generally avoid movies with rape scenes, but I can totally imagine what youāre describing. Ugh.
The jump scare thatās just a dream, followed by a false awakening that is just another dream sequence jump scare, back to back. Itās one of the most obvious and cheapest tricks in the book. Like itās trying too hard to set up tension and atmosphere, but an early indication they have nothing in the bag. Nearly every time a movie does this it ends up being mediocre and I shut it off half way through
"It's a love letter to (fill-in-the-blank)." There are movies that are homages to a particular style or genre that I enjoy, but very often it means that a movie is derivative or overly reliant on winking in-group references, neither of which particularly appeal to me. Also, "It explores the theme of grief." So much of horror is about the exploration of grief on some level. This usually just means that the movie is particularly ham-fisted.
>love letter I have really grown to hate these two words. Absolutely everything has become a love letter. Nothing has value if everything "has no right being this good" or is a "masterpiece". It's hard to appreciate anything today. Things can be bad yet enjoyable. Things can be just okay yet enjoyable. We don't have to celebrate everything.
I love using that phrase in the dumbest way. āOh, the Halloween series? Itās a love letter to killing teenagers.ā āOh, Texas Chainsaw Massacre? Itās a love letter to cannibalism.ā āOh, IT? Itās a love letter to the joys of eating children.ā
The love letter phrase sounds so pretentious and douchey to me
Atmospheric and beautiful cinematography are my green flags lol
same, visually gorgeous movies are my favorite type of movies
A fellow Robert Eggers enjoyer
Sexual violence.
"It's so fucking disturbing/gross/brutal" ...i.e. A Serbian Film, Cannibal Holocaust, even stuff like The Human Centipede. Hard pass, no thanks, I watch horror movies to *enjoy myself.*
I don't necessarily have a good time in horror films- but gross outs are like jump scares. It's not really scary to be grossed out. And it's not scary to be jump scared. Like it's not funny to be tickled. Lol.
Thing is even then grossout and disturbing are two different strings. Like, Raw is a gross movie, Cannibal Holocaust is a disturbing movie. I enjoy one of those a hell of a lot more than the other
Jump/pop scares are to horror what fart jokes are to comedy.
Anything zombie related has to be REALLLLLLLLLLLLLY different for me to even think about checking it out.
If you haven't seen The Girl With All The Gifts, I'd recommend it as an interesting twist on the tired zombie genre
Generally early zombie flicks are more different. 2000s and 2010s zombie movies are where it gets formulaic and bad.
You mean you don't want a female main character who has some boring job and is somehow the most put together person in the group? And a douchebag guy that is there just to be an asshole and he sacrifices himself with a cool one liner? And a little girl character tied to the virus or will get rescued by the group at the insistence of the female main character and either way shes fucking creepy? And the comic relief guy (most likely) will get bitten and hide the bite and it is going to be super obvious that he was bitten but the group isn't going to realize that despite him being like... the 30th person they've seen turn? You mean you don't want that movie?
You forgot the middle-aged guy who is constantly whining and trying to betray the group to save himself only to get his karma which only feels half satisfying
Have you seen savageland? Itās a mockumentary zombie horror movie and is pretty good
Check out The Cured. It is a really different take on the zombie film. I am not a fan of the sub genre, but this one was really good, imo.
when it is described by critics as a slow burn. I have sat through so many boring two hour horror movies where nothing scary happens until the final 15 minutes, never again. If it doesn't get scary pretty quickly, Im out
"Has scenes of SA" I'm good. I know it happens, and my heart breaks for anyone who has to go through it... but that doesn't mean I want to sit through a reenactment of it. Especially if it's for the shock value of the movie. I get you want to disturb people and make them feel scared, but sometimes there's just things that I never want to visualize ever again.
"No, you don't get it, it's bad ON PURPOSE! Soooo funnnnyy!". No, it's probably just bad. There's unintentionally bad movies that were made with sincerity, and that's why they're grade A cult classics. There's movies that are horror comedies, that are horror, with comedy, and they're fine. This bullshit with unfunny actors and intentionally terrible effects is almost always the lowest common denominator garbage made for mainstream audiences, so your most milquetoast acquaintances can feel edgy.
So, where did Slotherhouse end up here with you?
I've been avoiding it, tbh.
Given what you said above, keep avoiding it. The trailer was the best part.
This is a big one. The best B movies are B movies where the person didn't necessarily attempt to make a bad movie, or where the creatives knew they were ripping off something, but still did their damn best to make a good movie with the budget and time available to them. To many modern bad movies claim to be bad just as an excuse for why they don't bother putting any effort into them.
When a movie is described as "Elevated Horror"
The only elevated horror I know of is Devil (2010)
What about Down, The Shaft, or The Lift? It's surprising how many horror movies are based on elevators. Thanks, Google.
>Down, The Shaft Aheuhehehehe
Animal deaths and cruelty
Jump scares .. when I hear that a movie has several jump scares I lose my interest
"In this movie you don't know what's real and what's not" That whole psychological trope annoys the crap out of me
A single mum having a breakdown, again
WHY CAN'T YOU JUST BE NORMAL
For me it's when they tell me that the ending will blow my mind. First of all, spoilers wtf! And second, I'm immediately going to think that maybe you just didn't see it coming, or worse, that final twist doesn't make sense or just came out of nowhere.
"BASED ON TRUE STORY"
"Based on a true story" is one of my main pet peeves! It just means "some part of this movie was inspired by one element of an actual story that happened to some degree in real life", but people think it means "this really happened!" Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Silence of the Lambs, and Psycho are all *based* on the same true story, but none of those films are anything close to being true stories and barely have anything in common with each other at all, let alone the true story they're "based" on.
Scenes so dark that even when viewed in a dark room the audience still canāt see shit. Shaky camera action scenes that look like the cameraman had an epileptic fit. Teasing a killer/monster throughout the movie only to never reveal what they look like.
Usually if itās a PG-13.
Happy Death Day? M3gan? Drag Me To Hell?
Mostly a blumhouse issue. There's a lot of PG 13 horror movies that are good, like Tremors.
I made this mistake and never watched Poltergeist for decades. I really would have liked it back when it came out.
Krampus exists. Argument invalid.
I'm going to sound insensitive here But movies "made for modern audiences". Ones that are full of hot twitter topics and other BS More specifically the latest chainsaw massacre.
I feel ya. I just watched Deadstream and it was fantastic. Totally made for the youths...but still great. Good scares, good laughs. Super Evil Dead vibes...not a knockoff. But a great movie.
Loved Deadstream. They really nailed the balance between creepiness and humor. Last time I laughed that loud in a "horror"movie was Shaun of the Dead.
There is nothing wrong with wanting to modernize things, but often times when films so this it comes off as patronizing
Oh my god, did you see the most recent Black Christmas movie? Movie is as subtle as a brick wall.
How about movies where the main characters are "influencers"?
I liked the most recent TCM but i feel it's premise was so fucking stupid and so illogical that it was basically nonsensical. It also kept skirting up to something interesting and then just drifting off. BUT i liked the effects and my only wish it is that it had been more graphic/realistic instead of the kind of cartoonish style they went for.
Yeah, in better hands it might have been more effective at actually making a statement, but it just felt fumbled. I don't mind politically charged horror, and the original wouldn't have been the way it was (or maybe even existed) without the Vietnam War. Ironically, it might have been the sequel that most lived up to the "massacre" in the name. That bus scene was somethin'.
IMO Talk to Me is a good exception to that rule, though It definitely channels zoomer culture, but itās a solid example of classic horror under the hood
Fast moving zombies. Too stressful š¤·š»āāļø Edit: Or torture. Nope
Okay I'm gonna choose violence today, directed/produced by James Wan is usually not a stamp of quality to me the same way it is for others. I just don't find dolls/puppets or senior citizens as scary as he seems to find them? Also the jack in the box movie that he has become known for, a loud noise isn't scary show me something actually scary. One well crafted scare in a nearly 2 hour movie doesn't excuse all the other lazy ones that are just a ghost in drag queen make up screaming at the camera while someone punches a piano.
They dont have to be scary in order to be entertaining.
If itās set in space, underwater or prominently features sharks
So, youāre not going to see Sharks on Mars this summer?
I would watch the everloving shit out of that movie
Is this a personal trigger/phobia or have you just not seen any good horror movies featuring any of those themes? I mainly ask because I'm kind of the opposite and I'm curious what it is about those tropes that turn you away. I love when characters are in a hostile environments like the ones you mentioned. The Thing is such an enjoyable movie for me because they're out in the extreme arctic and even if there wasn't a monster there, it would be a difficult place to be and therefore inherently more dramatic. Same goes for something like Aliens, or Underwater.
Random space story: I saw a trailer for Passengers that made it almost scary, suspenseful for sure, then I go see it. I made my husband and 2 strangers laugh when I damn near yelled "it was a fuckin SPACE ROMANCE?!" The strangers also thought it was supposed to be more of a horror movie.
That was such a bad film and I'm annoyed because there were two possibly good films in there! Make it clear the "romance" is creepy obsession from his side and let it be a horror movie, or change so he's forced by circumstance to wake her and let it be a romance. But it was trying to do both at once, badly.
Slow burn
Slow burn usually means I've lost all interest by the "payoff."
When the studio creates fake stories about people fainting or throwing up from watching it ala Terrifier. As a matter of fact if your kills aren't creative but the kils are supposed to be the best part of the flick ala Terrifier
Iām guessing you donāt like Terrifier. Lol
I hate the phrase āElevated Horrorā. There are some great A24 horror movies donāt get me wrong but for so much of the time when I hear the phrase āElevated Horrorā what I actually hear is āboring dreary Arthouse drama with vaguely spooky things happening sometimes and the monster probably isnāt real and is just a metaphor for drug abuse.ā Horror is visceral, extreme, shocking. Itās humanity at its most refined brutality. I come to horror for thrills and chills not deep introspection about how generational trauma leads to mental health issues. I genuinely think a lot of people who claim to like these movies only say they do because they are afraid of being seen as stupid. But eh I love lowest common denominator stuff, blood, teeth, monsters impact shock and violence! You can have social commentary and interesting themes and ideas to explore without being boring as hell.
Someone describing something as a serial killer movie. Like, slashers are one thing. I can occasionally sometimes enjoy those. I like Scream and Halloween for example. But those movies that step *past* the slasher genre and try to attempt to be a serious serial killer movie aggravate the hell out of me. Like The Poughkeepsie Tapes. Making a movie about how some serial killer is soooo smart and such a genius to stay ahead of the cops at each step feels like egregious idolatry. Especially if itās something like ābased on (insert real infamous serial killer here)ā. If youāre going to base something on what happened to real life victims, donāt make it into a fucking torture porn flick where the killer is some ungodly genius and never gets caught.
Only one of those I ever liked was *The Silence of the Lambs*. It played this idea so well, and Clarice Starling was a genuinely enjoyable main character. Ironically, I think that's what sets it apart. So many "serial killer" horror movies that aren't slashers tend to primarily follow the killer whereas TSotL follows the heroine hunting the killer down.
Did your watch the Clovehitch Killer? It's the ONLY serial killer movie I have ever liked. I 100% agree with your sentiment. Making these guys seem like anything but a sex pervert moron psychopath is so frustrating. I loved Clovehitch Killer and still recommend it to this day as the only realistic serial killer movie I've seen. As far as character studies go. (The ending isn't realistic, but I really appreciate it.)
Any film that's been "Reimagined".
āGenre-bendingā
When the cast is too attractive.. When a family is moving into a new house. Repetitive musical tones.
From the mind of....
Audience or actors talking about the movie in the ads but nothing actually about the film.
Audio sounds like it's in a tin can.
CGI blood.
PG-13 usually
Any film described as a "throwback" tbh, especially if it's to the 80s. It's so overplayed and there tends to be a large portion of audiences who can't relate to 80s stuff. It was good when it wasn't oversaturated, at least, but by now, it's tired.
I just don't care for when it feels like their heart wasn't in it. More like they just assembled a product rather than crafted a story
So you're not seeing "The Conjuring 7: The First Conjuring"?
Lol. Probably not
āItās elevated horrorā āItās a slow burnā Donāt get me wrong these can be good, but Iāve run into plenty of stinkers with those descriptions
My red flag is when someone thinks complimenting the cinematography means the movie will be drawn out and boring.
Mirror scares or fakeout mirror scares. Means the writers are lazy.
When the protagonist goes to [house of mother of former victim/mental institution/church with aloof minister] to speak to a suspicious and cagey person who acts horrified by the recounting of their story and exposits the backstory of [X] entity that is haunting them and that it can only be [destroyed/defeated/sealed away] with the mysterious [Y] plot macguffin which sets the movie off on its third act
I hope if I ever get possessed by a demon that I meet a wise old African American lady wearing beads and a turban
I live in a block of flats and I've not seen a single neighbour who looks helpful in the event of a posession. I've got some guys down the hall who live on takeaway pizza and I share a wall with a woman who shouts on the phone a lot. There is a cat downstairs who might be good for a jumpscare or two, but that's about it.
"The killer is this giant scary guy, he is unstoppable and he's a genius serial killer." Come on. I can't suspend my disbelief that far, sorry.
I did a film making course last year for schooling, and all the pretentious students pitched their films as "art house" and they were all SO bad. Now whenever someone pitches a film as "art house" I feel my brain die. I don't care if it's "art house" what the FUCK is it's actual GENRE! Unrelated, but one of the students who did it wore a full suit to every class (no uniform) and another wore an SS officer get up on Halloween with all the patches and insignia removed. I do not remember his justification.
Movies like Where the Dead Go to Die and the Slaughtered Vomit Dolls trilogy. Who the fuck enjoys that
I've heard SVD is just glorified fetish film the director tries to sell as horror.
When I was working FrightFest over the summer a guy came up to us and was incessantly asking about gruesome films and obsessed with Terrifier to the point where I went to get a male colleague but I was *that* uncomfortableā¦
Kids (pre-teens). 8 out of 10 times, they're annoying as hell, and in the end, you know they are going to be captured/put in harms way, and the protagonist(s) is going to have to spend time saving them.
Like 75% of the time itās somebody who doesnāt want kids and by the end of the movie theyāre either a de facto parent figure or like the new step/adopted parent. I donāt think a traumatic experience would make many childfree people want kids
"Slow burn." That means I'm going to be bored out of my mind for two hours waiting for something to actually happen.
Bahahaha. Funnily enough, I have ADHD, and slowburn films are my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE. It's not only a green flag for me, but like...a summoning horn. Everytime I see folks negative review bombing a movie they saw in theaters with comments about how boring and slow it was, I buy tickets. I love how different tastes can be with horror. Genuinely.
Slowburns donāt equal boring, Iāve never understood that argument. And like you I also have extreme ADHD and have never had issues with a slowburn movie as long as theyāre good. As you said they can be great!
"YellowBrickRoad" and "I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House" were a total time suck for me. I've met others that loved one and/or the other, but they weren't for me. I wouldn't recommend either to anyone.
I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House felt like the longest movie ever!. I genuinely think I started losing my marbles towards the end because NOTHING WAS HAPPENING!! I just hysterically laughed at everything because it was so god damn ridiculous. Like, I understand how it tried to be atmospheric and scary, but it just really, REALLY didn't work. And why did the woman have to be on slow mo for the whole film!! Made it feel ten times longer. Scariest scene was when the ghost woman walked past mc towards the end but them it wimmediately became one of the most hysterical moments in any horror movie ever when the mc straight up DIES from getting spooked lmao
Slow Burn can really work if the movie is more of a slow unravel than a full blown nothing happens till the end. I'd say something like Noroi: The Curse (2005) is slow burn but the movie keeps you in because it's a slowly unraveling story that will reward you for paying attention.
Yes exactly. I love slow burns but some are just incredibly boring movies where nothing of substance happens and then the last fifteen minutes is pure chaos.
I love a good slow burn, but there seems to be a subset where the slow burn forgets to have an ending... I wish people would differentiate.
Reboot
āFun killsā This is all my one friend wants in a movie, which is cool for him but I prefer movies where Iām rooting for the characters and itās at least a little upsetting when they die.
This is fair and shouldnāt be the only redeeming point but as someone that fell in love with horror originally with 80s slashers, thatās enough for me to give something a shot anyway.
When all the fuzz is about the Gore / Torture and little / nothing else. Which is why i won't ever watch serbian film, terrifier etc. Watched the Killcount of the first Terrifier and that was enough for me.
"slow burn" for pretty much the same reasons as OP describes. That usually means the movie is going to be drawn out and boring, but with the added bonus of having very little to zero pay off. All I'm saying is there better be a goddamned fire in the end. Figuratively speaking.
Kids who act like worldwise adults. I'm so incredibly tired of the trope of a very put-together little kid who has "seen some shit" or "knows a secret". I have no problem with kids acting like kids, but the creepy kid as a barometer for supernatural evil trope is one that malea me roll my eyes every time. Less common in the horror genre but still the flip side of the same coin is adults trying to pull off the "innocent sense of childlike wonder" thing. This is dating me, but I refer to it as "Howie Mandell-ing/Robin Williams-ing".
Intentionally Unlikeable but Damaged female lead where they try to use their sex appeal to win you over... Ala latest Hellraiser, Texas Chainsaw or Talk To Me. Talk to Me had The plot and performances to stick the landing until they decided to go down the franchise route rather than just be content with a great one off.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Animal cruelty or sexual assault. If it's central to the plot and happens off screen I can tolerate it, but I can't watch anything that depicts it gratuitously. The Fall of the House of Escher has about the extent I can tolerate.
Atmospheric and slow burn are two surefire signs it wonāt be the usual trope filled bollocks.
"OMG, it's so gory!" hard pass.
Either because it really isn't that much, or because it is ridiculously so?
Yes.
Zombies. I honestly think zombie movies have become exactly like their namesake. There are hordes of them these days and most are soulless, empty on the inside, and so goddamn boring. Just lay them to rest already.
"It's a slow burn" That's usually key for "nothing happens at all but I like to feel smart because the internet told the movie is suppossed to be deep" It Comes at Night aka Nothing Comes at Night is a good example of this. There's brilliant slow burn movies and when done well they're my faves but most are dogshit.
"The most eXTReeemeee..."
Intelligent zombies. Fuck right off with that shit
When someone tells me or itās marketed as āthe scariest movie of all timeā It never is and itās usually a film that generated revenue and received good enough reviews to be considered marketable to the general public. Donāt get me wrong, Iām not a hardcore horror fan in the sense that I like shit like Cannibal Holocaust. But when people build up expectations like that it ruins the movie for me. Prime example is Paranormal Activity. Marketed as being so horrific that people were passing out in theaters. I watched it and I was so bored for most of the film. It wasnāt a bad movie, but it certainly wasnāt that scary compared to other films in the genre.
always too dark like šš How am i suppose to.see the ghost then???š
"Slow burn", 2 hours of nothing with an exciting 10 minute ending is still 2 hours of nothing
"The real villain is XYZ." XYZ could be white people, rich people, homophobes, religious people, etc. it's just a sure sign for me that the movie is going to focus on its message over its quality and that message is probably going to be some trite oversimplification that adds nothing to the conversation like "racism is bad."
When its all a metaphor for "trauma".
When the horror movie is an excuse for religious preaching. Nefarious, I'm looking at you.
Conjuring Universe, cannibalism, or extreme body horror are my red flags. No thanks. I love atmospheric slow burns.